"THE IMPORTANCE OF COOLING SYSTEM SERVICE" 1950s OLIN MATHIESON SERVICE STATION SALES FILM 99284

[@Bill23799]

I remember when I was a boy in the 60's there was no self service Gas Stations. All stations were full service. The attendant was well dressed and friendly. He cleaned the windshield and checked the oil and the tires. The restrooms were spotless and they also gave you S&H Trading Stamps.

[@jasondean3332]

It’s 2am and I’m about to go to the garage and flush the cooling system in my 1956 Oldsmobile. Hot damn, I haven’t changed the antifreeze since ‘59

[@carsonp.7009]

How is that possible my friend

[@jasondean3332]

@@carsonp.7009 You just gotta keep adding….. it’s been 3 years and everything still looks good in the radiator.

[@carsonp.7009]

@@jasondean3332 Ahhh i see, its like one of those neverending soups they keep throwing stuff into Haha

[@jasondean3332]

@@carsonp.7009 Exactly…… hahahaha. Whatever it Takes. I think I should check my oil now.

[@bloqk16]

I'm a gearhead from the 1960s, so for those younger in the audience about that era . . . Unlike antifreeze nowadays that is already mixed and just poured into the vehicle's cooling system; antifreeze back then, in one-gallon jugs, was 100 percent ethylene glycol, requiring a mix of 50 percent water, by volume, into the car's cooling system. A problem with that would be from the water source: The tap water that was high in mineral content created a lot of "scaling" or buildup of mineral deposits in the radiator. The workaround for that was to use bottled distilled water; as that's what I did. But for those vehicles with radiator mineral buildups, repairs were done by the mechanic removing the top of the radiator and "coring" the radiator's tubes to remove the scaling on the tubes. Back in the 20th century, the draining of cooling systems created environmental hazards, as backyard mechanics, service stations, and repair shops would have the old coolant drain freely from the engine and into the storm drains, where it would flow into streams, rivers, lakes, and oceans. I'll admit I was guilty of that, as the average guy a half-century ago was clueless about the term "environment" being connected to the health and welfare of the soil, air, and water. Careless handling of ethylene glycol antifreeze would also be a hazard to animals, since its sweet aroma could attract animals, such as dogs, to lick up or drink the puddles of antifreeze on the ground; making the animals very sick or resulting in death.

[@Richard_K1630]

I'm due for a "spring drainout." It's going to be tough now with all this social distance recommendations.

[@wonniewarrior]

At 4:00 that seems similar to the old copper sacrificial cap we called welsh plugs.

[@bansheemania1692]

Like a Freeze Plug?

[@northwest8634]

That was an actual 'welch' plug. Frost plugs are cupped and a bit harder to get out.

[@alfresco4976]

Who's fired up? WE ARE!!! I feel like I've just been to an empowerment seminar.

[@marctronixx]

LOL

[@fromthesidelines]

Originally released in 1955. That's an April 1955 calendar on the wall at 1:27.

[@mikezylstra7514]

Yup. April 10th on a Easter Sunday. Neighbor kid was born that day. I remember my mom all hyped because Annie was going into labor that Sat nite. I was sitting in front of the TV eating a chocolate Easter bunny.

[@davidgold5961]

I used to work at a radiator shop. It was the best place in town to take a leak.

[@markhull1366]

Complicated under the hood. Boy they don't have a clue of what's about to happen after 1973 wnd the Federal Emission standards.

[@12cjp]

I haven't change my antifreeze in my van since I bought it 9 years ago ,over 200 thousand miles I only change the oil every 3k miles run great.

[@rollingtones1]

Unfortunately for you and your van, your cooling system is rotting from the inside out and someday you'll have an expensive repair bill.

[@Richard_K1630]

Got Rust??

[@volvo09]

Modern antifreeze is much more resilient than old stuff, but you still need to change it. If you plan on keeping the vehicle change it out. The inside of the engine will be clean from your oil changes, but the antifreeze will degrade and either cause corrosion inside the engines cooling passages, corrosion around gaskets, or turn to a powdery sludge and block the heater core or radiator cooling passages. If you are keeping the car i'd highly advise you do it, from experience.

[@skylinefever]

When did cars use water with corrosion inhibitors in the summer and 50/50 antifreeze and water in winter? At what point did car companies decide to use 50/50 ethylene glycol all year long? Nowadays there are several antifreeze types, and several types will cause problems in the wrong vehicle. At one time, Honda used the same green color as standard antifreeze, but Honda antifreeze had no silicates. As a result, the silicates would destroy the water pump. Dexcool looks much like Chrysler HOAT, but if you mix them, you will get sludge clogging up the system. This happened to both of my parents in 1999. Making things worse, their cars had timing belts that drove the water pump, making repairs even more expensive. During the 1990s and early 2000s, GM made many V6 engines with intake gasket problems. Much blame was put on Dexcool, but much blame was also on gasket design. The original gaskets had plastic frames that would crack and cause leaks, and Fel-Pro problem solvers used metal instead. That reduced the number of times an engine had to have intake gaskets replaced. 4:10 my dad said he once made the inside of the engine look like that in his 1971 Toyota Corolla. He figured that if water and ethylene glycol antifreeze mixed at 50/50 had had one boiling point, and if 60% ethylene glycol 40% water had a higher boiling point, then why not use only ethylene glycol antifreeze? The reason is that corrosion inbibitors in antifreeze are not effective unless a certain amount of water is present. Back then, you could buy oxalic acid based cooling system cleaner, and that stuff worked really well. However, if you left it in too long, it would disolve the inside of the cooling system once it dissolved all the rust, scale, and sludge. That is why the cleaner came with an acid neutralizer, and directions on when you use it. 4:37 few cars had that coolant distribution tube in the engine block. It is my understanding that the flathead MOPAR inline 6 was one of those engines. 5:39 starting in the 80s and completely in the 1990s, car companies stopped using soldiered brass radiators, and instead used aluminum radiators with plastic end caps. Those end caps would fail and radiator replacement was the only way to go. Japanese and Korean cars tend to have those most radiator problems. Automotive cooling systems should have as few plastic parts as possible, they are nothing but trouble. 10:46 It is definitely good to keep all sorts of parts that can be damaged by lack of maintenance. I think a great thing to have is a shredded timing belt sitting next to some bent valves and a wrecked piston. I think if my mom and dad saw that, they might have replaced the timing belt on mom's 1985 Nissan Maxima so the belt wouldn't have gone out in 1994. 16:20 One great thing about modern times is that the service writer's computer has a list of maintenance schedules set by the manufacturer. However, not all service writers read that schedule.

[@stancarpenter8854]

I don't know exactly what you are saying, but it sounds good.

[@8avexp]

Back then, alcohol was used as anti-freeze. You had to use a cooler thermostat (160 deg F or lower).

[@thebikehippie6562]

Sounds like he knows his shit☝

[@straightpipediesel]

Train locomotives still use water with inhibitors today. They use a dump valve to drain the system before it freezes.

[@skylinefever]

@@8avexp thanks. I didn't realize that something other than glycol eas used.

[@502Chevy]

My how times have changed. Modern coolant keeps everything clean for a 100k miles and even then most go to junk yard surviving on “drain and fill” method of maintenance after that 100k mile mark. Did anyone notice the block drain next to the freeze plug the teacher drove out? Don’t see those nowadays.

[@93sundance]

Now 5 years 100k (or so) and people still won't maintain their cooling system.

[@skylinefever]

Even funnier is that some people will change their oil every 3000 miles, but will never do anything for their cooling system.

[@markhull1366]

You got that right. Anyone who's had the Dexcool jello problem found that out the hard way.

[@bloqk16]

Back when this film was produced, $75 was equal to a week's wage for an American worker.

[@Carlitosway211]

@1:42 "Some of these new models are really getting complicated" If they only knew. Lol

[@kc0lif]

fram filters cigarette machine in background

[@mcqueenfanman]

10:17 is that The Love Boat Captain?

[@fromthesidelines]

Nope, that's not Gavin McLeod.

[@mcqueenfanman]

@@fromthesidelines Why so sure? Sounds and looks like him, he got into acting in the late 50s.

[@bloqk16]

@@mcqueenfanman I've seen enough 1950s TV from the Me-TV network to say that the "Joe" character in this film was not Gavin McLeod, as he had a higher pitch and more of a whiny sound to his voice back then. But, whomever the Joe guy in this film was, he certainly had training and experience as an actor, as his voice and the way he projected himself stood out when compared to the other cast members.

[@marks6663]

I think my freeze plug is leaking because rad fluid is dripping from under the engine. Have no idea what to do because I can't even get to it. I just keep adding coolant every week. Well, at least I got clean fluid in there. lol. Taking it to a shop is out of the question because it is an old high mileage van worth about $1500.

[@northdakotaham1752]

Could just be the lower radiator hose leaking where it attaches to the water pump. Maybe just a loose hose clamp. See that often.

[@skylinefever]

Most auto part stores sell a UV dye that can be added to antifreeze. If you add it and regularly shine a blacklight on your car, you may find the leak. You might discover the problem is cheap and easy to fix. Also, you don't want to let the leak suddenly get dramatic and leave you stranded.

[@marks6663]

@@skylinefever thanks. What I mean is I can't get to it. I have a pretty good idea of where it's coming from but it's impossible to get access to that location.

[@horatiodreamt]

Wasn't the Volkswagen in those days "air-cooled"?

[@bloqk16]

Yep! VWs back in that era were all air-cooled flat-fours; I had a 1967 Beetle. The engine ran well in cold weather, but, a problem was with the car's heater, as it used a "heat-exchanger" with the exhaust system to pipe-in warm air into the car. If that heat exchanger had a leak, then the car could get filled with carbon monoxide; where I experienced a mild case of that poisoning with a headache; and I quickly turned off the heater and rolled down a window for fresh air. But driving in cold weather without a car heater can be uncomfortable, indeed! Worse still, without the interior heat in the car, the windshield can "ice-up" resulting with driving blind.

[@Qusin111]

FYI: Coolant systems are closed loop these days, I test mine every couple years and go from there but here is what MFG's say: CARS.COM - When is the right time to change your engine coolant? For some vehicles, you’re advised to change the coolant every 30,000 miles. For others, changing it isn’t even on the maintenance schedule. For example, Hyundai says the coolant in the engine (what many refer to as “antifreeze”) in most of its models should be replaced after the first 60,000 miles, then every 30,000 miles after that. The interval is every 30,000 miles on some Mercedes-Benz models with some engines, but on others it’s 120,000 miles or 12 years. On still other Mercedes, it’s 150,000 miles or 15 years. Related: More Car Service Advice Some manufacturers recommend you drain and flush the engine’s cooling system and change the coolant more often on vehicles subjected to “severe service,” such as frequent towing, which can generate more heat. The schedule for many Chevrolets, though, is a change at 150,000 miles regardless of how the vehicle is driven. Many service shops, though - including some at dealerships that sell cars with “lifetime” coolant - say you should do a coolant change more often than the maintenance schedule recommends, such as every 30,000 or 50,000 miles.

[@skylinefever]

I find that even though Dexcool should be replaced every 5 years or 150,000 miles, it is usually putrid after 4 years, sometimes 3 years.

[@marks6663]

Some people say that America was not a great country back then. That we had so much progress yet to be made. They are right, in a way. The anti-freeze coolant only lasted a year.

[@bloqk16]

When it came to gasoline, lubricants, and coolant; the 1950's were not "the good old days." And we should be fortunate nowadays that they "don't make them like they used to" for those same products.

[@jimmotormedic]

Can you imagine how many engines were ruined due to forgetting to put antifreeze in before it got cold out! Sorry sir your entire engine is shot. I could put a new one in for 150.00 or a good used one for 75.00.

[@manhoot]

This was pretty "cool"

[@steventuck1524]

I think I need my rear end flushed out...and greased

[@foxcub2yo108]

This is hilarious! The idea that coolant goes bad...

[@volvo09]

It quickly went bad back then. It does in modern cars but it takes a long time, like 10y plus. I still change mine every 100k though, I've seen too many gaskets and o rings leaking or damaged from internal aluminum corrosion to let it happen on my cars. But yeah, it's much less of a deal these days, especially on light duty cars and trucks.

[@whizatit]

who is this "PF" and why do they have counters blocking video? Yes periscope... make a seperate channel for your timers please its blocking key information/video at times and is annoying as hell... i find it strange this is the ONLY channel that does this trying to sell old videos pfft, if ya wanna sell it then why post it on youtube??

[@PeriscopeFilm]

Here's the issue: Tens of thousands of films similar to this one have been lost forever -- destroyed -- and many others are at risk. Our company preserves these precious bits of history one film at a time. How do we afford to do that? By selling them as stock footage to documentary filmmakers and broadcasters. If we did not have a counter, we could not afford to post films like these online, and no films would be preserved. It's that simple. So we ask you to bear with the watermark and timecodes. In the past we tried many different systems including placing our timer at the bottom corner of our videos. What happened? Unscrupulous KZbin users downloaded our vids, blew them up so the timer was not visible, and re-posted them as their own content! We had to use content control to have the videos removed and shut down these channels. It's hard enough work preserving these films and posting them, without having to spend precious time dealing with policing thievery -- and not what we devoted ourselves to do. Love our channel and want to support what we do? You can help us save and post more orphaned films! Support us on Patreon: www.patreon.com/PeriscopeFilm Even a really tiny contribution can make a difference.

[@bansheemania1692]

NOW Coolant System's have Rats nest of hoses,t fittings CLOSED SYSTEM ....Give Me the Regular Radiator any day

[@ArmpitStudios]

It's good that few men stand that way these days, with their foot up on something and leaning their arm on it. It looks absolutely ridiculous.