I've had to add coolant to a hot running engine therefore I know it
can be done, so I'd say yeah go for it.... just top up the system as
much as you can afterwards and then when you start the engine, top up
the rest as the water pump pushed the bubbles round the system.
Having a 2nd person at the front to bleed the radiator in real time
would be handy, but not vital.

my technique is to open
the pressurized tank a tad and burp the gas out first. Then if the
coolant rushes into the tank, to rev the engine hard using the
throttle on the engine block. This causes the level to get sucked
back down and enables me to remove the cap fully and top up the level
while hot. You have to keep the engine revving all this time
otherwise the coolant overflows. Other than that its pretty
straightforward... oh and use a funnel!

Peter
84 Westy

At 5:55 PM -0500 11/19/03, Kevin Carrubba wrote:
>Volks,
>  Replacing hose from T-Stat Houseing to Coolant Dist.
>My mechanic said I have to drian from the cyl heads then change hose
>then bleed.  What would happen if I just yanked out the hose with
>drain pans underneath and put in the new hose and bleed system?  Is
>this going to trap air in the system because I did not drain it
>properly.  Just trying to not pull those head shields off to speed
>up the process.
>Thanks
>Kevin
>87 Westy