Low Conductivity Coolant Change Procedure

Too bad it's in poorly translated-from-korean. What do we think "after adding water in the water coolant" means?
If any dilution is intended, it would have to be distilled or deionized water, or we're right back to "conductive".

_H*

 

From the context of running the pump to purge the air, it seems pretty clear that the better wording would be something like "The function to activate the electric water pump is to purge trapped air after adding coolant to the coolant reservoir, so that the level reads correctly."

The procedure seems pretty straightforward. The only thing worth worrying about is making sure you're using the correct coolant at the correct concentration. I've seen some discussions about this (not sure if on this forum or not though) and IIRC the coolant isn't anything super exotic or proprietary, but you should still make sure what you're using is appropriate.

 

Took me a while to find this, it's in the battery replacement procedure, blue coolant p/n:

 

Yeah there it is! That part number is Hyundai's brand of blue engine coolant and is used in a lot of their vehicles. Readily available stuff.

 

I can't find any vendor source for that blue coolant part number.

I located the owner's manual for the Ioniq 5 to see if it uses the same coolant. Well, surprise, it uses both types! Perhaps they're trying to minimise the quantity required for this absurdly-priced liquid. I can't find a replacement interval for the Ioniq 5 but for the EV6 all I could find was one reference at 210,000 km.

 

My understanding is that the stuff is not to be diluted. Maybe that has changed and they now have a concentrate?

 

I would like to know more about this low conductivity coolant, what it is made of and similar stuff.
And from historical perspective would like to know it this was a result of panic mode inside Hyundai after first battery fires or is it really a valid choice from them.
Big corporations when in panic mode and not knowing what went wrong can make many weird decisions down the road.
What Tesla uses as a coolant?

 

From the images above with my markups:

 

From my 2+ hours of research yesterday the issue of EV coolant normally being partly conductive kicked off some years ago when an EV caught fire in China some hours after a formal crash test. It was determined that coolant had leaked into the battery housing and caused a short and slow thermal runaway. From that there was concern that occupants of vehicles involved in a crash would have sufficient time to leave before a similar thing happened.

But there's very little info on the subject overall regarding EV applications and although I understand Hyundai specifying this special coolant in an abundance of caution I'm also wondering why it requires relatively frequent replacement on the 2020+ Kona but not the new Ioniq 5? One article on industrial coolants intended for general wet electrical usage said that the coolant draws ions from surrounding materials (metals and plastics) and slowly gets more conductive. I do notice that the Ioniq 5 cooling tubes are made up of a large panel and may have a lot less connections and perhaps a more optimal choice of materials than the Kona, which by our observations, has been updated to the blue coolant without any other related changes.

There's also a developing technology involving lithium-ion cells placed directly in the coolant to provide the minimum thermal resistance, allowing optimum cell performance. Clearly that's a far more complicated application than just the safety margin provided in the Kona's case.

There's also some information about the coolant used in high-power charging cables and plugs, again a more direct application and costly fluids are not unexpected.

https://www.breakinglatest.news/business/byd-responded-to-han-ev-caught-fire-after-being-collided-different-batches-of-coolants-are-of-different-colors-and-do-not-conduct-electricity-it-and-traffic/

https://www.cnet.com/roadshow/news/coolant-likely-cause-of-volt-fires-says-ap-source/

https://www.electronics-cooling.com/2015/12/tech-brief-low-electrical-conductivity-liquid-coolants-for-electronics-cooling/

https://chargedevs.com/newswire/liquid-cooling-in-electric-vehicles-what-to-know-to-keep-evs-on-the-go/

https://www.electronics-cooling.com/2020/03/keeping-cool-as-the-electric-vehicle-market-heats-up/

 

I am and will continue to be a DIY. I've done many jobs and learned quite a few from just researching and doing. Many times my work is better than so called 'Professionals'. I had my 2019 Kona EV in for a recall (the battery cable one). I have paperwork that states it was done, yet the dealership said it wasn't performed! Very hard to trust such dealerships. Anyway, my thought on the coolant ... if it any way affects my battery warranty (which for the 2019 is 'lifetime'), I would not want to jeopardize voiding the warranty. So, as much as it would really bother me, I would probably have to 'submit' to having an authorized Hyundai dealership perform the work - UGH!

 

In my 2019 owner's manual, the maintenance schedule calls for coolant replacement at 192000km...

 

That's good to hear! I hadn't looked at when it was due, in my 2019. So I've got lot's of time then before having to deal with it. Thanks for letting me know the requirement for coolant flush/change.

 

^^^^^
Don't they do a coolant change, when they replace the battery?