Concerns for Richard & Matt

[Phaeton]

Guys,

Jut reading through your blog & came across this "Using the standard Mini gasket we refit to the cylinder head and run the water pipe from this straight thru the heated inlet manifold and back to the top hose." Shouldn't that go into the bottom hose not top hose otherwise you're actually bypassing your thermostat.

Please corrct me if I'm wrong, I usually am.

Alan..

 

[hmalan]

Alan,

I have read lots about this on mini forums and there are as many differant views as there are as to whether or not you should connect up a heated manifold.

If you connect to bottom hose, as would be on a normal mini, without having the heater matrix / radiator in place you are putting hot water into the supply that has just been cooled by the radiator, if you put it into the top hose it should then be cooled by the radiator and your thermostat should still be acting upon the temperature of the water in the block.

There are some that say connecting it to the top hose will mean that the pressure from the block, in the larger top hose, will cause a back pressure/ dead area in the pipe back to the manifold.

With the manifolds the overall view on the mini forums seems to be that connecting them up is supposed to lose you a few bhp but is also supposed to make the engine run smoother and more economicaly and assist in cold weather.

I think it really is a case of suck it and see.

I have connected mine into my top hose, and I have also decided to connect up my water heated manifold.

Alan T.

 

[RichardG]

I was looking at all the buggies at Newark and think they all had a different set up.

Danny I think had it plumbed in the same as me but he had an extra heater matrix "rad" fitted between the heater valve outlet and the inlet manifold as well as a long loop of pipe to the front of the buggy to increase capacity.

I picked up a similar heater matrix type rad at Newark and plan to fit in same way as Danny but without the big loop. This I guess means that the hot water from the heater valve gets some cooling before it goes thru the inlet manifold and back into the bottom home.

Also planning to fit an electric fan that will blow cold air thru the heater matrix across the front of the engine so that the viscous fan is being fed with cooler air to push out thru the radiator. Hope that makes sense :?:

Time will tell!

Richard