Which coolant should I use?

Chris Landi · **Joined:** Mon Mar 08, 2004 6:31 pm **Posts:** 579

Richard Casto wrote:

BretLuter wrote:

Every grocery store + 90% of drugstores I've been to in the last 10 years have gallons of "Distilled" water, right next to the "drinking" and "filtered" and "spring" water.......... Usually about 0.75-$1 per gallon.

Bret.

I felt the same way. Until I needed to actually buy some and I couldn't find any. I tried 2-3 different grocery stores and one Wal-Mart. Maybe I was just unlucky. None of the grocery stores even had a spot for it. It was all bottled/gallon water and all “purified”. I think that the increased consumption of bottled water is pushing stuff like distilled water off the shelf. Wal-Mart at least said they usually carried it, but was just out. One new addition is "Fluorinated" bottled water. That is a new one for me.

My intercooler sprayer requires distilled water so I buy it on a regular basis. I pretty much shop at Lowes Foods due to proximity and I have never had a problem finding it in stock there.

Chuck Frank · **Posted:** Wed Aug 03, 2005 7:02 pm

We use distilled water at our store, get it at Food Lion.

Graham Jagger · **Joined:** Fri Aug 29, 2003 12:53 am **Posts:** 1718

I haven't had any problem picking up distilled water at Kroger. I get about 2-4gal at a time and just stash it. I use it for coolant mix and adding for batteries. Even the so called maint free batteries can use being topped off from time to time.

A few things I've learned with American Iron:

The factory fill DexCool is long life. I've run it almost 100K miles without problems. No real swings in cold or hot weather protection.

A 50/50 mix is the default answer from the factory because it covers all the continental US. Other than real extremes. In those climates you do want to change the mix. Go to Prestone's website and you can find a nice chart showing the mix and the protection provided at each mix level. In this climate I agree with Adam. 30% coolant and 70% distilled water with the option of RL Water Wetter. I just drained off a gallon of the DexCool mix and replace with RL-WW and distilled water in my Z06.

Never mix the old fashioned Prestone Green with the newer DexCool. They don't like each other and the outcome is not good. Pick one and stay with it. The big thing. If you started with DexCool and swap to Green. Don't go back. And plan on flush and fill more often with Green.

The pre mix stuff is a convenience thing that you basically bought half distilled water at antifreeze price.

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Which coolant should I use?

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