I took a trip up to Pen Argyl on November 2, 2003. My goals for this trip were to flush the coolant system, replace the thermostat, gasket, and upper and lower radiator hoses. The old hoses were dry rotting and were gooey in certain areas and were a little difficult to pull off, so I cut them off.
The coolant that was in the car for the past 17 years was a little sludgy and brown.
This was taken with the old thermostat in place. You can see the brown residue all over it. Autozone's replacement thermostat was way to big - grrrr... so I had to go over the hill to the auto store in Pen Argyl, and luckly they had the right part.
After I installed the new hoses, I started to fill the radiator with brand new Prestone antifreeze/coolant. As I was filling, a small amount of antifreeze started to seep from the gasket. As I continued to fill, I heard something come loose inside the radiator, and a guzzling sound. Antifreeze started dripping from the bottom of the radiator. I do not know what the problem is, maybe the Stud will need a new radiator. After this happened, I started the car up to see if the thermostat would at least open. The car started fine, but it ran for about 30 seconds, and a bunch of gas barfed out of the carburetor, and ran down the side of the engine block. I immediately killed the engine. I have no idea what happened with that, but hopefully it was just a freak thing. The next Team trip will be just around the bend.