Found alot of "stuff" in my engine.. what is it?

[Jim_rx7]

Ok, finally got around to cleaning the 2nd housing now and I came across alot of "stuff" in the side of the housing.

I can only describe it as sand like stuff.


Here\'s a picture of what it is and where it came from on the housing. As you can see, there was quite alot. It was more or less blocking the hole in the housing where it came from.





The strange thing is I\'ve still not found any obvious sign of failure, but there was water sitting in one of the housings (a few drops at the most) and one rotor had a little surface rust.

Any ideas??? - thanks

[RotorHeid]

it\'s a Radweld,

[Jim_rx7]

That can\'t be good for it if it was practically blocking that hole section up?

[HaywardRotary]

It is not necessarily Radweld,nrearly every that have done a few miles that I pull apart have that in them,it is usually just a build up of such things as rust,and alloy oxidation.
Regards
Carl

[JayDee]

i have found certain antifreeze greatly minimize this build up!

[Ricco_04]

I had something similar when I took my TII lump apart (116k miles)  Looked like it was stained by the colour of the coolant? :

[HaywardRotary]

i have found certain antifreeze greatly minimize this build up!

Very true!
Regards
Carl

[Jim_rx7]

can any damage happen with it blocking up that area?

[rustyrex]

Hey,thats the kind of stuff that worked its way into my expansion tank causing puddles everytime i stoped and cooled down,the coolant could not be sucked back to the engine due to the "stuff" blocking the pick up pipe in the expansion tank as it sits quite close to the bottom of the tank where the "stuff settled.
since i have flushed it out its been fine, no water loss what so ever and that was months ago.
so i supose thats what "stuff" can do.

[NurburgRob]

Is this then related to the \'don\'t use the wrong coolant\' issue?

Isn\'t there a specific type we should be using? or the stuff we shouldn\'t be using?

Is it right to say that the colour is not a sufficient indicator of the type?

[rustyrex]

I\'m not sure on right or wrong coolant but i think the moral of the storie is whatever coolant you use flush it out regularly i,e at least once a year ,surely all coolants will produce some amount of deposit or rust particles from the internal castings.
if in doubt flush it out.

[Jim_rx7]

Yeah, I\'ll be flushing the radiator and expansion tank etc out before I get the engine going again.

[gsb876]

Its one of those things you should do with every service every year, change the coolant, but sometimes we all do it where it still looks fresh so you leave it a while.

This thread certainly brings it into light that it is important to change all fluids on time