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I just got done replacing the heater core and flushing my coolant system in my 94 9000 cse and i have been having problems ever since (3 days).
Well, I am having very strange and disturbing cooling problems. First after drain/replace heater core/flush/refilling the 'check radiator level' indicator would come on and off, level was fine. I got nervous and put Bars Leaks in (the powder version) and that made my problems a LOT worse. I drove the car for an hour (home) and the cooling system was acting up the whole way. The temperature would rise very quickly, if I jarred the car somehow (swerve, brake, etc) it would quickly drop while simultaneously turning on the 'check radiator level' indicator and the heater would blow very hot. After a few minutes the 'check radiator level' indicator would go out, temperature would start to rise again (quickly), and the heater would blow cool. This would go on until I got nervous and jarred the car again to get it back. At which point the whole process would be repeated. I made my own deduction that it was functioning better when the heat was blowing hot, so I aimed for this condition the whole way home, hoping I wasn't doing any damage. I kept the heat on full blast the whole way to help dissapate as much heat as possible.
I am assuming this is an indication of some kind of plugging up going on in the cooling system. At this point I am a bit frustrated because my hands/arms and body are tore up and sore from replacing the heater core. I'm really not looking forward to tearing it all apart again.
Could this be caused by not adding a potent enough coolant mixture? I used Pentosin lifetime coolant (not enough, only 1.5 liter but i figure I'd add more later) with distilled water from safeway. I could not find ANY information as to how much coolant the system takes, but I'd guess by the amount I put in it was just below 1:1 ratio.
It's also possible that I could have swapped the hoses going inot the heater core on reinstallation. Although this model did not have any arrows on it indicating flow, so I assumed that it made no difference anyway.
Another symptom that is strange is a bubbling sound coming from inside the dash (assuming in the heater core). I thought this was just the core settling in, but it continues
tommorrow I will be taking the whole cooling system apart (again!) and this time I think I will remove the radiator and spray it out with the hose along with any other part of the system I can get to. Following this I will add TWO bottles of flush and drive it around for an hour, take it all apart again and fill it with saab coolant.
Sorry this is so long, thanks for reading it (you got to this point!) Any comments/suggestions greatly appreciated.
Matt
94 9000 CSE
WA
posted by 12.22.3...
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