I have the 5,500 watt, 19,000btu/hr coolant heater and have been doing the space heater in the car trick since 1999. This will be for when I can not use it.
Just running a line of coolant to the wind shield washer reservoir is the easiest cheapest idea in concept.
But there is a few problems with that.
1 you could make the washer fluid so hot it cracks the glass on contact.
2 the boiling point of methanol is around 120'F, so there goes all your methanol in very short time period.
I picked up something that was actually built to do this because:
It heats the water up to 140'F and turns off.
It appears to hold about 1 cup of water.
I can turn it on and off as needed.
I don't have to use alcohol. I could use a polypropylene mix, which is used in air craft deicing.
Quote:
Originally Posted by SDMCF
I use a grill block but no longer bother with a blanket because in my use I rarely park the car for short enough periods for it to make much difference to engine cooling whilst parked. Do you think it is worth trying again and checking for faster warmup for a cold engine?
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When I lived in northern japan I timed it. On a icy morning I could get warm air to start blowing from the vents 3 to 5 minutes sooner when slowly driving.
In Maine, which is next to Canada, when there would be a high of 10'F (something like -20'C) the engine would never get up to operating temperature with out a grill block if I took the car out on the highway.