Draining a little coolant to change thermostat

[joney]

With good instructions gotten from this forum, was about to drain about 5 quarts of coolant, so I could change the thermostat. But I find my radiator drain valve inaccessible, radiator is enclosed in a box! I really don't want coolant all over the place, as it's new and plan to but it back in. Is this box removable? Without jacking up the Ex? Just had the coolant drained and replaced last month.

 

[XLTrunner]

Yep...remove the box. There are two bolts on either end and lower it down. BTW...if you have the SOHC, I don't recall needing to drain more than a quart or two to get the level low enough to change out the t-stat without spilling.

 

[sehaare]

With good instructions gotten from this forum, was about to drain about 5 quarts of coolant, so I could change the thermostat. But I find my radiator drain valve inaccessible, radiator is enclosed in a box! I really don't want coolant all over the place, as it's new and plan to but it back in. Is this box removable? Without jacking up the Ex? Just had the coolant drained and replaced last month.

On my 98 XLT with the SOHC, there is a petcock in the radiator on the passenger side. From memory, I believe that it takes an allen wrench to open and close the petcock which even has a barb on it for a small hose to attach to it, so you could drain it into something to catch the coolant and reuse the coolant if it does not need to be changed.

I've always removed the box as XLTRunner stated, but I seem to remember that every time I did that and found the petcock, that I might not have had to remove the box to get access to it.

I turn 60 in a few days so I've worked on a lot of cars in those years and the memory of all the different setups sometimes bleeds together, so I could be wrong about not having to remove the box, but I am sure that there is a petcock that you can use to drain from.


EDIT: I just reread your post and see that you are indeed planning on reusing the coolant so getting a hose to fit the petcock barb should set you right up for what you want to do.

 

[donalds]

I usually fill a 1 gallon water jug / milk jug
From under the rad as stated above