Oil/water heat exchanger

[couchboy]

Hay guys pros and cons for running rb25det factory oil/water exchanger in motorsport appreciation will be used mostly for circuit driving. 

Cheers

[Duncan]

Nope, no benefit for motorsport. In road use you could consider it helpful that the water helps bring oil up to temps better but in motorsport you would always warm the engine before racing anyway.

On the downside it leaves your oil filter in a difficult position, can fail, and is impossible to clean out if you ever spin a bearing. I would be adding a remote oil filter relocator in it's place.

[MBS206]

51 minutes ago, Duncan said:

Nope, no benefit for motorsport. In road use you could consider it helpful that the water helps bring oil up to temps better but in motorsport you would always warm the engine before racing anyway.

On the downside it leaves your oil filter in a difficult position, can fail, and is impossible to clean out if you ever spin a bearing. I would be adding a remote oil filter relocator in it's place.

See, I've always wondered about the whole water bringing the oil up to temp.

If you take a litre of oil, and a litre of water, and subject them to the same amount of heat energy, the oil ends up at a higher temperature. But then again, I'm assuming the water is subjected to more heat energy inside the block.

For those of you with  temp gauges, what is coming up to temp first, the oil or water temp?

 

IMO though Duncan, you are 100% right that for motorsport, I'd be ditching it, and running a relocator + oil cooler.

[GTSBoy]

7 minutes ago, MBS206 said:

But then again, I'm assuming the water is subjected to more heat energy inside the block

Not so much "in the block" but in the engine as a whole. In particular, during warm up, the coolant will get most of its heat from the head. The oil, be comparison doesn't do a lot to soak up heat in the head.

8 minutes ago, MBS206 said:

For those of you with  temp gauges, what is coming up to temp first, the oil or water temp?

My coolant temp gauge will rise to the middle of the gauge before the oil temp gauge comes off the bottom (50°C). So even with the blurriness of the "middle of the gauge" covering a wide range of "normal" coolant temperatures, the coolant is certainly >>75°C by the time the oil gauge starts to move.

That's with the factory oil-water HX in place.

 

The only reason these things exist is for emissions. The faster they can get everything warmed up, the better.

 

And, I concur with Duncan on the plan for a track car also.

[MBS206]

1 hour ago, GTSBoy said:

Not so much "in the block" but in the engine as a whole. In particular, during warm up, the coolant will get most of its heat from the head. The oil, be comparison doesn't do a lot to soak up heat in the head.

My coolant temp gauge will rise to the middle of the gauge before the oil temp gauge comes off the bottom (50°C). So even with the blurriness of the "middle of the gauge" covering a wide range of "normal" coolant temperatures, the coolant is certainly >>75°C by the time the oil gauge starts to move.

That's with the factory oil-water HX in place.

That's what I thought may occur, as the oil is more spread thin, rather then being pumped around with no air gaps with the coolant...

[The Bogan]

I put one on my 86, the quicker my temps come up the quicker I can thrash it.

Coolant rises much faster than oil, the heat exchanger helps bring up the oil temps quite a bit faster.

It does nothing for cooling.

 

[260DET]

If a heat exchanger brings up oil temps quicker then that's a good thing for a race car isn't it? Use a separate oil cooler if high oil temps ultimately are a problem.

[GTSBoy]

1 hour ago, 260DET said:

If a heat exchanger brings up oil temps quicker then that's a good thing for a race car isn't it? Use a separate oil cooler if high oil temps ultimately are a problem.

Yes and yes.

Cooler obviously needs to be properly thermostated to avoid a huge waste of time. Oil plumbing can start to get a little complicated with the addition of all these things though.

[The Bogan]

My concern would be the age of the WTO heat exchanger, with age comes risk.

The OEM Forester heat exchanger cost me around $200, I couldn't even find a new RB one.

I have been looking at this> 60 plate https://www.scintex.com.au/products/heat-exchanger-camping-showers 

My current setup uses the coolant lines from the throttle body, that pickup point is where my turbo lines will be soon

I've seen these on inboard boat engines before, I haven't heard anything bad aboit them

Only issue would be if you aready topping out the efficiency of your radiator, maybe, puck nose

[260DET]

That Scintex heat exchanger looks good.