Coolant Flush Questions for '01 Sport

[btcman]

Yesterday I flushed cooling system of my son's '01 Explorer Sport with 4.0 L SOHC engine (100,900 miles and no coolant change in 5 years and 50,000 miles). I used the Prestone flushing system and nasty, black coolant flushed from the system. I may have made several mistakes while doing the flush. First, X was on a slight incline during flush with front end facing downward-??. Drained the system thru the drain petcock ( 8 qts ) and installed tee on heater hose going to the top of engine. Started the engine, turned on hose, turned heat on, but forgot to put it on high-what problem, if any, caused by having fan on lowest setting? Opened the petcock as Prestone instructions advised (uneasy about this), but very little fluid actually drained from there. Much black crap flowed out of top of radiator during flush while running engine for about 5-8 minutes (almost two full five gallon cans). When fluid coming out of radiator finally turned almost clear, stopped engine, closed petcock and put new Motorcraft coolant into radiator. I installed about 7 qts. into radiator (14 qt. capacity) and recovery tank (filled to cold fill mark), but no new coolant flowed out of heater hose tee, as instructions indicated. I covered tee anyway, left radiator cap off and started the engine and let it run for about 10-15 minutes. After about 10 mintues, the temp gauge needle moved to about 1/4, a little higher than normal in recent months. I finally turned fan to high. Only cold air was coming out for about 5 minutes. So I put about another 1 qt. of water in radiator and then put on new Motorcraft radiator cap, drove X few blocks and heat finally started coming out of inside vents. After turning off engine, coolant in recovery tank stayed at same level and did not get sucked into radiator. I drove X for 6 miles and did not hear anything unusual and needle went back to less than 1/4. My son is going on 300 mile trip this afternoon. Did I make any major mistakes in flush/refill process that may cause problems for my son on his trip to the beach? What should I check to make sure I did not create future problems. Thanks for any quick feedback. Sorry for the long post?