Ways to shorten warming up times of an diesel engine
 

We al strugle to heat up our diesel faster, so we can benefit from the following points:

- faster hot engine, so les fuel use
- faster hot coolant, so the cabineheater works
- longer life time/less wear on the engine

The following things are stuf i know to fight against the cold engine.

- grill block: works good for faster warming up, but can't block to much otherwise you overheat the eninge when driving long runs (+30 minutes)

- block heater: works good for warming up the engine, cheap but only works when you have acces to 220V (or other voltages, depends on country location) doesn't work at the mal or other places where you can't plug it in

-webasto block heater: works good, with option it heats the cabin, so no more frozen windows. Bad thing: cost a lot of monney...

Annybody has other idea's?

I like engine blankets for heat retention between runs.

Its been talked about a lot, but not many have done it, but you could insulate the engine block itself.

Not sure what applies differently to diesel, but here are some of the things I've done to my Neon...

1. Insulate hood (Used 1" XPS and expanding foam in the bracing for maximum R-value)
2. Seal up the hood and upper engine bay
3. Block heater
4. Oil pan heater pad
5. Misc (Grill Blocking and Warm Air Intake)

Here are things I'm planning to do...
1. Further seal engine compartment
2. WAI -> Controlled HAI
3. Insulated Coolant Storage System (current project)
4. Active Grill Shutter System

Right now, I still have some bad seal on the sides of the hood. The hood itself is well insulated, so you don't feel it warm to the touch after driving then parking, but between the fenders and the hood, you can feel the heat escaping there.

I've also dumped some expanding foam where I could under the hood (such as, between firewall and strut housing, along fender sides, etc.) to further insulate.

The insulated coolant storage system is what I'm really banking on. I'll have 0.645 gallons that'll be stored in a container sealed up in 1-2" of insulation on all sides. Just over 1/2 a gallon doesn't seem like much, but should be sufficient in raising temps after sitting w/o the heaters going prior.

I've also considered some sort of solar powered pump, painting my hood black, running some lines under it, and then tying that into my coolant system, but wouldn't be effective in shade or much in the winter.

Hope any of that helps!

At the moment i did a full upper grill block. I cant block much more, the only way i can get awey with a small lower grill block is if i close the gaps around the radiator, so al the air comming in, would go trough the radiator. After that, i can close a bit from the lower grill. I need to install a fanled, but damn, those electronics are hard to reach...

Keep your EGR connected. At least my VW TDI has an EGR cooler which warms the coolant. But I don't use it because it clogs the intake with oily soot.

RE: Grill Block - I'm running a VAG 1.9TDi PD with a 75% grill block, and although I haven't driven it through summer yet, I'm confident that it's not even going to trigger the radiator fan. Even with a new thermostat, it still takes 7-11 miles for the engine to come to full operating temperature (route is mostly 50-70 mph).

Block heater is probably your best bet. Provided you're not at the Mall all day you should have enough residual heat left in the block to have a relatively quick warm up.

Filling the oil only to the MIN mark did wonders for my TDi.

Higher antifreeze concentration in the coolant also helps.

A slight valve overlap during the intake stroke, which basically acts like an EGR, might help retaining heat into the cylinders while reducing the likelihood of clogging the intake manifold.