Frothy pink coolant (A Tundra problem)

2000 Tundra V8.

There is what smells like trans oil in my anti-freeze. A nice festive xmas season pink froth was bubbling out of the overflow bottle. The trans has no coolant in it... nice clear red. Where do these two fluids come in contact... My guess is its a dual oil cooler/radiator - but I wouldn't think the cores could mix unless both were ruptured, unlikely. I don't have time to even look at it today or tomorrow but I'm looking at buying a new radiator right? Its not some nutty system where coolant is piped thru the trans or anything insane is it?

How does one flush this frothy mix out of said cooling system once I figure out how to stop it from going in there in the 1st place? My best 1st thought was a hose and some simple green... backflushing it over and over again until its all clear. That sound about right?

Walter, I think the toyota engine coolant is red. At least mine is. You may have a blown head gasket or something along those lines.

Brust wrote: Walter, I think the toyota engine coolant is red. At least mine is. You may have a blown head gasket or something along those lines.

Mine has been changed but is a little on the orange side... but oil would have made the usual chocolate milk, or at least darker in color. This is pink and smells exactly like auto trans juice too.

OP is making stuff up. toyotas are flawless.

I believe that a leak in only the transmission fluid cooling part of the radiator will cause the problem you are describing.

should a bought a silverado

bruceman wrote: should a bought a silverado

My mom just had to replace an engine in her lady-driven well-maintained 2000 Silverado. Runs like new...

Ugggg... frothy pink coolant was in fact trans oil, and the trans was also filled with it.

A $.05 o-ring in the bottom of the radiator let go and allowed the mix to take place. I have the engine block filled with simple green and water soaking for the night but how the hell do you flush a milkshake out of the torque converter?

The only way I know to flush it out is to just keep filling and draining. One way is with a pan drop. The other is disconect a line and have the one side pump out and fill through the other until it looks clean.

How did you discover this in the first place? Did it overheat, push out coolant?

You really don't need the engine block to be completely sanitary. A little trans fluid in the coolant is just extra lubrication for the water pump lolz.

skruffy wrote: You really don't need the engine block to be completely sanitary. A little trans fluid in the coolant is just extra lubrication for the water pump lolz.

I'm not sanitizing but I am trying to make sure the sticky foam is dissolved so it isn't blocking up passages in the head or anything silly like that. The simple green is good at dissolving lubricants... I have no worries about the motor but the trans is scaring me a little. I'm not sure what lots of water and glycol will do to stuff in there and I don't really have a good plan for getting it out except by swapping 4qts at a time until it stops foaming.

pull the return line off at the rad install a hose barb and a 4 foot hose in to a 5 gallon bucket. run engine and add fluid until clean comes out the hose. Some shops will use iso Alcohol to flush with 1st. If it were me with a newer unit I'd fix it then call a trans shop and ask how much to power flush it. then after they were done I'd drop the pan and do the filter.

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