From: Barry Lovelock
Date: 16 Jan 2001
Time: 06:07:13
Remote Name: 62.253.64.4
The bilge statement was a tongue-in-cheek comment, accurately placed if you read Ian's comments below, about the mess you get out when antifreeze (and all it's attendant inhibitors) is not used. In other words, the brown mess (bilge!) is your valuable ferrous metal coming away from the block and head! BTW, Did you not mean to say "Antifreeze, in my opinion is not coolant, as it performs a totally different function". Well, the ethylene glycol type is most definitely a coolant and with it's higher boiling point much better than water alone. Did not Spitfires and Hurricanes run on 100% mixture in their rads? I think the point is that IMHO and those of the RR club too, to use anything but antifreeze, with of course all it's anti corrosion agents, is plain daft in any engine with aluminium parts and to stop the decrepit 70 year old A7 metal dissolving further also silly not to. Barry.