MAYBE SOMETHING YOU DID NOT KNOW,
ABOUT HEATING PROBLEMS

by Bob Forest (your roving reporter)


What is this about the heating problems of some cars. Our MGA at 65 miles per hour and over would show a temperature of 205 to 210, but never go higher. I could idle all day, and no problems. Under 65, it was at 195 degrees.

I am also a member of NAMGAR and they have a magazine called the MGA. In the July/August issue there was an article on Engine Coolant. I could not believe what I was reading.

Here is the article written by Dean Butler for the MGA:

"An item that I picked up from the MG Vintage Racers' e-mail list concerned cooling. If anyone needs to be concerned with the efficient cooling of an MGA, it should be someone who races one. So I thought that the information might be of some use to the "street user" of the MGA.

The original question came from Ed Cronin- "Last month there was some discussion about what to use in the cooling system. Does any club frown on adding water pump lube to the coolant? It makes the water appear whitish and is supposed to provide some corrosion protection."

The response was provided by Dean Butler as follows. "Re. Coolant: This is something I got into in great depth several years ago, wrote some articles, etc. The key conclusion with regard to coolant are: 1-The most efficient coolant for a race car is plain water. Plain water absorbs nearly twice as many calories of heat as a 50/50 mixture of water and ethylene glycol antifreeze. One cc of plain water absorbs one calorie of heat for each Celsius degree of temperature increase. A 50/50 mixture absorbs only 0.56 calories per cc. Of course antifreeze raises the boiling temperature of water, but a 50/50 mixture will boil long before plain water will boil, and this is true whether or not the system is pressurized. This is not intuitive, but I can take you through the math if you do not belie me! I drove my 1931 1750 Alfa on the Colorado Grand a few years ago, and it boiled very quickly with a 50/50 mixture. I then drained the cooling system and refilled it with plain tap water. The car ran 15 degrees Celsius cooler and did not boil again, even on long uphill runs.

2-Midly hard tap water is safer for your car than distilled water or very hard water. The worst water you can use is distilled water. Distilled or deionized water is very aggressive Water "wants" to contain minerals and distilled water will attack cast iron and aluminum far more aggressively than mildly hard tap water.

3-There is an additive you should use - one of the additives such as Nalcool made for the trucking industry. These additives are not antifreeze. They are an additive mixture which stops electrolytic action in the cooling system, lowers water surface tension for increased heat transfer and coats aluminum with a compound which slows corrosion. Nalcool comes in two versions. One is for cast iron engines which have a few aluminum parts, and the other is for engines with a lot of aluminum. You can buy Nalcool at most truck service garages. 4-Water pump lubricant additive is not going to hurt anything, with or without antifreeze and it may help lubricate water pump seals, although the effectiveness would be only over more miles than most of us are going to do with our (race)cars.

5-Ethylene glycol antifreeze is very corrosive. Fresh antifreeze contains compounds which offset the corrosiveness - but these wear out in about two years, leaving your engine very vulnerable."

So after reading this(Bob Forest here speaking), on a very hot day in July, I drove my car at 70 miles per hour, and there was the 205 degrees. I headed back home, waited for the engine to cool down, drained all the antifreeze from rad and engine block. Did a rinse, then filled the system with plain tap water. (I wanted to see before spending the $15.00 if it worked) Did the same route, and could not get the temperature over 190 degrees. So it does work. Then I headed to Cummings Diesel on the TransCanada west of St. Charles and ordered the Nalcool, but the parts manager, said that is Detroit Diesel product and we carry Fleetguard DCA60L(same stuff), also ask for the strips and chart, this is to check that you have the right amount in.

For those of you who drive a fair amount every summer, and want more comfort and less worry, I highly suggest to go this route. We drove 1500 miles on this trip, and a few times going up a hill it hit 198 degrees. As you all know the weather was hot, hot and hot.

Don't forget when Fall comes around to drain and keep the product, and refill with Antifreeze for the winter. I know it is work, but it is only done once in the spring, and once in the fall. Then happy cool driving.

©VEA
 

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