Water pump and power steering with pink custard

[chongobambino]

Hi all. New to this forum. Not asking questions but thought I'd share my recent find on a 06 Mondeo mk3 tdci. Basically everything on the engine that should have water and coolant in has been magically transformed into pink custard. This at first stumped me as the coolant was blue. Turns out the water pump/power steering pump combo has expired. Toast. Cruck. One sick puppy ect. Luckily for me im stripping a transit with same setup so cheep fix lol. Going to try adding a few pics for your enjoyment. Hope this help someone with similar problems but keep ya fingers crossed it dont happen as its a ball ache with hands like mine and a temper i never thought i had.

[FatHead1979]

WOW, that looks like it'll be "interesting" to fix!

[chongobambino]

Very time consuming lol. The "pink stuff" wont burn had filled the entire cooling system and was kind enough to hang onto about a pint of coolant. Also, i discovered that in one of the thin pipes around the thermostat area had a tiny plastic one-way valve inside so im leaving it out to see if heaters will perform better. Il add a photo of it later just incase someone else is unfamiliar with it.

[chongobambino]

This is 1 of 2 one-way valves in the thin coolant pipes to/from thermostat housing.

Apologies for the bad photos.

Edited July 16, 2018 by chongobambino
My poor grammar

[chongobambino]

ALL FIXED. (ish). As previous, removed thermostat, both of those tiny one-way valves and flushed everything with hose pipe for at least 20mins even though it was running clear'ish after about 5mins but with small blobs of pink stuff but not lot's. The first 2 photos show location of the one-way valves. My next step was adding something that could actually mix with this contaminated system. A gallon of GUNK engine degreaser was purchased but only used 2litres of it and all is bang-on. Even without the thermostat the system is now circulating and the heater (sunny day about 23°C) is putting out almost untouchable heat. Obviously due to not having the thermostat fitted reduces pressure which will give a lower reading on the temperature gauge but WHO CARES, its nice and toasty in the car and know more power steering fluid in the coolant. The third photo is what the coolant bottle looks like with GUNK engine cleaner thats circulating and it turns to milk once engine temperature gets hotter. Last photo is of my choice of "pink custard remover" good-ole-GUNK.

Hopefully this information will help other people (regardless of motor manufacturer) to have a nice clean cooling system that absolutely CHUCKS HEAT into the vehicle. Happy motoring everyone and have a scorching hot winter.