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brown looking grease in my radiator

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Old 07-17-2007, 04:15 PM
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brown looking grease in my radiator

checked my coolant and found brown looking grease in radiator. i have seen oil coolers go out on other diesel engines but the coolant was a grey milky color. any suggestions.
Old 07-17-2007, 08:10 PM
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check your oil to make sure you dont have antifreeze in it cause it could be a headgasket
Old 07-17-2007, 08:28 PM
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It does sound like it could be a headgasket
Old 07-17-2007, 09:07 PM
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It could also be some kind " stop leak " product that's been put in your radiator
Old 07-17-2007, 11:02 PM
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flush your system and your block real well and go from there.
Old 07-17-2007, 11:30 PM
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Originally Posted by LOGAN
flush your system and your block real well and go from there.
Good idea. I have seen rust do this over time, it will make a "Brown sludge". Or like stated above most stopleaks are brown in color. Id do as Logan said flush everything well, and drive on, see if it comes back. If your worried about it being a headgasket, have an oil sample done. Good luck.
Old 07-17-2007, 11:46 PM
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change your oil or drain some out after letting it set for a day or two, the water will drain out before the oil does.
Old 07-18-2007, 11:44 AM
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I had a similar deal with my 2001. Turned out to just be bad coolant, I hadn't changed it in five years. It was brown, and kind of greasy, but the oil was fine and after flushing the system, no more problems.
Old 07-18-2007, 11:48 AM
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still have some brown greasy stuff left from my blown hg.... cno way to get it all out!
Old 07-18-2007, 12:46 PM
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I pulled the plug on our old Chevy farm truck the other weekend and it looked like red mud in the radiator. Just a combination of rust and low coolant level. After many many flushes, it finally runs clean. Although all the internals appear dyed red now.

I did try the Cascade trick mentioned here and it worked well.
Old 07-19-2007, 01:10 PM
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check the oil dipstick, see if there is any coffee color look to the oil.

Any steam out of your tail pipe when the engine is warmed up?

Take off the radiator cap...start the engine...let it warm up and look for bubbles.....a very strong bubbling action indicates a blown head gasket.

It used to be on the gassers we could use a vacume gauge and read on the vacume gauge if it had a head gasket out....I don't know enough about the diesel to know if anything like this is possible.

Does the engine overheat at all?
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