Draining coolant from my 2.8

[Burning_Beard]

She's running a little cool, so I figured I'd throw in a new thermostat. The radiator's petcock is nestled into the front crossmember, and it seems if I released it, coolant would go everywhere. I can't even see the petcock from underneath, I had to pull the airbox off to even see it, since the base of the rad sits in that crossmember. Is this correct? How do I properly drain my coolant?

[berettaboi]

with a large catch bucket! lol sadly. others may have a trick, like slipping a large enough hose over the opening. i'm not sure, i pulled the lower rad hose to drain mine...

[1988GTU]

It's going to make a mess unless you have a very large/wide drain pan that can cover the cradle of under the car. Cardboard, sand, zorball and rags are going to be your friends here.

[Money pit Beretta]

Feel lucky if you can get the petcock to open. They tend to get stuck and you sure don't want to break it.

[1988GTU]

Sometimes soaking the drain plug with a top shelf penetrating oil and running the engine up to operating temp with a once more soaking will give you better odds for it breaking free rather than just breaking on you.

[Chad91GTZ]

Put a hose on the petcock.

[ronaconda]

If all you are going to do is change the t-stat, it sits right under where the top hose goes into the engine and uses an o-ring. You will lose very little coolant by just changing the t-stat.

[berettaboi]

you dont really want to drain coolant (from a jack stand perspective point) if you get it up to operating temp... hot stuff...

[Burning_Beard]

If all you are going to do is change the t-stat, it sits right under where the top hose goes into the engine and uses an o-ring. You will lose very little coolant by just changing the t-stat.

I went to the hardware store, and they had a small siphon that fit into the breather hole of the tstat housing cap.