Getting car to warm up faster.

[Aaron]

My Fiero takes forever to warm up. Not literally, just significantly longer than it did with the 2.8, and even more significantly longer than every other car I've driven. It takes 15 minutes of normal city driving, at least. Not quite normal, I keep the RPM below 2,000 until the oil warms up, but I keep up with traffic.

Now I already know one of the causes. When I put my T-stat in, I drilled it. 4 holes, at like 3/32" each (Just shy of 1/8"). That's a lot of coolant bypassing the T-stat, so I think that's causing most of my problem. I'll be fixing this tomorrow.

However, my heater is also bad. For example, it takes fucking forever for it to get warm. Even as the engine's water temp gets around halfway to normal, the heater is still barely above outside temp. When the engine is fully warm, the heater is warm, but not hot. Our other cars will get much hotter. I have my heater setup to where the water goes through the engine, then through the turbocharger, then into the heater core. I did this so that it would warm up faster, being as the turbo heats up really quickly, and it'd get really hot, as the turbo is the hottest piece on my car. However, the turbo's water line is only 3/8", and the turbo is a big restriction. So basically, the flow through the heater system is very low, and it is a long line that feeds it, even though it's insulated. I thought that despite the flow, the temp would overcome, and it'd make for a super duper warm heater. Apparently not.

Now, I have two coolant outlets from my LIM, prior to the T-stat. One goes to the turbo, the other goes to my oil cooler, then back to the inlet of the water pump. This is a 1/2" line, and the oil cooler flows much more than the turbo. However as far as I know, engine oil is slower to warm up than the coolant, and it doesn't help that I have 80 gajillion quarts of it.

So, should I use the water from the oil cooler for my heater, or leave it the way it is?

Or, any other ideas to get a heater that warms up quick, and is really hot?

[Nashco]

1. Replace your thermostat.

2. Your turbo should have it's own flow to/from the engine, similar to how the throttle body heater lines would be on most cars.

3. Your cabin heater should be first in any loops that is shares with other components. Running in series, go through the heater core then X item; the other heat exchanger isn't nearly as particular as you and your passenger about coolant temps.

4. I would suggest you look into it a bit harder to see if you have enough ports available to run each loop on its own (oil cooler, turbo, heater core). If you can't do that (it sounds like you only have two ports), I'd suggest routing your oil cooler and heater core in series (engine->heater core->oil cooler->engine) and use the other port for the turbo. As you mention, the turbo doesn't require much flow, you can get away with a smaller port for that.

5. If it's cold as balls where you're at, you can block off most of the radiator inlet and the engine vents. I doubt it's that cold yet in OK.

6. If you've done all of the above and still aren't satisfied, get some seat heaters installed. They're cheap, very effective, light, fairly easy to install, invisible to admirers, and it makes females far more likely to want to go for a spin when it's nipply outside.

Bryce

[Aaron]

Replaced the T-stat. The car warms up much faster, it's normal now. The heater obviously gets warm quicker, but is still a bit on the cool side.

[Shaun41178(2)]

I can't remember the last time I used my heater. hehehehe

[Aaron]

lol. I took out my air conditioning, because I have never, ever, used A/C in CO.

[Nashco]

Replaced the T-stat. The car warms up much faster, it's normal now. The heater obviously gets warm quicker, but is still a bit on the cool side.

What temp thermostat? Like I said, route through the heater core first on a shared loop, that will make a significant difference when it's cold out. Oh yeah, and this might seem obvious, but make sure your controls are working properly so that you're not bringing cold outside air in when you don't want/have to be.

Bryce

[Aaron]

Stock 195*. The car definitely warms up faster now, and it also seems to run a bit warmer overall, with a bit more fluctuation. I'm not worried about it though.

I don't see the advantage of running the heater core first. Having it run second to the turbo should produce much warmer heater temps (Assuming the turbo flowed enough). I can run it second to the oil cooler, and theoretically, the oil and water stay around the same temperature, so it shouldn't have much of an affect. it'd be very difficult to run the heater first on a shared loop, because of how the factory return is setup.

And I also can't put the turbo and oil cooler on the same loop, as it'd make for an even worse mess of coolant lines.

The controls are working properly.

[Aaron]

Here are some off the beaten path ideas I've had recently. Basically, it's fucking cold outside, and I want a heater that gets really hot, really fast, without electronics and weight.

1) Why does the Fiero heater core return run all of the way back to the engine, to return there? Why can't we eliminate that entire return line, and have it dump right into the line after the radiator? Less weight, scrap aluminum. The only effect I can see is slightly longer warmup times, but I doubt it makes that much of a difference.

2) This one is really off the wall. As we know, the exhaust system on a car is not only the hottest part of a car, it also heats up the fastest. My headers are too hot to touch within a minute of startup and idle. What if I welded an enclosed pipe, maybe 3.5" D and 2" long, around my 3" downpipe, and had a water inlet and outlet to it. Plumb water lines out of the intake manifold, to the exhaust pipe, then to the heater core. This could eventually damage the exhaust pipe I'm sure, but I'd use thick stainless. It would also cool the exhaust temps, but that won't really hurt anything. Thoughts?

[Nashco]

I don't see the advantage of running the heater core first.

By running the heater core first you're sending the thermostatically controlled coolant to the heater core, ensuring that the heater is always getting ~195 degree coolant. If you go to the turbo first then you're adding another variable...sometimes the turbo will cool the coolant, sometimes it will heat the coolant. Ditto for an oil:coolant heat exchanger. By having it in series (either first or second) you're cutting down on your flowrate, so by having the heater core in series AND second in the line is a double whammie.

This method is how all OEMs do it, none of them plumb the turbo before the heater core.

Bryce

[Aaron]

Ok I understand. The reason I did it with the turbo, is that the turbo should never really be cooler than the water. But the flow restriction is too much.

I'll see if I can think up a way to have it on its own loop, and combine the others. But it's working ok for now.

[fieromadman]

Man I dont get why you have such bad heat problems. My DOHC heats up WAY faster and hotter than the 2.hate ever did and it's got a lower than factory temp t-stat.

You sure you got your coolent all hooked up right?

I'm really thinking the small diameter of coolent passage through the turbo is whats killing it. Do you still have the T-body heated by the coolent?

[fieromadman]

So everyone knows, here is the coolent routing for this engine:

[Aaron]

Yes, the coolant system is hooked up correctly. It heats up much faster now, normal, just the heater is still a bit on the cool side. I'm quite positive it is the restriction causing this. My throttle body does not have coolant to it.

[Series8217]

So everyone knows, here is the coolent routing for this engine:

That diagram is wrong. It shows the wrong direction of flow for the throttle body line as well as for the oil cooler..

[Series8217]

Moved to maintenance.

[Aaron]

So everyone knows, here is the coolent routing for this engine:

That diagram is wrong. It shows the wrong direction of flow for the throttle body line as well as for the oil cooler..

I thought that too, but I wasn't going to say anything, because I thought I may have been mistaken. Glad to know I wasn't.

[fieromadman]

You know what, I never looked too closely at those lines before but they definately don't make sense on that diagram. Well... I guess I can stop posting that damn thing then... Funny thing is, I think I scanned that from the GM book.

EDIT: I just checked, yeah that was out of one of the GM books specifically for the engine. Fucking idiots...

[darkhorizon]

Block heater!

[lucky]

Aaron, you sure your heater core isn't (at least partially) clogged?

[Aaron]

Yah, worked fine before the swap. It's just the flow to it isn't half as much as it was stock.