[AT] anti-freeze

[Ralph Goff]

Hi Larry
As Charlie already said, there is not water outside at this time of year 
unless you are willing to chop through a foot or so of ice to get it. 
Thankfully, mine comes out of the ground through a frost free hydrant.
Running water in an engine is not possible as the water freezes as soon as 
it hits the metal. Even running an engine on weak anti-freeze is risky as 
radiators have been known to freeze up while driving due to the exreme cold 
rushing through the fins. Of course most radiators and grilles are well 
covered up for the winter here. I've even heard of some that removed the 
engine fan and it worked fine for the winter. I'd try it on my Super 90 
Massey if it was'nt so hard to get at the fan on that one. It rarely gets up 
to normal temp even with the radiator fully covered in this weather.
Our daytime "high" looks to be about -20F for today.

Ralph in Sask.
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Larry Goss" <rlgoss at insightbb.com>
To: "Antique tractor email discussion group" <at at lists.antique-tractor.com>
Sent: Tuesday, December 23, 2008 1:00 PM
Subject: Re: [AT] anti-freeze


> Humm.  This thread mentions an interesting concept -- anti-freeze in a 
> Johnny-Popper.  My uncle and my grandfather had around 2 dozen of them on 
> the dairy farm and never put anti-freeze in any of them.  It was a lot 
> cheaper to drain the radiator and the block every night and fill it with a 
> bucket of  water from the irrigation ditch every morning.
>
> Larry
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Ralph Goff <alfg at sasktel.net>
> Date: Tuesday, December 23, 2008 12:22
> Subject: Re: [AT] anti-freeze
> To: Antique tractor email discussion group <at at lists.antique-tractor.com>
>
>>
>> ----- Original Message ----- 
>> From: "charliehill" <charliehill at embarqmail.com>
>> To: "Antique tractor email discussion group"
>> <at at lists.antique-tractor.com>
>> Sent: Tuesday, December 23, 2008 7:07 AM
>> Subject: Re: [AT] Ralph Goff CLOSE THE DOOR
>>
>>
>> > John my dad used to tell me about not being able to get anti-
>> freeze during
>> > WW II and folks putting kerosene in the cooling system.
>> >
>>
>> Charllie, my Dad also talked of using either diesel fuel or
>> kerosene as
>> anti-freeze in his John Deere D way back in the fifties. I don't
>> know if he
>> couldn't afford anti-freeze or if it wasn't available. It would
>> have cost a
>> fair bit to fill up that big cooling system on the D so maybe he
>> was trying
>> to avoid the cost. He did comment on at least one occasion when
>> the
>> "anti-freeze" (kerosene) got so thick in the radiator that it
>> stopped
>> circulating and actually overheated the engine.
>> This would likely have been in the early fifties before
>> electricity came to
>> the rural areas so block heaters were not an option. No battery
>> chargers
>> either so when the batteries wouldn't crank anymore it was time
>> to grab that
>> big cast iron flywheel and try to start the tractor. I sometimes
>> wonder how
>> they survived those winters. We have it pretty easy now even
>> though we
>> complain about the cold.
>>
>> Ralph in Sask.
>>
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