Date:         Tue, 31 Mar 1998 13:18:20 -0600
Reply-To:     Patrick Larsen <pll@UNLINFO.UNL.EDU>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <Vanagon@vanagon.com>
From:         Patrick Larsen <pll@UNLINFO.UNL.EDU>
Subject:      Re: Head (gasket) fix
Comments: To: Vanagon@VANAGON.COM
In-Reply-To:  <Pine.SOL.3.96.980331120444.29141A-100000@yoda>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

At 12:10 PM 3/31/98 -0500, EMZ wrote:
>> >  THE PROBLEM IS THE WATER THAT IS USED WITH THE ANTI-FREEZE
>> >!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
>> >My Vanagon is proof of this. I did just this, put 70,000 miles
>> >on the gasket job and not one problem. Never bothered with the
>> >anti-freeze after that.
--snip--
>     Pure H20 and anti-freeze is the best. Prestone is now selling
>     water for cooling systems. It is 99.9 % H2O. You can use any
>     anti-freeze you want, but make sure you use pure H2O with it.


>     If you do you will not have a problem again.
        ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
--snip--

This is an extremely bold claim. Especially if it is based on a sample size
of one in an experiment that isn't even close to finished. Until this
*experiment* is finished (head gasket failure, or tear down and inspect
heads) it doesn't really mean much. And even then, a sample of one is
pretty much meaningless, hell, there are waterboxers with over 150K that
haven't had head gasket failures. If we took one example from all the stats
people have been posting recently, the waterboxer might look extremely
reliable (>150k before failure) or extremely unreliable (<30k before
failure). If you actually have evidence that I will never have a problem
again by simply using deionized water, then I would be interested in seeing
it.

With all the posting of statistics lately, it might be worthwhile to
discuss what they actually mean. In my opinion (For what its worth :),
these recent postings of stats shows what we knew all along, your head
gaskets are probably going to fail, and long before you're ready for a new
engine. Beyond that, the numbers do little to get at the root of the
problem, WHY they fail. The large standard deviation leads me to believe
there are variables other than just a design flaw. These variables may or
may not include coolant type, water type, flush intervals, driving style,
climate, stored in winter or not, ever overheated...I'm sure there are many
more but you get my point.

Note: I am neither a statistician nor a waterboxer expert, these are the
opinions of a layperson :)

Regards,
Patrick
___________________________________________________

Patrick L. Larsen
Water Center-University of Nebraska
Home: http://www.uvm.edu/~plarsen/pat.html
Work: http://www.ianr.unl.edu/waterscience/wsl.html
___________________________________________________