Block heater on a 2006 matrix
 

Well after stalling a few cold winters I decided to splurge on a mod with little payback but some comfort gain.

I bought a block heater from:


the kit is the same as others have used:
http://www.trdparts4u.com/scripts/pr...dproduct=-5127

I looked to see what wattage it is and mine was stamped on the end 400 watts:
http://i835.photobucket.com/albums/z...ts/file-76.jpg

My next task was to find the hole for it. Other threads pointed me in the right way so my fingers went exploring.

engine bay
http://i835.photobucket.com/albums/z...ts/file-82.jpg

air box/ oil add area
http://i835.photobucket.com/albums/z...ts/file-81.jpg

Now look down and find the side/ back corner. It is on the side facing the battery and slides in the direction of the washer fluid tank.

These pics are with it slid in half way so you can see the end:
http://i835.photobucket.com/albums/z...ts/file-78.jpg

Here you can see the end with the prongs.
http://i835.photobucket.com/albums/z...ts/file-79.jpg

http://i835.photobucket.com/albums/z...ts/file-80.jpg

Where I ran the plug:
http://i835.photobucket.com/albums/z...ts/file-83.jpg

After 10 min of being plunged in I almost burned my hand trying to see if it was warm. It is!

Oh, you're gonna like it! Can't beat instant heat this time of year.
Is that the 1ZZ-FE engine?

...the pictures look just like my wife's '04 Vibe base with the 1.8L (1ZZ-FE) engine.

...I'm thinking about getting one for my '09 Vibe if I can find one.

My engine block heater won't work. I'll plug it in when I park at night (just to get it to work, timer comes later) and int he morning it's still cold! :mad: Tomorrow my dad and I will trouble shoot it. I ran the cord up through my engine bay, and the cord wraps by my battery. Just a hold until we get something like Doax did to his Matrix a while back. Not the plug in the body, but in the grill block or something.

The Vibe/Matrix has the 1ZZ-FE VVT-I engine. Only the GT or XRS has the 2ZZ-FE VVTL-I.

Yes it is the 1zzfe engine. If I read the site right this heater works in most Toyota small.blocks. check it out but it just might work for you.

The set up is simple enought that if it does not heat up I say you have a bad heater.

Well my car this morning was showing a Water temp of 86F with an ambient of 24F. That is a 62F increase. I also saw that number jump up rapidly to 110F then slower to full temp. I bet the first coolant that circulated by the warm area made that number jump. So not bad. Full temp was at the 3 mile mark instead of 5.

But my MPG for the trip was lower then normal. This was due to 4-5" of the white stuff that we get this time of year. I lost 1.5 MPG of my 240 mile tank average :( 6 hours of overtime made up for it :)

Uhhh, yeah, scratch that. I was looking at the coolant temp, since I don't have engine temp. Just figured that out today...

mpg improvements
 

Care to guess your mpg improvement using the engine block heater?

Not sure, I know it speeds up my warm up times by about 20-30% (depending on how cold it is out) but I have to admitt the rational for it was more user comfort then MPG.

I added a port on my nose cone for the heater:
http://i835.photobucket.com/albums/z.../file-1830.jpg