I am a slacker and only relie on my stock temp guage so I can't be exact on temps, but I HAVE made my stock guage sit lower w/ all my cooling mods.
So, who has an actual temp reading of

Before/After gutting T-Stat:
Before/After removing T-Stat:

My hypothesis is that our Twins are sufficiently heating our oil and coolant to keep us within safe #'s w/ a gutted T-Stat.

 

O.o

 

Not sure about the gutted thermostat, but IIRC, there's a passage that allows coolant to by-pass the radiator for warm-up, but if you remove the thermostat, it's open all the time.

 

The thermostat is there for a reason. If you run the car without one, you'll be constantly on the cold side. Fuel economy and power will suffer.

This is just a bad idea.

Dale

 

I'm running with out a thermostat and I see nothing wrong with it. The temp is fine and power wise I feel that my car is pretty fast. I have a full exhaust, street port, PFC, intake, and boost controller (12 psi) but fuel wise i get around 10 mpg and 14 freeway.
I'll check the temp later and tell u what they are

 

I think your hypothesis is true only for a track care when the car is seeing high operating temps and boost. It is even recommended on the mazdamotorsport website.

However, on a daily driven car it would be a mistake. It would run too cold especially at cruise causing the above mentioned problems.

 

Why wouldn't you want to run the appropriate gauges to see what risk your hypothesis presents? I just think using your turbos to regulate temeratures isn't the best or most consistent way of doing things.

 

Once the T-Stat opens, it will never close again on my car.
So my question is, what proof do we have *for our TT cars* that cruising w/ a gutted T-Stat still wont be sufficient enough? I need some #'s.

Dohc-Vtec: those #'s would be great. The more info (vac-boost) the better!

 

I dont know about you guys but when I drive my car (which isn't very often for some reason) I let it warm up completely before I even leave the driveway. I consider completely warmed up when I see 82c on my Commander which I believe is when the T-stat would open normally anyways. If you didn't have a T-stat the car would never totally warm up until you were to drive it around for a while. I also have removed my double throttle thats why I let it warm up completely.

 

Lots of proof. I can drive around town (not highway) in <70F weather and take several minutes to get up to full operating temp (86C+). With a gutted t-stat, this process would take FOREVER, and anything short of a 15-minute drive would never get the car up to temp. And forget cruising on the freeway!

Boosting at temps below the point that the t-stat is supposed to start opening (85-86C) is inefficient and hard on the motor. You will also not make as much power.

I don't understand where people get the idea that running your car as cool as possible is good for efficiency, power, or reliability.

 

I had a drilled t-stat and when I switched over to a v-mount my water temp would always be at 74c and would go down to 67c on a cold night, I would only see 84c when I am in traffic, I could barely gun it since temps were to cold, replaced it with a new undrilled one and now I am always at 84c to 86c much better temps to drive with....

 

Running w/o T-stat will cause overheating. Don't do it!

The T-stat opens and closes the by pass loop. Basically when the engine is cold the waterpump circulates water in the block, when the T-stat opens it closes this radiator by-pass hole and forces all the coolant to the radiator.

If you REMOVE the T-stat entirely the coolant will be able to by-pass the radiator and go right back into the engine cooling jacket.

 

I think I see what you are saying Jeff, the water would be in a loop just in the block.
But running a gutted version would keep this by pass hole and add a big hole..is it effectively the same as eliminating it completely?

Also, Rynberg, besides the initial warm up period, what would you guestimate ambiant temps to be to allow the coolant to ever get hot? I am asking for a South Florida perspective. Won't the coolant, after the longer warm up time, be now hot enough to let it circulate unobstructed throughout and be in the right temp range?

 

I guess it depends how you gut it. If you leave it permanently open it'll keep the by-pass closed.

I personally can't see running w/o a good T-stat. During highway cruising the engine is only making about 20hp to move the car and is getting a lot of air flow. When you are racing the engine is making 255+HP and not always getting the same air flow.

If the T-stat is gutted then the car will run very cool during highway cruising, this is not a good idea for the engine.

 

When I got my engine rebuilt I bought a polished filler neck housing from a forum member. My mechanic figured that it had a T-stat in it and just bolted it on. Since I was breaking my engine in I didn't rush to put one back in. I ran the car for about ten days with no T-stat untill I finally got around to putting one back in.

My car would take almost 25 minutes of stop and go traffic to hit 70 deg C and 40 minutes to get to the high 70's and rarely (lots of traffic) into the low 80's. Granted this is with low boost on a single turbo, but overall it makes zero sense to run without one.

 

Other components need warming up too- driving easy until the car fully warms functions fine, from tires to tranny etc.

 

Thanks Moehler, that is more of what I am looking for.
Low boost + No T-Stat = 30 min of heavy traffic to get to ~80C
Rynberg told us a good operating temp is about ~85C.