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Thu Sep 26, 2013 6:46 pm

I have a 78 westy and I was thinking about how to keep a cool head when climbing some of these hills in Az and Co in the summer.Back in the old country when I drove LR Defenders i had a windshield sprayer on to the radiator for those hot moments. I am thinking there is no reason why such a set up aimed in to the engine cooling air intake would not have a similar cooling benefit. Water goes in when the ' emergency cooling' button is pressed , steals some heat , turns to steam and exits. The aircooled equivalent of nitrous ? :-)

Why not ?

Thu Sep 26, 2013 7:29 pm

I would think that you would need more than a squirt of water to do anything useful. Might be fun to scare tailgaters though with a puff of steam :lol:

Thu Sep 26, 2013 7:42 pm

That is an added benefit !

Actually I found on the LR that if its set up right you will get about 10-20F reduction with 30s of water. Its on my TBD list...I dont see a downside, yet.

Thu Sep 26, 2013 9:01 pm

other than carrying around 100 gallon tank @8 pounds or so per gallon cause it is the 10 - 50 mile climbs that will give you trouble, not 30 second hills. If you have driven your bus in the rain you will know it is not like the engine temps fall thru the floor. You might even work against yourself in some cases because while condensed water is much more dense than air, vaporized water is less dense than air so you would lower the amount of molecules flowing by the engine. You would also lower compression as well as add moisture inside the bus if the heat exchangers are open.

It would be an interesting experiment but taking your foot off the floor a little will accomplish the same. Owning a bus is in part learning how to be patient when driving and everyone is flying past you but try it and let us know how it goes.

Thu Sep 26, 2013 9:46 pm

Why not a full flow oil system with a fan and a thermostat?

Thu Sep 26, 2013 10:09 pm

Did you see the thread by Colin about driving his early baywindow bus through Death Valley in the peak of summer? I'm satisifed that a properly maintained, stock engine will do just fine even in the hottest of climates.

Do you figure that rapid cooling of your engine by means of water on a hot day may cause thermal cracking? Sure a rainstorm gets things wet, but isn't the weather (and so the intake air) already cool? I would be very concerned about rapid, moist cooling on a hot air cooled engine.

Thu Sep 26, 2013 10:43 pm

How about a CO2 bottle on top of the fan and shoot some to get your engine to a decent temperature.

Thu Sep 26, 2013 10:52 pm

A properly tuned and maintained bus will LONG outlast the driver in intense heat. 8)

Fri Sep 27, 2013 1:29 am

Drive every day here. Run 20/50w oil. Plan your trip. Any big climes or grades try to make early in the morning when its the coolest time and you won't have any issues. I do have an oil cooler with fan for driving in the hottest part of the day. Wouldn't leave home without it.

Fri Sep 27, 2013 4:57 am

asiab3 wrote: A properly tuned and maintained bus will LONG outlast the driver in intense heat. 8)

Plus, it will put hair on your chest

Fri Sep 27, 2013 5:08 am

I remember reading somewhere that the Germans loved the air cooled engines in their desert vehicles, as they could outlast the Allies and their water cooled Jeeps. Just my 2 pennies, have a cool day!

Fri Sep 27, 2013 7:52 am

Wasted youth/adulthood wrote: Did you see the thread by Colin about driving his early baywindow bus through Death Valley in the peak of summer? I'm satisifed that a properly maintained, stock engine will do just fine even in the hottest of climates.

Do you figure that rapid cooling of your engine by means of water on a hot day may cause thermal cracking? Sure a rainstorm gets things wet, but isn't the weather (and so the intake air) already cool? I would be very concerned about rapid, moist cooling on a hot air cooled engine.

This. There is a little thing called thermal shock that is quite prevalent on cast iron. Ever run cold water on a hot cast iron pan? It will crack right in half. Iron does not have the carbon bonds that makes steel flexible. If you squirt cold water on hot cast iron cylinders, be ready for thermal shock to take place and your cylinders to crack in half. If you really want to make the difference with temps, make sure the engine compartment is completely sealed and the cylinders and oil cooler have nothing blocking them.

Fri Sep 27, 2013 8:47 am

Patent it and sell it.

Fri Sep 27, 2013 10:01 am

Read up on water injection. You will need much less water to cool your engine from the insides than from the outsides, though I suspect cooling it from the outside would work without having the negatives people speak of occur. Not sure what negatives there are to adding water to the mix, you would certainly want to make sure there was no water sitting in the engine after shutdown. With water injection you could boost your compression ratio to something outrageous to get better HP and mileage.

Fri Sep 27, 2013 10:41 am

Thanks for all the commentary. Well tuned / drive slower stuff I had already thought of and do , surprisingly enough. Adding the oil cooler and fan make sense - thanks.

Oh , and I think the Germans lost out in the end.

Fri Sep 27, 2013 12:47 pm

Are you having cooling issues? Make sure all your tin is there and down shift when needed. Let the engine work like it's supposed to work.

Any help you think you are doing for the engine will lead to the opposite.

What's funny is how few threads I see on hear about overheating issues.

I read a thread on here about a guy towing his motorcycle through the mountains of Alaska with no issues.

Get a grip and just drive it. Bring a heat gun with you and you can see for yourself.

Fri Sep 27, 2013 12:57 pm

Move up here to Alaska you will have NO such problems.

Fri Sep 27, 2013 1:49 pm

I probably won’t add anything new here, but the truth is a properly functioning Type4 will run plenty cool in any climate. Now you might think 110 degrees outside is way too hot, but it’s a good 250 degrees below the temp inside of your engine.

Believe it or not the engineers that designed these things knew a lot more about thermal dynamics, metallurgy and engine design than you or me. If your engine is running hot, then there is a problem somewhere that needs to be addressed. If however you just want to add something useless for the fun of it, then I would suggest and aux oil cooler with fan. After all, these engines are essentially oil cooled. You will need a high temp thermostat on that fan though, because the oil must first be allowed to heat up to operating temp before any extra cooling is applied.

Fri Sep 27, 2013 1:53 pm

I think the heads are the real cooling problem. That is not much that a bigger oil cooler can do about that. It would be interesting to see what a mist of water vapor would do.

Fri Sep 27, 2013 2:03 pm

How about shock cool and potentially damage (i.e. crack or warp) your head. Water or water/methanol injection would be the only smart alternative, they used that method on most WWII aircraft engines, especially air-cooled radials.