How to Check Coolant Level 1994-2002 Dodge Ram 1500

Hey friends. It's Len here at 1A Auto. Today we're going to be working on our 1996 Dodge Ram 1500. This is the 5.9. I want to show you something very basic, checking your coolant. We're going to come right under the hood and we'll check it out.

This right here is your coolant reservoir. Inside here you can see where there's a level. You've got your high or max and your low. If you're coolant's anywhere in between here and here, you're doing all right. If it's a little low, well you're going to want to add some, right? You've got to get it up in here. If it's above there, more than likely the vehicle's probably pretty hot. But if it's cold and it's above there, that's going to be an issue because when your vehicle warms up, the coolant expands inside your cooling system. Your radiator caps going on the inside. I'll show you. This is cold by the way. There's a spring loaded piston in there. When it heats up. This kind of goes like this and it allows fluid to come through this hose and into your overflow tank or your reservoir.

So fluid will come into here. If it's already filled up to here, where's the fluid going to go? It's going to come up, up, up, and it's going to want to come out. It can't come out through here. This is sealed. It's got a little thing right here. It's going to spill cooling out all over the ground, which is very, very bad. We do not want to pollute the environment. So, if you needed to add any coolant, let's say that this one's low, right? Which it is. You would, obviously, come over to your radiator, take a peek inside there. The coolant looks like it's full to me, so I'm not worried about the radiator.

We'll put this back on here. Turn that so it's tight. Now we just need to add this. Okay? So to add, pop this open and then you're going to use your manufacturer specified coolant on this, which is, for this vehicle it's going to be the green. I'll go grab some of that and we'll be able to move along.

Okay, so we grabbed ourselves some coolant. It's important to make sure no matter what type of coolant you grabbed or brand, you read the bottle and make sure that it's already diluted. If it's not diluted, it'll say concentrate, in which case you'll have to make sure you go 50/50 with the coolant. This one says prediluted. Do not add water.

Just going come right over here. Trying my darnedest to spill as little as possible, of course. Yeah, that's good. It's just below the maximum. We're going to take this. Push this right down on there. Bonk, bonk, and there we are. Easy-peasy.

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