Ahhh,
I see, I completely understand, now!
The metal fins thinned to the point of catastrophic-failure!
I know cavitation can occur in certain fluids under certain velocities, and, under certain circumstances. Cavitation will typically result in the eating away of components which are immersed within the agitated (boiling-type) water. I wonder how much antifreeze prevents cavitation and how much of this could be related to cavitation.
I know in hydronic boiler systems, the system is a closed system, and after a while a lot of the oxygen is removed from the water, thus making it like black sludge, which still works fine within the boiler vessel and within hydronic heating baseboards, radiators, etc. I suppose, though, the fact that the car typically has an open-design, being open to the radiator canister could account for oxygen constantly being dispersed within the water for the entire cooling system whereas a boiler has an Extrol tank which is a diaphragm tank which takes up the necessary space of the expanding water as it is heated and pushes that water back into the closed system as the water contracts, taking up less space as it cools.