Chrysler Voyager?

Question

My brotherinlaw has one of these and the radiators dont last very long also blown off to radiators hoses recently , mechanics reckon its an electrloysis problem due to aluminum radiator any ideas

Answer 1

I own a shop, and see this a lot. Electrloysis (as you call it) is when another metal contaminates the aluminum. An engine block is made of cast iron, and as it rusts, this rust will build up inside the radiator. This causes a reaction with the two metals, and the result is trouble with the deterioation of the radiator. A good example of this reaction is; place a piece of aluminum foil inside your mouth, and let it touch a filling. Ouch!!! The reaction between the two metals make an electrical reaction. You can see iron inside a system when it turns the coolant an orange tint. This explains why it is important to flush the cooling system often, and change the coolant, in order to make the radiator last.
As far as I know the Voyager never used Dexacool type coolant, but uses the normal green type. Some coolants are in fact orange in color, making it very difficult to distunquish the differences in bad or good coolant from looking at it. This doesn't matter, but what does matter is the fact it needs cleaned out once a year to keep from the electrical charge being built up. You can probe the radiator with a volt meter on a low setting, and actually see an electrical charge. Once a new radiator is put in a vehicle it is a good idea to retighten the hoses soon after in order to make sure they are tight enough. When one severly overheats it may in fact blow off the hoses. I would also suspect a bad head gasket as the culprit if it blew off a hose. Have the system pressure tested with the dye to make sure its not done that. A blown head gasket will cause the radiator to burst at the seams sometimes, if it has an internal leak such as a bad head gasket.
Glad to help out, Good Luck!!!

Answer 2

Depending on what year it is, it may have the Dexcool coolant in it which starts out an orange color, even if it didn't originally come with Dexcool, sometimes the green coolant gets replaced with orange.

If it blew the hoses OFF instead of blowing a hole in one, then there's either a more serious problem, or someone never tightened the hoses properly.

Whenever the radiator was replaced, the shop doing the work should have also done a coolant system flush to get any other contaminants out of the system unless he denied the extra charges for this.

Might consider trying a different shop.
If it failed too early (it should last much longer than just a couple years) then it may have been a defective radiator. They may have used a rebuilt radiator, which isn't near as good as a new one.

A good aftermarket radiator will have a lifetime warranty on it and can be bought for much less than a factory replacement.