Running warm

[123-jn]

Hi folks, I see alot of threads on vans running hot or hotter now the weather seems to be here. Mine was running fine but with the stat only starting to open at 87 degrees the engine is soon having to turn on the fan to keep things cool, It takes a while for the temp to come back down, I decided that this yo-yo temperature cannot be good for the engine, 85 degrees then up to 95 fan comes on temp continues up to over 100 before the cooler water from the rad starts to cool it back to 83 then a few miles on another slight incline and off we go again. I have now fitted an 80 degrees stat from a golf VR6. This has the effect of keeping the coolant at around 83-85 degrees for normal driving (instead of 90-93). Now when I go up an incline probably due to the stat being wider open sooner the temperature peaks at around 90 degrees and begins to fall back (no fan required) The only time it gets any hotter is on a real low gear climb when my auto box heats up and the heat is dumped into the cooling water, the fan then comes on at around 95 degrees (top of rad ) with an infra red thermometer (the temp gauge reads just above the led ). previously with the old stat this would have caused the fan to run and sometimes on full speed, which is fine but the temperature range in the engine during this is too wide.(up to 110 deg) Once I've got the new auto gearbox cooler fitted the coolant will not have to cool the gearbox as well so all should be even more regular and even in temperature.

[cshots]

this sounds like a good solution, is there a chance that you'll just mask issues with the cooling system though because you won't notice how hot it's getting?
otherwise I'd be quite keen to try it, where did you get the vr6 stat?
cheers

[Bigjcc55]

I've used the brickwerks 80 deg stat.
http://www.brickwerks.co.uk/index.php/t ... 1l-80.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[123-jn]

In answer to the masking question, My RAD is clear but old and could be more efficient and possibly with a nice new one the large temp range may not be as bad, but some fool (me) fitted an LPG tank in the way of radiator removal and decided not to change the rad first!!!! The lower temp stat (available from all good motor factors mine was £9.00) gives my rad a better chance as a bigger flow flows sooner through the rad. with the original one it still only sends a small flow at 87 degrees, by the time enough water has been cooled and has got back to the engine the temperature has risen fast. With the new stat for some reason the temperature stays more even with a shorter range. Possibly because the Rad is being used more but I don't really understand. It just works. Before the temperature gauge was like a YO-Yo even tried two new stats. It ranged from on the led to just short of the top stop with just a short hill making the difference. Now it stays on the led and a hill just takes it about 2 mm to the right. Engine coolant temperature stays around 85-90 degrees give or take 5 degrees (measured in the outlet to the rad with an infra red thermometer and in the heater circuit) I have yet to take a reading while driving up a hill but it cant be too bad or the gauge would go up further

[cshots]

brilliant, thanks for the info. have just done this mod, will report back when I've got some experience of it on the roads.
first impressions are that you can here the fan kicking in at low speed a lot earlier (just when warming up to bleed the system) so have positive rumblings for the effects in real situations.