The company that manufactures the cooling system sealer supplies GM with the material in pellet form and also sells under the BarsLeaks brand name. 'The GM coolant supplement pellets and the BarsLeaks 'golden seal' are the same material. It causes no harm and will be perfectly benign unless there is a leak somewhere.' I would add 6 of the coolant supplement pellets to ensure a positive seal of the system. It is/was factory installed in that system and needs to be replenished over time and/or as the cooling system is refreshed.

An engine like the 4.3 can leak coolant internally if a gasket starts to fail or something so the coolant supplement/sealer is good insurance against this. I personally always recommend the use of the GM coolant supplement pellets ( or the equivalent BarsLeaks products HDC ) to ensure against any internal coolant leaks into the oil. It is well tested and an excellent product if used correctly. You should have absolutely no problems with DexCool. so.once per month or so, check the radiator itself to make sure it is completely full to the brim as evidence that the cap is working correctly. If the cap is malfunctioning, the wrong cap or if the hose to the coolant recovery bottle has a hole/crack/kink the radiator cannot pull coolant back into the system when it cools down and the level will steadily drop and will run low. It would have been easier to just check the coolant level occasionally.Ĭhecking the coolant recovery bottle is a good way to do it for routine look sees but it is a good idea to pop the pressure cap off occasionally when the system is cold and check the radiator level, too. so.the system would not pressurize and would overheat. The mud from the rust accumulation would build up in the pressure cap fitting and unseat the presure cap seal. The problem compounded itself over time on some vehicles that were run in a chronic low state. It just doesn't tolerate the system running low as well as some of the silicated coolants. Just keep the system full and DexCool is great stuff. If the system runs low long enough it will accumulate enough rust to actually get muddy. The red sludge you describe with DexCool is simply rust. The surface drys again, rusts and another slug of coolant comes along and washes the rust off. Then along comes a slug of coolant and washes the rust off. When the system runs low on coolant, areas of the head will loose coolant and the inner surface of the coolant passage will almost instantly dry out due to the heat and haze over with red surface rust. With DexCool, the surface is very well protected as long as it is wet with the coolant. Your owner’s manual will tell you which radiator fluid is best for your vehicle. Where silicated coolants 'plated' the inner surfaces of the cooling system and passages in the block and heads and provided some level of corrosion protection when the surface would dry out due to low coolant levels. IAT coolant must be changed every 24,000 miles or every 2 years, OAT coolant must be changed every 150,000 miles or every 5 years, and HOAT coolant must be changed every 150,000 miles or every 5 years. 'The problem that people experience with DexCool is in engines with cast iron heads (like the 4.3) when the systems run low. From a GM engineer who was on BITOG, but left when he got tired of the abuse.

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