R6 changing coolant without bike running?

I have a 2019 r6 that is stored outside under a cover in Virginia. It has water wetter in it, so I need to replace with antifreeze for the winter. Easy, normally. The issue is I crashed a few weekends ago and had to get surgery on broken wrist. The bike is not starting, and I'm not really up to trying to get it running right now with one usable hand.

I can drain the coolant in the radiator, but the engine side of the cooling system is going to be blocked by the thermostat. Normally you warm it up to flush the entire system, but I can't do that since I can't get it started.

Does any one have any idea how I might flush or replace the entire system? Would unscrewing the thermostat cover on the left side work?

Thanks

 

you can use a compressor airline at the cap to evac the whole system with the drain open. Then just fill with glycol or leave empty.

 

Will that evac the entire system though? Maybe the pressure opens the thermostat?

I might be misunderstanding how the cooling system works; I thought there are two "sides" that are separated by the thermostat: the radiator/water pump side and the engine side. When the coolant gets to temperature, the thermostat opens and allows the coolant to move through both sides. Essentially, the coolant in the engine is not circulating until the bike gets warm and is sealed off when the thermostat is closed. So opening the drain and the radiator will therefore only empty one part of the system.

 

Typically the thermostat will have a small hole to allow a small amount of coolant to circulate before it actually opens, but mainly (I think) to allow air to be escape when you refill.

 

the drain is at the lowest point so the thermostat is irrelevant other than purging air out when refilling

 

That makes sense. I've been looking over the piping and coolant flow in the service manual, and I can't find anywhere in the system that is sealed off by the thermostat. It looks like it acts as a wall that eventually opens to improve flow, but it does not close off the engine from connecting to the drain.

Thanks for the help.