People topping up with plain water

[Rolla07]

I have a jug of Toyota pink premix for my Corolla 55-45. Not even sure if my Venza uses it too. Never water.

 

[bunnspecial]

To me at least, topping up with water is better than running dry. I've nursed a car home with a slow-ish leak by driving slowly and adding water every few miles. Of course, in that particular case, once home I drained completely, fixed the leak, and refilled with 50/50 DI/antifreeze.

I've been known to go as high as 2/3 water in older cars in the summer. I want 50/50 in the winter, but 1 part antifreeze to 2 parts water cools better and still gives plenty of corrosion resistance, wetting, and water pump lubrication.

Modern stuff, if it needs coolant of course gets the proper type in the specified mixture unless in an absolute emergency(and in that case if I do add water I drain as soon as possible). If a modern car is losing coolant, though, it's more important to me to figure out why it's low in the first place.

 

[WagonWheel]

What temp will distilled water boil over in a radiator? I figured it's under some pressure so boil point will be higher than 100C / 212F sea level pressure.

 

[CR94]

Originally Posted by Donald
... First question would be how hard is the water? ...
Very hard when it freezes.

Louisiana rarely gets very cold. Visiting relatives there a during a colder-than-usual spell a few years ago, we found my cousin busy replacing the water pump in his old Ford truck. He said the old pump had seized. The next day, he admitted discovering there was nothing wrong with the pump, except that the water in it had frozen, so the impeller couldn't rotate. Luckily, it wasn't cold enough long enough to freeze the water in the block.

 

[Amkeer]

I normally use the coolant for topping off. If not its distilled water. You will lose some coolant over time so its important to keep checking it.