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[bigegg]

Just been given a 3.0 V6 Manual omega elite by the widow of a bloke who lives down the street.

60k miles, and *very* nice.

It's been off the road about a month, since he died, and just before that the car had a leaking HBV replaced.
Unfortunately, the muppet who replaced the HBV didn't use coolant to replace the lost fluid -
yep, tap water 

You've guessed it - went to collect the car this morning and the radiator pipes and header tank (and everything else) is frozen solid. It was -13c here last night.

So...
fastest way to defrost? I'm thinking neat antifreeze into the header tank and wait for it to filter through, defrosting as it goes.
Or should I just wait for the weather to warm up? Will towing the car damge anything?

I tried to turn the engine over before I noticed the frozen pipes - am I likely to have done any serious damage?
(like to the water pump or timing belt?)

[tunnie]

I'd be concerned about rapidly de-frosting that, I'd be inclined to let it happen naturally. Wait until it defrosts on its own, then flush well and re-fill with correct mixture of anti-freeze.

[tango]

let it deforst naturally
towing should be fine
but remember under no circumstances try to crank the engine or being a manual move the car while in gear

[bigegg]

let it deforst naturally
towing should be fine
but remember under no circumstances try to crank the engine or being a manual move the car while in gear

too late 

[aaronjb]

Water pump on the V6's isn't cambelt driven, so it can't cause the valves to crash (AFAIK) - of course the belt that does drive it won't be too happy going around and either that drive belt would slip or the impeller would fall off the water pump (oops!)

Let it thaw, put coolant in it and then cross your fingers and hope that the freezing hasn't blown any of the freeze plugs out! Otherwise you've got a lot of work on your hands..

[albitz]

Water pump doesnt run off cambelt on V6,so shouldnt think there was any harm done by cranking it over. Although it might have put some strain on the aux. belt. Assuming you dont have a garage to park it in to thaw out ?.......more extremely cold weather could cause (more ?) damage.I would be wanting to get it thawed and drain the water personally.You may be faced with core plugs popped out,cracked rad,or worst case scenario, a cracked block.
Fan heater,small paraffin heater or similar available ?

Should,ve typed faster.

[Andy H]

Replacing the HBV shouldn't require a total replacement of the coolant. If you are lucky the system will still have some antifreeze in and the coolant will have turned to slush. It is not a good idea to start an engine with slush in the coolant system because the lumps will (temporarily) block coolant passages (and the pump won't like it) but the slush doesn't do the same damage that hard frozen water does.

If you are unlucky the previous owner topped up a leaking system several times with tap water and diluted the coolant to the point of insignificance. A hard frozen engine will have popped core plugs and may have cracked the block or a cylinder head 

[bigegg]

pipes that I can feel are frozen solid, as is the header tank.

 

still, it's got a few parts that I can take for the mv6...   

[Lazydocker]

Afraid it's just a waiting game now It may be OK, but you won't know until it thaws and you run it up

I expect the water pump might be shot as you tried turning it over but, again, it's a waiting game

Fingers crossed for you

[Elite Pete]

If your lucky the core plugs at the back of the heads will probably have popped out if your unlucky you could have a cracked block. 

[bigegg]

checked at about 1pm, and the top radiator hose felt it was full of slush, so disconnected it and drained out as much as I could.
Poured a litre of neat basf GX48 antifreeze into the hose and radiator.
Reconnected hose and poured another litre into the header tank.
"Pumped" the big hose to mix it up a bit.
Left it to stand til 6.15 this evening, and she started. 

The engine management light is on [1], and exhaust seems to be badly blowing, but no major water leaks (left it running 20 mins and system is pressurised with no apparent drop in water level).

No apparent misfires, so I'm guessing engine block is OK?

I'll drive it to my unit tomorrow and have a good look round it, but first impression seems to be I might just be lucky.

[1] I'll have to find my paperclip 

thanks for all the help

[tgm147]

Sounds like you've got away with it, just listen out for any weird noise from the pump. It still may be damaged but for now, I'd say you got away with it!