Block heater replacement for Cummins C8.3
My block heater has shorted out. It's cold out. The block heater fits into a freeze plug hole in the block and is held in place with an allen bolt that threads into a flat metal keeper that you insert into the hole and then draws down tight with the allen bolt wedging the heater assembly to the side of the block. Kind of like a sheet rock anchor. It will require draining the coolant from the block, removing the old heater and installing a new one.
The block heater tripped a breaker, reset breaker and tripped immediately. Disconnected a very burned plug connection at block, plug ruined and continuity check shows OL at the two prongs of the heater in the block.
My coolant was changed to Fleetguard OAT "permanent" coolant in 2018. Can I catch the coolant and reuse it? Does it need to be filtered if reused? Or should it simply be replaced?
Also struggling to find a place to do this project. I'm full timing and wonder if this is just one of those times to bite the bullet and take it to a shop.
We are camping in cold weather a lot more than we imagined. We've been to Portland to help take care of grandkids while they were kept out of daycare during the Thanksgiving to Christmas time, New Mexico for an "outdoor Christmas celebration" in mid-January, and now short listed for a Covid vaccine requiring more cold weather camping. They ran out the day before we were supposed to receive it and we are waiting for a call back.
Topic: Block heater replacement for Cummins C8.3