overheated 328

Nah, the head gaskets should be ok.

You said the radiator leaked; you are having that looked into, aren't you?

 

Milton, I'm sorry to hear you had this trouble! It makes me wonder if you might have had the same trouble if we had tried to get together a few weeks ago when I was in Albuqurque!

I hope it's something simple and cheap!

 

I broke my waterpump/alternator belt yesterday too....for I think the 3rd time in 4 years. You should be fine, mine always is. That's the beauty of water, it boils hwich is very effective at keeping things cool...it hits the boiling point and the engine will stay at that temp until all the water is gone.

That's a big part of the reason I've never been sold on Evans coolant so many seem to be switching to, the boiling point of the stuff is so high that a belt failure would all but guarantee an engine melt-down, a standard cool/water mix won't....it's like a fuse for your engine.

 

Sorry to hear what happened to you... We all experienced that!!!

 

I know it doesn't help at this point,
But I always carry an extra belt, oil, coolant and such when I go on extended trips like that.

Good Luck with your car!

 

From your description on how it overheated, I wouldn't lose any sleep over the head gasket. Besides, warping the aluminum head is far more pricey so you can always worry about that! ;>)

I would bet big bucks you're just fine though. Just check the waterpump for play.

Ken

 

Ken,

Suspect the scenario went like this:

A WP bearing seized briefly, breaking the WP belt. Look for traces of melted belt on WP pulley, &/or brown traces coming down out of the WP weep holes.

Things heated up, pressure rose opening a crack in the radiator & blowing coolant out the reservoir overflow.

I concurr w/ mk e, The engine s/b OK, happened to me about a few years ago, except my radiator didn't spring a leak.

 

Mark Eberhardt’s comments regarding boiling water and engine temp are absolutely incorrect. At the point in which water boils, cylinder head temperature will increase radically. When water boils the rate of heat exchange between the head and the coolant drop very rapidly. The gas effective acts as a layer of insulation trapping heat in metal components.

As for potential damage from over heating, I have seen alloy heads warp. I have seen Ferrari heads warp, with no external signs of over heating. I have a set in my garage. There have been some on this chat site that were wondering a while back about a rash of reported cam bearing cap failures in 328. It is our opinion that these failures are due diminished cam journal lubrication as a result of a warped head. It is interesting that they seem to fail at about the same cap.

As for Evans Coolant, it is a shame that the car in question was not using Evans Coolant. In fact if Evans Coolant was used, it would have provided an additional margin of safety. There have been many testimonials to this effect over the years.

The previous concerns about Evans Coolant are not base in sound physics. Before people discount Evans Coolant I would genuinely hope that they would have tried the stuff. Acceptance of the benefits of using Evans Coolant is becoming far more wide spread. There was a time not too long ago that many mechanics were skeptical about the benefits of synthetic motor oil. Once again, MID block modification like the 4-liter 308 would not be possible without Evans Coolant. That should speak volumes.


Sincerely,

Mark Lewis

 

I think most of what you are saying is true, but I think some of it may not be.

Bubbles formation does dramatically reduce the cooling systems effectiveness. All water mixed coolant will suffer from this problem. Everything I’ve seen leads me to believe that Evans coolant does cool better in general than standard coolant/water blends mainly because it does not form bubbles.

The part I’m having trouble with is when the cooling system is not working because the waterpump is stopped. Physics tells me the heat energy has to go somewhere. The first place it goes is to temperature increase. At about 240F and 15psi, standard coolant/water mixes start to boil. When that happens, the temperature of the coolant will not increase further until it is all steam. While it is boiling, it will absorb a lot of energy. Water at 240F has 208 Btu/lb, while stream has 1085 Btu/lb – so as a pound of water turns into a pound of steam , it sucks 5 times more heat out of the engine than a pound of water could…..that’s a lot of cooling that isn’t there if boiling doesn’t occur. On the down side, that will leave more and more of the engine to be cooled only by conduction as the water boils away...but at least it is being cooled.

I’m not trying to say that other coolants are bad, and there are definitely times when non-water based coolants are the best why to go. I think the 4 liter project is a bit of a special case and what you gain by switching coolants probably far out weighs what you give up.…I’m just not convinced that is true for most street cars.

 

The following is a discussion as to why the 4-liter engine program uses Evans NPG+ coolant:

1. Boiling Point: Regular ant-freeze with 15 psi radiator cap will boil at about 255 degrees F. Evans NPG+ with a cap will boil at about 400 degrees F. Vapor doesn’t not conduct heat nearly as well as a liquid. The vaporization of coolant should be avoided at all cost. Under a load it is not uncommon for anti-freeze to enter the radiator as a frothy mix of coolant and small air bubbles. This is precisely what we are trying to avoid in the 4-liter engine. Air bubbles don’t transfer heat.

2. Surface Tension: Many on this website have advocated the use of a water wetter to improve cooling. This is a good idea. It allows cooler incoming coolant to more easily reach the hottest engine parts. The adverse affects a hot boundary layer of coolant and vapor is reduced with less surface tension. The incoming coolant has greater access to engine parts. Super heated coolant is flushed off of metal parts and is then delivered to the radiator to dissipate heat. NPG+ has about half of the surface tension of anti-freeze. Water wetter is not necessary with NPG+.

3. Molar Heat of Vaporization: As a liquid changes state to a vapor it draws heat from the liquid. As NPG+ changes to a vapor it transfer about 25 percent more heat from the engine than anti-freeze. For this reason it is not uncommon of NPG+ to be slightly hotter compared to anti-freeze while metal temperatures are substantially cooler. Evans has done extensive testing in which both metal surfaces and coolant temperatures are measured at various locations within the cylinder head. Invariably, NPG+ provides superior cooling.

4. Vapor Pressure: NPG+’s vapor pressure is about 60 times less than that of typical anti-freeze. This means that NPG will recondense much more rapidly back into a liquid. Remember that a vapor does not transfer much heat. In addition, the increased vapor pressure of anti-freeze makes this type of coolant more prone to generate vapor pockets in the cylinder head.

5. Density: NPG+ weighs 9.2 pounds per gallon, while anti-freeze weighs about 8 pounds per gallon. There are those that will correctly stated that water has a better specific heat value than NPG+. It is important to balance specific heat with density.

The 4-liter engine will place far greater demands on the cooling system than the stock 308. We have a reduced coolant volume within the engine because we have encroached into the water jacket to increase displacement. We increased displacement by about 38 percent. This extra displacement generates more heat. Increased intake flow, hotter cams, higher compression, and more aggressive ignition timing all add heat to the system. These are some of the reasons that NPG+ is so critical to the success of the 4-liter engine project.

Sincerely,

Mark Lewis

 

Mark L,
I think you're doing the right thing for most of the reasons you state and specing a great product for the way cool 4 liter project. And in my car I've thought long and hard about making the switch too....the problem I always come back to is what happens when the belt breaks?....I've now broken 3 in 4 years.

I'm starting to suspect the problem is the extra load all the goodies (efi +20A, large fuel pump +10A, intercooler pump +15A, large cooling fan +5A) I've add are putting on the alternator....so I guess the problem is of my own making My next mod may be to supersiive the alternator belt and maybe the alternator. Then it will be time for me to have another look at Evans coolant, I think it's a good product, just not the best product for all application.

 

For the record, we are going to junk the stock belt in favor of a serpentine belt system.

In my last post, I mentioned the Molar Heat of Evaporation. From my conversations with the engineers at Evans, this attribute of their coolant would be extremely beneficial for the scenario that you just mentioned.

From an antidotal standpoint, Steve was telling me about one of his buddies that was racing on a short track when his water pump went south. The guy didn’t stop, he finished the race. The Evans coolant completely protected his engine. There was no damage. Everybody was shocked. I know that everybody has testimonials, but I thought that I would pass it along.

Mark Lewis

 

Good call on the belt, I'll be watching to see what you do there.

That's true. The problem, at leatst in my mind is the temperature. The boiling point of the stuff is so high I'm worried there would be damage before the extra heat of vaporization had a chance to help....but maybe not. what if the boiling point, 350F is what is stuck in my head, it seems really hot to me.

Well that's a good sign that maybe I'm just too nervous about the boiling point. Do you know if that was an electric pump that died, a belt off or just a leaking pump? With normal coolant mine is good for about 3 minutes until I see stream, I've never pushed it further....maybe 4-5 minutes to damage with normal running, I'd guess 1/2 that at power....and the alternator light does come on to tell me the belt is gone, as long as I'm paying attention to the dash. It may not be a big deal, I tend to be a bit conservative....although with the engine at 20+psi boost, you might not know it

 

With the boost that you are running I would strongly suggest that you look into the NPG+. You are creating coolant problems nearly similar to the 4-liter engine. Your combustion chambers near the exhaust valves have to be as hot as all heck. More horsepower equals more heat. The Evans coolant will dissipate more heat for many reasons. By the way, the stock water pump absolutely sucks. So much for being politically correct. Somewhere down under Ferrarifixer’s ears are burning. If you knew how little coolant that the stock pump is pushing around, you would wet your pants.

To the best of my knowledge the water pump in question lost a belt. The NPG+ coolant will transfer more heat as a liquid than a gas. It changes state far more slowly to a gas than anti-freeze, it forms smaller bubbles and returns to a liquid much more rapidly. These are all attributes that Evans has painstakenly engineered into their product. It is a good thing.

The stuff doesn’t wear out. Change it and forget about it…almost.

It is better at inhibiting corrosion than the standard mix of water and anti-freeze.

It has less surface tension than if you were using a water wetter.

And it is proven. There are Ferrari guys using the stuff and a whole lot of other Ferrari guys who never changed their coolant regardless of manufacture.

Mark Lewis

 

Don't worry..you'll be just fine. How many cars have you owned without Evans coolant? How many engines have you had to replace because of the lack of Evans coolant?

Fact is..if your car is going to over heat there is not a thing you can do about it..you can prolong it but it will over heat.

If this Evans coolant is so good why did Ferrari not use it in the 456/550 series cars? These car run pretty damn hot because of the tight engine bays. Do they use it in the MC12 or the Enzo? What about Lambo? Do they use it? Which racing team uses it?

Evans coolant may be good stuff..but in a daily driven car it is not neccesary. just fix your belt..fill her with a 60 40 mix (water being the 60) bleed it and drive the thing.

In your 4.0 liter engine..it may even be needed..but please, lets get a little bit real here...Cars have been using Etholine Gylicol for years and they have kept cool. Most times its a mechanical failure which causes an overheat and if you suffer that, no coolant is going to save you no matter what it is.

 

Ditto!

Finally someone that makes sense!!

 

Suddenly I don't feel so bad.....
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HOORAY, problem solved!

Nothing serious, and another happy camper.

 

Water pump seized en route to le mans last week.
New pump fitted on the way home.
Dismantled old pump yesterday to find the inner bearing seized.
cheers, d
(prompting a "Let's see your Fcar on a tow truck" thread)
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I'm glad it wasn't really serious