Umm... you can't just toss in any random coolant.

 

What happens if you're cruisin' down the road and for some reason start losing coolant? Without the low coolant warning light you'll continue driving until you notice an unusual rise in temperature. By then you've already overheated the engine.

If the low coolant light was functional you would have been warned before enough coolant has been lost to create an overheat situation.

I would never recommend unplugging a sensor as the cure, but that's just me...

 

You know GM took away the sensor right? It caused more problems than it was worth.

 

i was haveing the same problems on my 2001 monte carlo ss and i could not find a leak then one night i went out to the car in the dark and was just looking around with the car ideling and with the car cold i could not see anything then when the coolant heated up i saw some smoke in my led flashligh beam turns out it was steam the heater coolant elbows on the left side of the engine buy all the pullys had a small crack in it and did not cause a flowing stream just a pin hole stream that shoots out pretty good under throttel so i replaced them and it was farly easy just make sure you get all of the tube out and replace both upper and lower elbows at this time use a pick to work the broken parts out and then replace them . this fixed my coolant levle going down and the sensor i replace wich took care of the light going on and off hope this helps it was very easy to overlook due to not much of a stream unless the engine was reved up and seen it at night in the dark with led light oh and do not use the old green antifreeze use the gm red brand i cant remember the name just make sure it is gm certified for your car

 

Hello,
For all that want to know what GM says and what I have learned from real world experience. If your vehicle came with Dexcool (orange) you MUST use Dexcool and only Dexcool approved. You CANNOT use the yellow "universal" as this is not the truth. The yellow universal is NOT universal. In an emergency, sure. But as soon as possible, drain and replace with orange Dexcool.If your vehicle came with Dexcool but has been switched over to green or yellow then you must stay with that. Once you mix GREEN WITH ORANGE YOU MUST FLUSH THE SYSTEM. These two types of coolant, mixed together, create a chemical imbalance which accelerates the process of electrolysis. This will eat holes in your head gaskets, heater core, radiator, basically anythiong the coolant touches will get eaten. This will not happen overnight but it will happen.
If your vehicle has Dexcool and you are in a situation where you must add coolant and Dexcool is not available you are better off using water.
For what it is worth, I am an ASE certified mechanic with 26 years of experience. I have been employed with O'Reilly auto parts going on 8 years now. I've seen horror stories and can speak from experience.