Green vs. Gold (yet another thread)

[cmac2012]

I know the topic has been beat to death, but my angle here is different. I’ve been raving about my mechanic and his MB diesel expertise. I recently got my SDL back with the new-ish engine and tranny he put in. It runs really well, what little I have run it. Before I go too far I wanted to put in a new lower radiator hose, get the rear axle shafts renewed somehow, and a new steering gear installed.

Today I installed the lower hose, a silicone unit I bought from HPS. A bit spendy, but it’s a hard item to find, and the silicone is supposed to last longer than I will.

I was a bit shocked when I drained the coolant to see that it was bright fluorescent green. I never had a conversation with my man about coolant, and here it is.

So I searched the topic yet again, and quite a few people say the green is not that much of a disaster. One guy on an older thread from Benzwhirled claims that the gold coolant is particularly friendly to the plastic in the stock radiator tank necks. My car has an all aluminum radiator now, there is the coolant reservoir that’s plastic, but it appears to be a different sort of plastic than in the original radiators. OTOH, those tanks are not available now - made with unobtainium.

This would be a really lousy time to try to flush all of the green coolant out, and I understand the green and gold don’t play well together.

May the MB Diesel gods not smite me, i’m thinking to run the green, at least for six months to a year. Somebody splain to me if possible why this is a bad idea.