96 GTi Coolant flow and Winterize

[JDCam]

Guys,
The more I stare at this the more I am confused....

I was looking up how to properly add Anti-freeze to my 96 GTi for the winter.
One video shows adding it through the hose connector.
Another says thats no good as thats the outlet and recommended adding through the inlet hose instead.
I looked in the service guide and it says to add through the adapter on the outlet hose, but only after you have clamped off the hose. This would in effect add the anti-freeze in backwards flow.

This led to another concern. I run the machine out of water often with garden hose attached. Following these same principals, with the hose hooked up to the adapter on the outlet would it not just be emptying out the back of the machine and never hitting the engine or exhaust?.

This doesn't seem right.... very confused

 

[AKnarrowback]

I'll take a stab since I winterize my machines for very cold weather.



The picture here is from the 96 manual for the GTI. On the head of the motor you have two large water lines going out the back. One attaches to the main water inlet fitting from the jet pump, the line on the left as you face forward. One attaches to the outlet at the rear of the machine and has the motor flushing fitting built in line, it is in the right as you face forward. Only block or pinch the rear right hand hose, all others are part of the cooling system and should be flushed with antifreeze. The right rear hose is a direct line out of the motor that self drains everytime and will just dump antifreeze without forcing it through the rest of the system.

I would pull the left hand hose off of the jet pump fitting and pull it up higher than the motor and stick a funnel in it. I would pinch off the right hand hose to keep any anti freeze from flowing directly out of the motor as I pour it in the other left side line.

Now, with the right hand hose pinched off and the left hand hose up high with the funnel in it start the machine and let it idle as you pour a full gallon of RV/Marine anti freeze into the funnel. You should see the pink antifreeze go through any of the smaller clear lines and then start dumping out the exhaust. After the full gallon is poured let the machine run for 10 more seconds then shut ut down.

At this point you have flushed all the cylinder and exhaust manifold passages with anti freeze and pushed enough into the exhaust to replace or dilute any water that is still sitting.

One suggestion is to have the air box cover off and spray fogging oil in to the carbs as you are doing the ten second run time.

DO NOT START POURING ANTIFREEZE UNLESS THE MOTOR IS ALREADY RUNNING! Never put any liquids in the cooling system with the motor shut off or you could back feed into the combustion chambers and damage the motor.

When you are done then reattach the main coolant line to the jet pump fitting, pull the battery out and put things away for the winter.

Where are you located? We're interior Alaska and the machines sit out in the cold 6 months or more a year with temps as low as -50F. The nice thing about the 580, 657 and 720 motors are they should, in theory, be a self draining system that clears the cylinders and manifold with gravity after the machine is shut off, but I do a full gallon in each my machines just to be safe.

 

[JDCam]

Very well explained. Thank you. I am about 2 hrs north of Toronto.

What about running it on a garden hose in the summer. With the garden hose connected to the flush port, is it really doing anything or just draining out the back?