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What's your intake air temperature? On my car I'm using IAT as basically the underhood temperature as the whole intake is plastic and shouldn't heat soak much. My stock Neon IAT is at about 135F with 60-70F ambient temps driven at 55mph. This also puts the coolant temp at about 186F. I can see though when the thermostat actually opens as the IAT starts to go up. When I'm coasting the coolant temp hardly drops but the IAT does as the thermostat is closing preventing flow through the rad and therefore the engine bay temperature is dropping.
I don't think there is any advantage to having a hot engine bay, you've already got the hotter thermostat and cooking all the rubber and electronic bits under the hood for 1 mpg isn't going to be cost effective. I think you should open up the airflow atleast until your fans never come on driving on a 55mph highway without the air conditioning on. My cooling fan comes on at 208F so most days driving to work it never comes on, even in the short stretch of stop and go at the end of my drive. Also if your engine bay is smelling "hot" you are probably smelling all the plasticizers evaporating out making the rubber and plastic stuff more brittle...
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