A car’s cooling system always has a tough time doing the job it has that it was designed to do – carry off excess engine heat. Rust may clog the passages of your radiator. Why chance expensive engine damage or the ruin of a vacation due to unnecessary radiator damage. Radiator inefficiencies due to simple neglect of maintenance and prevention. Rust may clog the passageways of your car or SUV’s radiator. Hard water deposits a scale much like the mineral scales that clog your coffeemaker, humidifier or kettle at the lake cottage. These mineral scale deposits reduce heat transfer in your radiator. Simply put your radiator will not be able to cool your car engine. Your car or SUV will overheat. Your car engine, trip vacation at least your day will be inconvenienced and perhaps ruined. Even more if two different metals touch inside your radiator system them electrolytic corrosion can and will occur. Further trouble and radiator damage is possible. If conditions are ideal or more than ideal for rust to form – rust is guaranteed to form and deposit in the waterways of your vital radiator. Rust makes up about 90 % of all solids that can choke up the water flowing areas if your radiator- including the water storage “water jacket” areas. Scale is a deposit of the solids left by the evaporation of the water and radiator antifreeze. These scales that are formed and deposited in your radiator and cooling system are very similar to the scale that forms inside a teakettle or coffeemaker after the boiling of hard water. What the solids are composed of depends upon the nature of the water itself but they most commonly include calcium carbonate, calcium sulphate and magnesium oxides. Electrolytic corrosion can result from soldered seams in older style copper radiator, copper gaskets in contact with other metals, brazed joints in steel tubes and imperfect plaiting on steel or other metal parts. An electrolytic current is set up and the metal most active electro chemically slowly dissolves. What can you do to prevent all this damage to your radiator and the grief and costs involved? As always the key words are prevention, prevention and prevention. An ounce of prevention is worth kilograms of cure. Radiator saboteurs can be averted by radiator cleaners and inhibitors used properly. You will prevent most of your troubles in your car of SUV’s vital and expensive to repair cooling systems. Fall and spring cleaning of a cooling system should always include- clearing out rust and scale with a chemical cleaner. It never hurts as well to have a competent auto repair shop conduct a thorough flush of your radiator. Basically your car’s radiator is flushed “backwards” with a strong flow of coolant to remove heavily trapped sediment and that horrible scaling. Lastly and in addition during these cleaning and preventative maintenance procedures you should insist that a radiator rust inhibitor be added to your radiator coolant. A Radiator Rust Inhibitor is a blend of rust inhibitors, lubricants and biocides that restores rust- and oxidation-inhibiting properties to coolant, promoting cooling system life. Furthermore, it provides lubricant to coolant that reduces and eliminates water pump noise. All in all isn’t maintaining your car’s cooling system an investment in your time and energy?