Date: Tue, 15 Feb 2005 18:12:14 -0500
Reply-To: Dennis Haynes <dhaynes@OPTONLINE.NET>
Sender: Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From: Dennis Haynes <dhaynes@OPTONLINE.NET>
Subject: Re: Coolant
In-Reply-To: <5.1.0.14.2.20050214212406.00ba4dd0@mail.wavecable.com>
Content-type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
You said the key words "without the presence of oxygen". Systems that
have extensive corrosion have a history of leaks that require regular
additions of fresh water, usually from the tap. The continued addition
of fresh oxygenated water causes the problem. How many of us heat our
homes with baseboard heat? Tap water filled once, no additives of any
kind and our boilers and baseboard plumbing lasts for years. Get a leak
that allows make up water to constantly enter the heating loop and you
will have problems.
The corrosion that happens under the rubber gasket is due to the gasket
or sealer on it failing first. It gets wet, the heated coolants gets O2,
and the process begins. The type of antifreeze really doesn't matter
there since if the gasket was sealed, the coolant wouldn't be there.
Dennis
-----Original Message-----
From: Vanagon Mailing List [mailto:vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com] On Behalf
Of Greg Irick
Sent: Tuesday, February 15, 2005 12:28 AM
To: vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM
Subject: Re: Coolant
> " Distilled or deionized water is very aggressive Water "wants" to
> contain minerals and distilled water will attack cast iron and
aluminum far
> more aggressively than mildly hard tap water. "
I have to completely disagree with this so called 'theory' about
distilled
water. I spent 20 years in the US Navy as a Submarine Reactor Operator
and
I can tell you that it just doesn't stand up to scrutiny. The makeup
water
that is added to a reactor plant, whether it is a Navy plant or a
civilian
plant, is 99.99% pure water and is stored in stainless steel tanks. All
of
the piping to add the water to the system is stainless steel along with
the
pumps used to add it. One of the reasons for the selection of stainless
steel for the tanks, piping, and other equipment is precisely because it
doesn't corrode in the presence of water at the temperatures that the
coolant is operated at without the presence of oxygen, sodium chloride
(salt), or a pH that is too low (acidic) or too high (alkaline).
Doing a search on Google for "stainless steel corrosion pH water" will
yield more than enough information to make your brain hurt on this
subject.
Just my 2 cents. I'll get down off the soap box/lectern now and let you
resume your normal programming.
Greg Irick
Silverdale, WA
gregi@vwtype3.org
'65 Notchback with a Britax sliding rag top
'80 Westy
'00 Jetta VR6
