Fixing your cars plastic tank radiator

I just ran on to a post on instructables.com someone was asking how to fix a plastic tank on his car's radiator http://www.instructables.com/answers/How-To-Repair-A-Car-Radiator-Leak-In-The-Plastic-A/
Me being a radiator man and taking my craft seriously I had to post a reply. There were reply's with all kinds of answers to this persons question  none of which will work to fix his plastic tank.

This is a picture of a crack in a plastic radiator tank. This is the inlet tank of the radiator (their the one's that ALWAYS crack) The inlet tank receives the hot coolant from the motor and the inlet tank cracks behind the inlet connection as shown in the photo,  The outlet tank almost never cracks it's the one that get's the least heat and wear and tear.

A new tank pictured above that we can install onto a radiator is the only way to permanently fix a crack in a tank other than replacing the radiator entirely. I have never seen any other method work for more than a few hundred miles or a week or two. And that's because there's nothing on the market that will vulcanize with the tank material to cause a permanent repair, also the tank it's self is degeradated to the point of causing the crack in the first place so your trying to repair something that is beyond it's life span. The normal life span of a plastic radiator inlet tank is 7-10 years or around 100k miles. Some people get lucky and with the right circumstances I've seen tanks last a long, long time, but that's not the norm in the industry.

So here's what happens. You pull the radiator out of your car clean out a groove on the crack, wire brush it real good, clean it with acetone or some other cleaner, try to isolate the crack with wire ties and then spread $15.00 worth of JB weld or some other epoxy on it, by the time your done you've spent 4 hours and $50.00 worth of supply's on trying to fix it. Reinstall the radiator on your car and run it for a week or so just to find that sure enough it leaks again (and it will). After 31+ years in this industry and trying every thing that's come out to fix plastic tanks including  my own inventions, I haven't seen anything that works. ( in the late 80's when the plastic tanks first came out we had nothing to repair them with including new tanks! new tanks were not available yet!) So we tried everything you can imagine and some you can't.

 The answer is complete replacement. The new complete radiators you can buy now days are so inexpensive that it has made tank replacement obsolete on all but the big industrial radiators and the most expensive automotive applications which is unfortunate for the radiator shops as we used to make good money changing plastic tanks, but alas everything changes.

 If you know of a technique that works to really repair a plastic radiator tank I would love to hear from you, and as always if you have any questions please give us a call we are always happy to help.
If you can't afford to replace your radiator I suggest adding water to your cooling system and saving your money till you can get it fixed. Also if the leak is real big don't drive your car with it leaking as this can and will cause engine damage from loss of coolant.
http://www.intermountainradiator.com