Thread: 180 T-Stat

Originally Posted by TDCRacing

I agree except on one thing. How will it make you're car preform worse? I am not trying to bash or anything like that. but you say you use a colder one at the track,where performance is essential. Just explain to me what you mean is all im asking. Maybe i'll learn something.

It is the basics of how an engine works. A hot engine, with cooler air will perform the best. As the engine cool or the incoming air/fuel gets warm, the performance suffers. Power is made by burning fuel and using the heat that is produced to force the piston down. The more heat that is made, the more force the piston is pushed with, the more HP the engine has. If you are running coolant and thus cylinder walls at 195°F (I know the cylinder walls will not be this temp, but it is all relative, so work with me here), a certain amount of heat is lost to the cylinder walls and into the coolant during combustion. If you lower the coolant temp, the cylinder walls will be cooler, and more heat will be lost during combustion. The more heat that is lost during combustion, the less heat there is to move the piston, thus the less HP.

The reason that many people started using a cooler t-stat is to cure problems with knock retard. This knock retard was caused by excessive heat due to the forced induction on our cars. If modded properly, a car will not have any KR on a stock t-stat, and thus a cooler t-stat is not needed. Only when a car is not modded correctly will KR occur. In these cases, it may seem that the cooler t-stat, which is preventing KR, improves performance. While really, it only corrects a problem that was limiting performance. Again, if modded correctly, KR isn't a concern and a stock t-stat can be used.

Now when drag racing at a track, heat is an issue due to the nature of the racing. Many times racers need to sit in the staging lanes idling and heat soak becomes an issue. Also, multiple back to back WOT runs to get a car dialed are sometimes necessary. In these extreme cases, a cooler t-stat can keep things from excessive heating up. But the cooler t-stat obviously needs to be tuned in, in order to be effective. But again, this is an extreme case that many people don't experience on a daily basis.

So this is a general line of thinking that affects most people that drive their cars on a daily basis. As I said, racing at the track I consider an extreme environment where conditions are different than daily driving and occasional street racing. But for the majority of people on this board, a stock t-stat will work better, both performance and economy, in most applications.