What's the best coolant

[MadCityMike]

Do the 1.9's need any sort of SCA additive to the coolant?    Is cavitation a concern with these motors?    What's a good coolant to use?

Mike

[jtanguay]

Do the 1.9's need any sort of SCA additive to the coolant?    Is cavitation a concern with these motors?    What's a good coolant to use?

Mike

pretty much any coolant should be good, except the pink gm crap.  does any one use water wetter???

[GTD.]

Iron blocks VW G11 (blue)
Alloy blocks VW G12 (red)
or use G12+ (purple) which can be mixed in either G11 or G12
DO NOT mix G11(blue) and G12 (red) as they make a gel which can block water ways and pipes when mixed!

From empty use 2 bottles then top up the resevoir.

[BellCityDubber]

Do the 1.9's need any sort of SCA additive to the coolant?    Is cavitation a concern with these motors?    What's a good coolant to use?

Mike

pretty much any coolant should be good, except the pink gm crap.  does any one use water wetter???

I used water wetter in my 8v and my vr6...
it dropped temps a bit... not a LOT, but enough on a spirited drive..
I'm planning to put it into my TD and maybe perhaps I'll get some real world ##'s for people....

[hillfolk'r]

gtd  got it,,,,,,i do use dexcool,i never had a problem,,and iuse water wetter,,,iused almost a double dose of w.w.,,,barely noticed that,,but it does cause better cooling,not like it ran way cooler,but maybe a few degrees when beating onit,,,,,,,,,,her 99 i onlyuse the vw antifreeze g12 pink??i think,,,,dexcool is way better than green stuff,,,green stuff is crap,,,silicates are a killer!!!!ever seen silicate dropout???very ugly,and not fun to clean out,besides silicates are abrasive,why put sand in your cooling system???say no to green coolant,dont mix em either

[dieselweasel]

I've never heard of cavitation erosion problems with these engines probably because the cylinder walls are relatively thick.  You really should use SCAs or a long life coolant that doesn't require them, but you can probably get away without.

[hillfolk'r]

if you had a big truck,,use sca's.it holds 10-15gallons,,alot$$ to change.but since our systems barely hold 2 gallons its cheap to change,,,dont need to use sca's,,just changeit,,,you could get that litmuspaper test strips,,tells the acidity of coolant,,,,,,,,,i know ford put out a tech bullitin a few years ago regarding corrosion due to electrolytic action,,,checking volts at heater core+rad and stuff,with all accy's on,,,they recomended to run ground straps from heater cores and rads,and other cooling system accys,,bad grounds were  causing premature corrosion,,,,,,