Radiator replacement at 90k miles

11bravoZ71 · December 20, 2023

hello fellow GM drivers. happy holidays.
I wanted to ask Has anybody had their radiator crack on their 19+ Sierra Silverados. Mine cracked on the driver side plastic side. It bulged outwards. I did do a coolant drain and fill not to long ago. Perhaps I didn’t bleed the air enough and over pressure caused it to crack. Found this failure really strange. If anybody has any knowledge on how to remove It. I’d appreciate it. I managed to get some some JB WELD. On the crack without removing it or sanding the plastic. But it lasted 5 days because I didn’t prep it and sand the surface because I couldn’t reach in between the condenser enough. So the epoxy cracked and leaked ……

Already have a OEM unit being shipped. Just wondering if anybody had experiences removing this radiator on this body style. Because it looks over engineered like All vehicles nowadays. Have to remove a lot of plastics.
It’s a 2019 Silverado CC Z71

5.3 8speed

OG owner. keeping this bad boy forever.

the uploaded image was found on Reddit from Some other truck 19+ owner. I have the same EXACT. Failure location. Strange.

Edited December 20, 2023 by 11bravoZ71

Bikerjon · December 20, 2023

1 hour ago, 11bravoZ71 said:

hello fellow GM drivers. happy holidays.
I wanted to ask Has anybody had their radiator crack on their 19+ Sierra Silverados. Mine cracked on the driver side plastic side. It bulged outwards. I did do a coolant drain and fill not to long ago. Perhaps I didn’t bleed the air enough and over pressure caused it to crack. Found this failure really strange. If anybody has any knowledge on how to remove It. I’d appreciate it. I managed to get some some JB WELD. On the crack without removing it or sanding the plastic. But it lasted 5 days because I didn’t prep it and sand the surface because I couldn’t reach in between the condenser enough. So the epoxy cracked and leaked ……

Already have a OEM unit being shipped. Just wondering if anybody had experiences removing this radiator on this body style. Because it looks over engineered like All vehicles nowadays. Have to remove a lot of plastics.
It’s a 2019 Silverado CC Z71

5.3 8speed

OG owner. keeping this bad boy forever.

the uploaded image was found on Reddit from Some other truck 19+ owner. I have the same EXACT. Failure location. Strange.

Sh***y plastic side tank on the radiator. I've seen a lot of them leak. Never done one on a T1. This is not unusual. They usually leak between the tank and radiator core.

redwngr · December 20, 2023

Radiators (on anything) can fail, but it had nothing to do with air not bleed out.

11bravoZ71 · December 20, 2023

Thanks for the replies fellas. Perhaps it was just bad luck. Being plastic and all. A high quality all metal one for this body style would be nice. Once I get the new radiator and I remove this one and install I’ll update on the difficulty of the job.

silveradosid · December 20, 2023

mine 2020 failed at 32k miles, warranty fixed it

11bravoZ71 · December 27, 2023

To those who might need to someday replace their radiator DIY on the 19+ GM trucks. I Got the radiator installed. I watched YouTube videos of the previous body style 14-18 trucks. And the process was very similar if not very close. A 3 hour job but in retrospect fairly easy. this video was spot on. Even though it’s the previous body style. It guided me through till done. I did have to remove skid plate to make the job easier. Just do it.

Attached I have my cracked crappy JB patch on the old radiator LOL.
On the new radiator I lightly sanded the same area and applied JB WELD. As a preemptive move because it seems these radiators crack in this exact spot for some reason.