Heres the question guys.

I have an all out drag car that gets trailered to and from the drag strip for IFO events and such. The car is a 91 CRX Hf that has a stock cooling system including a stock radiator. The coolant ports to the intake are bypassed of course but the rest of the cooling system is stock. What im wanting to know is if there is a faster way to get the car up to peak temp which in my car is around 190 degrees. The reason I ask is because I have just started running Q16 and its pretty expensive plus it seems like my car takes forever to get up to 190 degrees most times as I reach the tree the temp is around 170 degrees. It never runs hot even after a pass she never sees 200 degrees. As soon as I run through the traps I switch on the fan just for good measure.

The shop I work for has an in house dyno dynamics dyno which we use constantly on customer cars and my race car of course which is how I know what temp the car is making peak hp at. I am tuned on s300 and run straight water in the cooling system. I used to work at a local drag strip and I remember having to clean coolant up off the racing surface so I just run water.

 

Oil heater on the bottom of the oil pan. Cook the oil while you're in the pits. Then go get in the lanes. Oil will be at operating temp when you go to fire and very little time to warm up, plus you can make your run without all the heat soak. You don't have to make your run at 190*f. As soon as oil temp is warm make your run.

 

Not a bad idea. They make electric pads you can glue to the oil pan to pre heat it

 

Is this a common practice? It sounds like a very good idea. Ill have to do some research. The bummer is I have no interwebs lol other than my phone. It makes internet browsing a little tougher.

 

oil sumps have this heating element threaded into them from the bottom. or you can simply weld a bung and thread this into your oil pan on the back side.

http://www.jegs.com/i/JEGS+Performan...FaR_QgodFgYA9A

 

sounds good. what abou't the warm up of the piston rings? they would still be cold

 

Yeah I talked to my boss about this last night. (Again I work in a performance oriented shop) he asked the same question and stated that he believes that max power is attained due to the cylinder getting to optimum temp.

 

that would be sweet if you could wire it to a switched 12v

 

Running any sort of electric heater off of the car battery will kill it in no time. You would have to have the car idling while its heating, which may speed up the entire process.

I believe there is a lot more to making power at a proper temp than just ring seal, but in sure that has a decent role in it

 

Dave,

I feel your pain on this. My car runs its fastest times when the operating temp is around 190-198. It also made the most power on your dyno at this temperature. It takes forever to get to that temperature, most of my runs are done around 170-175.

Johnny is coming up next Friday to track tune my car. Would love to see you come up as well homie!

--Ryan

 

Put the electric waterpump on a temp switch.

 

Everyone said I was crazy for doing this 3+ years ago.

It's been working great for me. Never over heat. I'm running a smaller radiator this year because of it.

 

I will look up some electric water pump info. I like the idea!!

I also like the idea of running a smaller radiator if for nothing else itll save weight. Tepid what radiator are you running?

 

exactly, with your car being a straight out drag car (i'm assuming it makes good hp) the piston ring to cylinder wall clearance would be too much. you would just have a lot of blow by exhaust

 

It's a Bell I/C core. You can get whatever size you want. You can get away with just a resivoir and no radiator, but you'll need a way to transfer heat in the pits. Coolers are not cheap....

 

Its just an all motor b series. It makes 260

 

NICE! what kind of torque numbers is it making?

 

181 tq. Its got a great torque curve but peaks the hp a little early at around 8700. I could use bigger cams.

 

How big of a reservoir are we talking? I have been racking my brain for a way to solve an issue of my radiator being in the way for a while. The downside is my car is built for a $2k budget I can't go over. A heat exchanger in the pits wouldn't hit the budget though since its not on the car while racing.

 

Phil what kind of racing are you doing?

 

Im getting the race radiator from dp it's tiny! I'm also running an electric water pump

 

Oil temp should be a better indicator of "operating temp" than say coolant temp...but for most street cars, the oil and coolant heat up at about the same rate, and then stay at nearly that same temperature together while driving.

The only other metric to me that would be important would be the temperature of the intake valve and whether that was hot enough to atomize fuel properly. I can only assume that a burnout should be MORE than enough time to bring the intake valve temp up enough to make combustion proper...

This gives me some ideas on things to test on my dyno...hrm

Thanks Andy for the tips in PM!

Or let the ECM control it...

 

Im sure the ecu would be the most reliable way to switch it!!! But im a hands on kind of drag racer I like to be able to control my temps myself. But for ease of use and reliability the ecu is the way to go.

 

Grassroots Motorsports Magazine $20XX Challenges. Buy the car and build it for (this year)$2013. Autox and concourse the first day, drag race the second day. The autox is typically 40 seconds long. If I can do a burnout, high 10 second run, then make it back to the pits with just a water tank. I'm sure I can make it through a 40 second run with a lot of off throttle time.

 

Not sure if many of you guys use or have seen/heard of block heaters. Up here in Canada, a block heater is installed on every new vehicle we PDI through the shop. Most customers will never use it, but some do, if parking outside and temps are forecasted to drop significantly.

For those who do not know. A brass fitting gets installed at the front of the block, just the right of the engine stamping (on B-series) and back of the block just below the Vtec solenoid on K motors. (Just remove the plug and replace it with the fitting and a crush washer, plug in the wire and that's it.

The brass fitting has an electric element built in and keeps coolant at a consistant "warm" temperature for easy start-up and reduced time to operating temperature in extreme cold situations running off of a standard 110-120amp house-plug.



If you guys are able to purchase them from a Honda/Acura dealership, I would suggest it. I know the kits can be scarce in the USA since most states will never see temps below freezing.

Although, if you CAN use one, plug it right in after each race to keep the coolant temp. maintained at a "warm" temp. and ready for the next run.

An oil-pan heater (similar to ones i've seen installed on volkswagen oil-pans) are also a great idea.