What is this?

I am in the middle of doing a full coolant flush and water pump / thermostat change on an M42. I pulled the radiator so I could run some water from the hose through it and as I was finishing I was shaking the radiator around to get all the excess water out from the fins and I heard a rattling coming from inside. I thought that was unusual and was able to shake this [attachment 41 BMW003.JPG] piece of tubing out of the upper hole in the radiator[attachment 42 BMW004.JPG]...the one next to the coolant expansion tank. Why would this be in there and is my radiator ruined if this came out of it? The car has had a history of running hot and I am wondering if this might be the problem. When I ran the water through the radiator the water seemed to flow through pretty good...maybe it is flowing through only a portion of the radiator thus not getting the full use of the fins. I would really like to figure this out before I reinstall everything and end up with the same problem. Thanks for the help everyone!

Cripes!!! Has the car always run hot? I would think the worse you could do is just button everything back up and see how it runs. Sure looks like someone did something silly!!

alan

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alanrw
Cripes!!! Has the car always run hot? I would think the worse you could do is just button everything back up and see how it runs. Sure looks like someone did something silly!!

alan

I purchased the car knowing there was a problem that two previous owners could not resolve. I figured that they just did not know how to bleed the system properly or had a bad sensor or gauge. I figured that this would not be very hard to figure out as you just eliminate each thing one at a time. The radiator looks pretty new so I was surprised that this came out of it. I guess you never can second guess what a PO has done!

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I guess you never can second guess what a PO has done![/quote]

.....ain't that the understatement of the week!!!

alan