At 11:12 AM 3/3/2005, you wrote:
>Ken certainly knows more about all things mechanical than I do, but
>why would you drain you coolant and then have to go through the whole
>system bleeding process when you could just clamp off the lines and
>top up as I have suggested?

Perhaps it's to encourage(force?) people to change their coolant regularly.
Actually, it just sounds like a case of "cheap insurance" to me.  If I was
changing an oil cooler for a customer, I think I'd probably mandate a
coolant and associated hose change just to mitigate perceived liability. If
I've learned nothing else in my own line of work doing repair and
replacement, it's the principle of "last man buys". In other words, if a
part fails and you were the last one to touch it, the failure will be seen
as YOUR fault, even if the part failed for reasons unrelated to the work
you did. If I was changing an oil cooler, I'd change the hoses going to it
as well rather than risk reusing the old stuff, stressing it in the process
(clamp, loosen, yank; push, tighten, unclamp) and having it possibly spring
a leak later.

John Bange
'90 Vanagon "Geldsauger"