Thread: How to change coolant elbows

that sloshing sound is air in the heater core, take both heater hoses off the alt bracket, then put a garden hose to one of the hoses and flush the core. then flush your coolant.

id do the elbows first, then flush the core, then the coolant flush to new.

Gonna be going this soon and have a couple questions. If replacing the plastic elbows with aluminum ones would using RTV so assure no o-ring leaks in the future be a bad idea? I don't see having to replace the aluminum ones ever so I wouldn't have to worry about scraping off old RTV. My other question is I will refill for Dexcool for the time being but in the summer will do a whole coolant system flush. There's no reason I should do the flush now right?

Doing the replacement is the same. Asking my opinion it is a bad idea to RTV them. The o-ring seals and seals well if you do the job right. elb

Aluminum elbows.. most of you weren't around for the elbow that GM cast into the belt tension/alt bracket. Reason why they went plastic is because you'd break the timing cover if you pulled it off wrong. I feel that the aluminum ones are going to corrode and cause more issues after they've been in for years. Plastic ones distort because guys don't follow the write up that we are posting in.

I wouldn't use RTV and personally.. I also never had a plastic one blow out after the first. Once my first one distorted..I realized I had put it in with pressure on it and it showed me what doing the job poorly resulted in.

Bill, so you're saying to just get the plastic ones then? I had the elbows replaced 3 maybe 4 years ago and it's leaking again already which was why I was thinking aluminum this time around. I'll skip the RTV but should I get the delco o-rings?

If you follow the write up.. you should be fine.

Lube the rings so they don't get hurt going in. Wiggle elbows as you tighten so they don't end up with pressure pushing them into a 45 degree and ... that's about all there is to it. If you want to go aluminum.. do it. I wouldn't put any additional value to them vs the plastic though. Especially if you have to pull things apart later and you pull the wrong way and break a timing cover. That's...what the difference in plastic vs aluminum would be.

Sounds good thanks for the help

i pulled my lim off of a new metal elbow. i had new o rings i installed from the lim kit and reused the elbow. came off like nothing. still on there today no rtv, just clean the holes good, use sand paper if need be, oil the o rings and slide em in.

New question. If I top off the coolant would it be safe to drive the car about 10 miles to my parents garage?

depends on how fast its leaking out and if it will over heat or not.

this is a road side repair for many people.

I plan on draining and flushing the radiator at the same time which I can't do in my f'd up driveway. I'll keep a bottle of coolant with me on the drive and hope for the best. It seems to be a slow leak from what I can tell.

just refill with water, why toss money in the street, literally lol

Originally Posted by Scottydoggs

depends on how fast its leaking out and if it will over heat or not.

this is a road side repair for many people.

This, I did it in a gas station parking lot when mine split a few years back.

Originally Posted by Scottydoggs

just refill with water, why toss money in the street, literally lol