Fuel Heaters???
 

Has anyone on here built a fuel heater? This is going to be my next mod.

The temperature in the last few days has drop off into the low 60's F.

I have been doing some testing and have noticed that my FE has drop off a ton due to the cold temps.

I'm running in open loop all the time so my IAT, ECT sensors have adjustable tables and I have made changes to get back to my desired A/F ratio around 19:1 but the engine is surging at this ratio where it did'nt when the temps were in the 80's F.

My thoughts are its a "atomization fuel" problem?

Fuel saving gadgets - a professional engineer's view

The cold is more of an issue for keeping the engine warm, not the fuel. Since the engine heats itself with combustion energy, you need to consumer extra gasoline to fight with the cold of the air. Hence things like grill blocks were invented

The prius has a neat trick for retaining heat, when you shut down it pumps some hot coolant into a thermos, and puts it back in the system wheat next start up. Not %100 of engine heat is retained between runnings of course, but better than nothing.

And it should be noted that you can buy said thermos and solenoid and run it off an arduino etc on pretty much any car :p

That's a cool prius trick.

ECT temps were 5*F cooler from 197F down to 192F

IAT temps were 38*F cooler from 118F down to 80F

Grill was block off the same as the last two runs. I might have to block it off all the way.

I might have to figure out a way to make my FMIC a FMIH :)

Yeah it is, I might have to give that some thought.:thumbup:

But I should mention that it's easier to just install a block heater :p

Yah but then techinically it is a hybrid, getting some of its energy from the wall.

i dont think its an atomization/vaporization problem, but simple temperature issue. how about a hot air intake? i think a good HAI would provide any help that a fuel heater could, i think it can be done at lower cost, simpler design, and more safely. i always think a grill block is a good idea. i'm not familiar with the coolant thermos, but along that line would also be a block heater... doubt its worth it at 60deg. but in colder climates it would have a greater impact as it gets colder