I'll preface this by saying I've only had the land rover for a week and this is/was my first time I flushed the coolant. Just got my new thermostat minutes ago from the fedex man so I'm ready to get this thing finished. My situation:

My driveway is on an incline so I'm planning to follow this procedure and I would like you guys's input. I've heard of air getting trapped in the system after replacing the water pump and such and I'm hoping to avoid anything like that.

In picture one, nose pointing down:

1) drain from the block
2) flush radiator through top hose and out bottom
3) install new thermostat
4) put everything back together
5) refill at reservoir, top off at drain plug (I bought a tiny funnel)

Then I'll pull the land rover forward off the ramps:

1) let it sit for a while
2) check reservoir level, and top off at drain plug

Anything I'm not taking into consideration? The engine will be running for less than 10 seconds during this process.

 

land rover service factory manual RAVE download land rover resource, service manual, workshop factory manual, download, rave, vehicles including discovery, series, defender, range rover, freelander, LR3, Handbooks, Catalog, Catalogue, Land Rover Inte

You want to download this service manual for your year model. You will find how to properly flush and refill the coolant system. The motor should not be running in the initial phases of air bleeding

 

Thank you! I downloaded what I thought was the RAVE manual, and well it was, but it was a zip file full of a hundred or so different pdfs with meaningless names.

 

You need to do it the other way,!!
Put the ramp under front tires to raise as much as you can, then bleed the system as engine is cold (not running), that will put heater core water level a little lower than front of engine ,
When you bleed the air out , put reservoir cap back on & run engine untill fully hot
(keep front tires on ramp), then turn engine off & let it cool down, this will allow the air to burp out from heater core, then refill coolant in reservoir,
Keep an eye on coolant level for next few days, because all air doesn't come out of heater core at once,,,,, but after a few cycles of engine getting to temp & cooling off again, all the air in heater core will be replaced with coolant,,

 

This sounds like a great way to get all of the air out but what about when I want to thoroughly flush the old coolant out?

 

Didn't you flush it already,?
By the way you can not get rid of all coolant by just draining it, if want to clean cooling system from old stuff, then need to connect hoses back fill it with water (distiller water is best) then run engine a little & drain again ,,

 

Twice I've drained as much as possible, filled with distilled water, ran to temp, then drained again. I did this while waiting for my thermostat to arrive and I wanted to do it one last time and fill with a little concentrate to balance out what water is left in the system and then fill it up with 50/50. I'd still like to get as much of what is in there out before refilling and considering it driveable.

 

I use this...

http://www.irontite.com/store/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=4

 

Cooling system holds aproximately 12qt's ,
The way you flushed it pretty good, but when you drain usually 8-85qt comes out, if you want to have a 50/50 coolant water ratio, most accurate way is to fill with 6qt concentrate which is half of system capacity, then top off with distiller water,,,

 

rave-lr.pdf is the starting point. Most everything else is linked from that.