Hello Eric, I am going to use the prep fluid. I service and repair Japanese cars 5 days a week, the cooling systems are generally unmaintained.
I worked on a Mitsubishi yesterday that had such a horrible rusting problem that it would be impossible to clean out without using acid type cleaners
(or a complete tear down and rebuild), which on a engine that age would cause more irreputable damage than it would be worth, (the acid cleaner that is).
the truth is.... from new these SD's and inside all water cooled engines the cooling systems are corroding and have a chemical electrolysis
reaction taking place inside, this over time will cause the metal to corrode away at worst,
at best you remove the bad junk every 24 months and totally flush and neutralize this so it does not have a chance to build up.