Coolant not circulating to VegMax + Hotfox

[jskrepnek]

Hi ...

Power-loss issues on veggie - noticed that my VegMax (which is just in front of the right rear wheel, on the other side of the well) and Hotfox (tank in rear cab of vehicle) are not getting much or any coolant delivered to them.

First question you might ask is: is there enough coolant in the system? Well, I open the rad and, yep, I say, it's filled right up.

But is it?

If there's not enough coolant in the system to fill the lines up all the way down to the hotfox through the vegmax and back in the return line, then would it be possible for the water pump for the coolant to be basically bypassing the junction to the filter + hotfox and the waterpump merely pulls air into the rear coolant (plantdrive) lines, leading to an increasingly large air pocket?

This might sound totally stupid, but I'm grasping here.

Ed @ Plantdrive suggested I might need a coolant pump? But I don't want to jump at that if there's something - a problem - underneath all this.

Note: the system *HAS* worked in the past (about 3 weeks ago). So it's not that the system is flawed in principle.

If I'm *maybe* right about the theory above, how would I go about filling the system?

Thanks so much for any clues ...

-- Joel

[BCDelica]

Did something happen recently that allowed air into the coolant (rad flush)? With interior highway driving you'd notice, on your temperature gauge, a failed water pump. Try taking off one side of the coolant hoses, at a tap, allowing the coolant to flow freely from the radiator (burp the system). With the rad cap off and into a large container of course.

Big question; how do you know the hotfox and vegmax are not receiving much coolant? Not fancy, but originally used a oven temperature gauge with a magnetic sensor attached to the part of the WVO system I wanted to watch. It was a Cambodian tire gizmo, and it worked fine with the 'hood' closed on the wire to the dial.

Kev

[jskrepnek]

Did something happen recently that allowed air into the coolant (rad flush)? With interior highway driving you'd notice, on your temperature gauge, a failed water pump. Try taking off one side of the coolant hoses, at a tap, allowing the coolant to flow freely from the radiator (burp the system). With the rad cap off and into a large container of course.

No complaints from the temp. guage at all. I'll try burping the system. How does the thermostat work in this situation? I mean, I can't burp the system when the rad is smoking hot (can't take the cap off), so will the thermostat even be open?

Big question; how do you know the hotfox and vegmax are not receiving much coolant? Not fancy, but originally used a oven temperature gauge with a magnetic sensor attached to the part of the WVO system I wanted to watch. It was a Cambodian tire gizmo, and it worked fine with the 'hood' closed on the wire to the dial.
Kev

When the system's been working the hotfox and vegmax get nice and hot - it usually only takes a couple minutes. What's happening now is even after hours of highway driving neither the VegMax or hotfox get warm and I can follow the coolant lines to pretty much exactly the place where no heat goes - so I assume no coolant is going past that point.

My big question is: it looks like my coolant lines (to the rear) are not totally filled up. So why doesn't the coolant drain down and fill up those lines to the vegmax and hotfox. I parked on a hill with the rad higher and the cap off, but the lines still don't fill - the rad stays filled up.

-- Joel

[jessef]

Sounds like one of two things.

air locked in the lines

or

line(s) plugged not allowing coolant to pass through

[Frisch]

Joel,
I'm no expert, but when I (and many others on this site) first hooked up my system, I had no coolant flowing to the tank and filter heaters. The solution - drive around till the temperature needle is above the lower lines, go to a long, steeper hill and floor it. I drove at about 70kph(as fast as I could) for about 20 seconds. I believe this pushed the air out of the lines and I've never had a heating issue since.

David Frisch

[jskrepnek]

Joel,
I'm no expert, but when I (and many others on this site) first hooked up my system, I had no coolant flowing to the tank and filter heaters. The solution - drive around till the temperature needle is above the lower lines, go to a long, steeper hill and floor it. I drove at about 70kph(as fast as I could) for about 20 seconds. I believe this pushed the air out of the lines and I've never had a heating issue since.

David Frisch

Yes, thanks, David. I ended up 'burping' it stationary, but I think next time I'll do it your way. So far, no heating issues either, so I think I've licked it.

Thanks,

-- Joel

[SpyderCS]

Could you describe how you burped the system? I'm trying to get the coolant flowing through my filter heater loop and having no success. I tried the trick with driving up a steep hill several times but it didn't work for me. My hoses are hooked to T's in the rear heater inlet and outlet hoses. I tried pinching the hose on the heater side of the T thinking that this would make the coolant flow through the T up the filter loop, but no dice. I've also taken the hoses off at the filter a few times and tried to fill them with coolant to help the air bubble out.

[GrinMedic]

I'm having some similar issues with coolant heating.

Just finished my install and despite highway driving my heated filter and hoses running from the tees to both the filter and tank are not warming up.

After going for a good run only my filter seems to get warm, the hoses carrying coolant to the in tank coolant heater aren't getting warm at all. I undid the both in/ out hoses and there is coolant in there, seems to flow well with the rad cap off.


Is this simply a case of still having air in the system?

Or is this a case of needing a coolant pump in the tank loop?

[Overlanderjay]

You need a coolant pump i do bus heater installs in boats and we have the same problem where the water pump is not able to move that extra coolant ,it wasn't design to do that . cheers Jay

[GrinMedic]

Well I figured out my problem with coolant circulation to the rear veggie tank... as well as the location of my missing vice grip.

Yup... I had left a vice grip on a coolant line, enough coolant could get past, but not enough flow to circulate into the tank.

Pretty happy it was an easy fix, felt pretty silly and had a good laugh at my own expense... WVO system is working great now!