Antifreeze check only good to -15deg C

Pouring it into the reservior will do very little but protect your reservior. Over time, it will find its way into the engine with expansion / contraction, but you can never be sure how much made it in. The more effective way to do it would be to drain a litre from your radiator and pour in full-strength.

I haven't checked but do we even have direct access to the radiator? Many new vehicles I see now only have access through the reservoir. If that is the case then sucking out a litre and adding straight antifreeze and then draining the rad so it sucks the reservoir content would be the answer and then top up the reservior after. If we have a cap then that would work easier but you also should add a little to the reservoir to match the mix. Are you the Grande Prairie area guy?

I'm the Peace River Guy.
Anyhow I got a private message from a very reliable source and this occurance seems to be very rare.
I called the Shop Manager and I explained the situation and told him the original levels have remained costant since it was bought in May 2010.
He told me to bring it right over and he would look after getting it up to standard and noted that it could have been done when they installed a block heater. All is well plus I get a little road trip and my wife gets to go shopping. I bet they even give me a nice gift for driving that far, I'll get back to you on that part----maybe I'll send this link to them and that will help out with the gift part
And remember when drying your car use a 235 mph rated leaf blower and never use a towel again!

how do they rate leafblowers in mph? Can't even drive that fast to measure it. lol. I usually see fan strength rated in cfm.

Hmm wasn't planning on checking my coolant but maybe I should after reading this thread!

I'm not sure how they rate leaf blowers but I will give you a HP rating after I hook it up to the Forte and see how much extra Thrust it gives me, should save gas also.
Kind of Tim the Tool Man thing.
It Sucks and Blows what more could I ask for, I mean foreward and reverse!

jcbel said:

Hmm wasn't planning on checking my coolant but maybe I should after reading this thread!

Click to expand...

I may do the same thing.

Trip to Dealer, replaced and flushed, and used full strenth antifreeze and mixed to aquire -50 deg rating.
They had no idea why this occured but from conversations with dealer this is very rare.
Interesting note which KiaTech sent me, the Forte has a 'dry' block heater... no coolant system intrusion required.
Note sure how this works but it does sound interesting and new way of the block heater working.
KiaTech will know and maybe explain it!
400 km's round trip highway using cruise control 105km/hr Peace River to Grande Prairie 6.6L/100km pretty darn good, kept my foot off the gas and just experimenting.
Got 2 free crush washers for the 2 filters I bought.
Gas milage definatly is not a factor anyways as my wife blew a wad shopping while waiting for me..
while I was driving I turned AC off and on a few times along with traction control and could not see any noticeble difference in my gas millage readout so I'm not going to worry about that debate anymore.

The block heaters on Thetas (and an increasing number of Kia's engines) are a 'dry type'. In the old days of steel blocks the best way to get a block warmed was to heat the coolant, as it has a better rate of heat transfer than the steel does. I can't recall if it's conduction/convection/whatever... steel sucks at it and coolant is better.

Enter the days of aluminum! This magical metal conducts heat WAY better than steel so it's far more effective to heat the aluminum directly and save time. Our block heaters for a V6 were 400W, now a heater for a 3.5 LambdaII is 250W. Less power, as effective (if not better) means less carbon footprint, tree huggers adopt pandas and every one wins.

Best part is no coolant system intrusion means a black heater in a Forte can be installed with considerably less mess, tools, or time.

But if my boss asks, it still takes me a long time... and our rate should NOT be reduced for it, at all. Thanks.

i was looking in my engine today to see if i could find the block heater cord but no luck. does anyone know where about's in the engine it is?