Best place to get coolant

[RazzyB]

I'm unsure what you mean by radiator hose here - which hose, the heater core return hose?

I read over at TDS about a fellow replumbing his coolant filter so it wouldn't drain into the degas bottle, with the theory that draining into the degas bottle was effectively bypassing the thermostat and making the engine stay cooler longer. He plumbed it into the heater lines.

However, upon reading about my A/C control valve on dieselsite.com, I see that that shuts off flow through the heater hoses when max A/C is on. I really like the function of this mod, so I don't want to lose it. But I'll always need hot coolant....so, it looks like I will:

1. plumb coolant filter inline with heater hoses, like stevebkfld on TDS did, and
2. run coolant to my veggie system from the unused 3/8" port on the water pump.

I sure hope that the flow from that unused port will suit my needs. Are there any other options?

Thanks!

Dinnertime thought: what if I moved the AC valve to the heater core inlet hose. Then I could tee off from upstream of that to get always-flowing coolant, and the valve would still perform its (excellent) function of keeping hot coolant flowing over the heater coils when the A/C is on...

As long as the valve is pointing in the same direction (toward the waterpump), wouldn't the functionality be the same?

 

[Ford_Forgotton]

Yeah, I thought about that, but what about when the valve is OPEN. Now you have split your coolant path in two directions. Since water takes the path of least resistance, there is a chance that either the tank, or the heater core will not flow coolant while the other one does!

Your most likely to turn the heater core back on when your oil tank needs it the most. In the COLD!

 

[RazzyB]

Yeah, I thought about that, but what about when the valve is OPEN. Now you have split your coolant path in two directions. Since water takes the path of least resistance, there is a chance that either the tank, or the heater core will not flow coolant while the other one does!

Your most likely to turn the heater core back on when your oil tank needs it the most. In the COLD!

Daryl, there you go again, spoiling my ignorant bliss...

It seemed like a good idea in my head at the time...

I suppose I'll go ahead with the plan stated above. Thanks again.

 

[sagebel]

Brian, I would tap into the heater hose on the hot side of the A/C mod and run that to the veggie tank, and then run the return back to the A/C mod. This I think would give you max heat as well as take away some heat from the heater core.

Scott

 

[bluefxstc]

I'm unsure what you mean by radiator hose here - which hose, the heater core return hose?

I read over at TDS about a fellow replumbing his coolant filter so it wouldn't drain into the degas bottle, with the theory that draining into the degas bottle was effectively bypassing the thermostat and making the engine stay cooler longer. He plumbed it into the heater lines.

However, upon reading about my A/C control valve on dieselsite.com, I see that that shuts off flow through the heater hoses when max A/C is on. I really like the function of this mod, so I don't want to lose it. But I'll always need hot coolant....so, it looks like I will:

1. plumb coolant filter inline with heater hoses, like stevebkfld on TDS did, and
2. run coolant to my veggie system from the unused 3/8" port on the water pump.

I sure hope that the flow from that unused port will suit my needs. Are there any other options?

Thanks!

RazzyB

If you want to keep the AC heater mod but would prefer to plumb the tank heater into the heater lines just tee into the heater line on the engine side of the shutoff valve. By doing this you still keep the coolant flow out of the heater core but have flow to the SVO tank. The downside to this is that on cold mornings you will be splitting the coolant between the SVO tank and the heater so it may take longer to warm up the cab. By using either location to get coolant you are effectively adding another radiator that is unregulated by a thermostat so engine warm up time will be extended.

Bluefxstc

 

[Todd T]

Like you, I have the AC by-pass and the coolant filter. I grabbed the coolant from the 3/8"npt port on the driver's side of the water pump. This keeps all the hoses on the driver's side, rather than crossing over the engine compartment.

The coolant line goes down the frame rail, through the heat exchanger inside my veggie tank, then through the coolant filter and back to the plastic radiator tank.

It doesn't take long at all to get the coolant hoses quite hot to the touch as they go into and out of the heat exchanger in my aux. fuel tank. It may not be much flow but it sure seems to work for me.

Like others, I was afraid putting a T on the heater hose line would starve one or the other.... either the veggie or the heater core. What about going direct out of the engine, to the veggie, then to the heater core and back? Down here in Louisiana it would probably have sufficient heat left for the heater but I don't know about up north.

I also added a coolant temp sending unit about two feet down the line. I used a brass T, grounded to the frame. By the way, I went up to a 1/2"npt T to keep the flow rates up. I felt a 3/8" T would create a bit of a restriction.

Todd T

 

[CPUNeck]

Brian,

Hope this isn't too late, but I have a few observations that may be relevant.

1) I have the by-pass H2O filter plumbed into the 3/8 side of the water pump. It returns to the deguase (sp?) bottle. When my hood is up I can see the return flow and at idle it really sucked, BUT once the engine approches 800rpm and more, it really starts flowing. (side note after thousands of miles on my FIRST filter installed with over 130k mi on truck flow was still the same I only changed for GP ) If you stand on it and hit like 1500rpm the entire chamber on the small side of the bottle is completely covered with a nice thick film of the coolant charging back to the bottle! Prior to WVO conversion this by-pass mod had NO precieved effect on warmup.

2) I do not believe my model truck has the fancy A/C valve, so I long ago, installed my version (ball-valve mounted on A/C mount T'd into heater hose from water pump (return) Now there is also a lower heater hose connection on the passenger side very front of the engine. This comes right out of the engine and if memory serves me right it is a 1/2" connection. In my design I T'd in here and ran to WVO stuff, then returned to the top hose were my ball-valve is. In essence I have installed a parallel heat exchange circuit MUCH larger than the heater core one. This did effect the trucks ability to come up to temp, but only by 7-9min of run time. The temp does quickly MOVE, just takes longer to reach operating temp.

I weighed the potential problems with not enough flow due to the parallel config, but after much thought realized I have many "bottle necks" for lack of a better work back in my WVO setup. Like my Vormax is all 3/8", my fillter rap is 3/8, etc.. So I rationed that the heater core would provide less restriction and enjoy at least the same amount of heat and to date all has worked exactly as expected.. err.. hoped I wound up adding close to a gallon of coolant

 

[RazzyB]

Brian,

Hope this isn't too late, but I have a few observations that may be relevant.

1) I have the by-pass H2O filter plumbed into the 3/8 side of the water pump. It returns to the deguase (sp?) bottle. When my hood is up I can see the return flow and at idle it really sucked, BUT once the engine approches 800rpm and more, it really starts flowing. (side note after thousands of miles on my FIRST filter installed with over 130k mi on truck flow was still the same I only changed for GP ) If you stand on it and hit like 1500rpm the entire chamber on the small side of the bottle is completely covered with a nice thick film of the coolant charging back to the bottle! Prior to WVO conversion this by-pass mod had NO precieved effect on warmup.

...

I weighed the potential problems with not enough flow due to the parallel config, but after much thought realized I have many "bottle necks" for lack of a better work back in my WVO setup. Like my Vormax is all 3/8", my fillter rap is 3/8, etc.. So I rationed that the heater core would provide less restriction and enjoy at least the same amount of heat and to date all has worked exactly as expected.. err.. hoped I wound up adding close to a gallon of coolant

Clayton, of course it isn't too late, as you have figured out by now, I think all of these things through (to death, I suppose ) before making major changes to Bertha.

It sure is great to see all you great guys over here.

And to everybody for the helpful discussion.

Here are my thoughts for the morning...

• leave A/C mod in place on heater core return hose (connects to top of waterpump)
• run coolant for veggie from the 3/8npt unused port on the driver's side of the waterpump and insert coolant filter into this stream
• run wvo return into heater hose, not degas bottle

But I don't want to feed the wvo line return to the degas bottle...I want to plumb it into one of the heater hoses. I was thinking to tee it into the heater return hose...should I add a checkvalve on the heater hose upstream of the tee to ensure the coolant goes the right way?

What do y'all think?