My buddy who has been helping me do the engine swap says he ran straight water in his radiator during the intial leak-testing startup, then changed it to antifreeze and changed the oil after a short running time. Is this a good idea?
Sounds Like A Plan To Me, Just Dont Overheat Anything. I Done The Same Thing To Clean My Engine Block Out After My Rebuild
Personally, I do it. I also run 'inexpensive' oil after the first build (a topic of discussion around the campfire at the Roundup). Once everything is okie-dokie'd, I'll drain the fluids out and put the 'good stuff' in. Makes good economical sense to me anyway.
i run straight water at first and regular oil for a while. if everything looks okay i run reg oil for the first few races than change to the synthetic. my wife near killed me once when i was changing the oil. she said i thought you had synthetic in the engine. i said i did. she asked why i was changing it? i told her it wore out as it already had about 6 miles on it. she didn't appreciate the humor. now i always make sure there are no problems before the expensive stuff goes in.
Yup start it on water, if you are going to run it for a while make sure you add a bottle of anti rust and water pump lube.
agree....I would fire it upwith the cheapest oil you can get...let it run for a bout 5 minutes....then after cooling, drain oil, change filter. Again cheap oil for 50-100 miles, then drain oil change filter, do a leak down and then run what you want..... Atleast that is what we did with mine.
I'll second that.... No minerals, no chemicals and it's cheap-$.50-.$75/gallon in most grocery stores. Seth
On my initial start up I used a 50/50 mix (anti-freeze/water). Anti-freeze mix makes external leaks easier to find. I also used conventional oil for a break-in and then changed to synthetic. Ken
good point...I have ran distilled water in my car for the last 5 years... when I pulled motor apart this spring, I was amazed at how corroded things weren't.
The very second that you put DI water into a iron block it no longer is DI water,if anything it's more damageing then plain old tap water
He's referring... ....to the iron/metal in the block itself. I know what is in distilled water, I don't know what is in tap water. Chlorine? Chloramine? Chlorates? Flourides? Ever hear of PB pipe? It breaks down under chlorine and other chemical exposure. I'll take distilled water just in case!
That's what I thought, but deionized or distilled (same thing) water is much less reactive than plain old tap water. Iron rusts because it naturally occurs as Fe+3 ions. Water naturally occurs as H20 + H+ and OH- ions. That means the hydroxide ions loves to bond with the iron ions making iron oxide or rust. Tap water also has chlorine which is Cl- naturally, which will also bond with iron. Just lots of junk in tap water you don't want in an engine.
