Thread: Coolant alarms

Gday Urban Panzer,I have the type that screws into the top radiator hose, beep sounds on start-up to let you know its activated and siren screams when level drops...has saved my bacon a couple times..Best $$$ ever spent on the Disco. Not sure of the brand, but easy when you change hoses just unscrew the fitting and the complete sender comes out and screw into new hose.
Easy, peasy,lemon squeezy
Cheers Ean

U.P, I run the "Engine Saver" low coolant alarm in my D2, my 350SL and daughters Frontera. I am a firm believer in early warning systems.

With regard to the float in the header tank, it should work, the only concern would be, if it were mounted too high, it would be vunerable to the coolant moving around. With the units I use, the sensor is located in a place filled with coolant.

Cheers

Mine is mounted vertically in the highest point of the radiator header tank. I believe a sensor in the expansion tank may react too slow and engine damage will occur before it is aware that coolant is dropping out of the engine and radiator.

And it wasn't a shop bought system in a package. Designed and installed by an auto electrician using bought components.

I have "engine saver" that Dave runs...it is a very slick system. The bleed screw on the top radiator hose junction on the V8 just gets replaced with one (of very very good quality plastic) that has the electrode in. He has a kit for TD5 to suit yours.

Cheers

Yeah seen that kit and can get it over here to, I like the simplicity of the screw in sensor, its just after reading the detailed post on here ref coolant alarms, it seems the top hose will still be full of coolant even when its loosing it "other" places, so im wondering how much you have to loose before it senses it.

The times mine has gone off the water level was right at the bottom of the header tank, about 1/2 inch in the bottom.The trick is to stop as quick as you can once it goes off. I blew the small hose behind the turbo and it went off I stopped almost straight away and the level was just disappearing out of the tank,finding and replacing that poor excuse for a hose was another story,L/R designers ya gotta love em
Cheers Ean

UP - mine started to go off once when I had a leak in a heater line to the LPG converter and and it was about a litre and a half down at that stage and the temp had not got above 100 on the Scangauge.

Cheers

Originally Posted by Urban Panzer

Yeah seen that kit and can get it over here to, I like the simplicity of the screw in sensor, its just after reading the detailed post on here ref coolant alarms, it seems the top hose will still be full of coolant even when its loosing it "other" places, so I'm wondering how much you have to loose before it senses it.

My thoughts exactly.

My take on the coolant level is that the system will drain/vacuumed the header tank dry first as the water pump will try and keep circulating the remaining water. This certainly happened when I had my pressurized head gasket failure.

I think the confusion is created by the fact that the hose sensor is higher than the tank, particularly on the Td5.

I have the Madman with the sensor in the tank and it worked a treat for about 1300 k's to get the car home.

What would drain first? The tank that has to have the coolant drained/vacuumed out or the higher hose?

Interesting question.