Winter sucks, all time low so far

[Johnny Mullet]

I am allowed to plug in at my work. That sucks that your job won't let you. Without my block heater, I would not want to see my MPG #'s

[bgd73]

Originally Posted by FastPlastic

I hear ya. Had my all time low last tank. Sad part is it hasn't even gotten cold yet. I hear next week were going to have lows down to -8.

I've been toying with a battery powered block heater. I've got a 200watt magnet mount block heater and a 400watt power inverter. Sadly the old battery from my Jeep just won't hold enough charge to do it. So I would need to find a better one. I can't decide if it would be worth buying a marine battery to do it.

so that really does work....
I can't complain about gas mileage any time of year, but the little 1781 boxer is a cold runner....
Nice to see someone actually uses power invertors..

try covering radiator towards the top, let it be more oil pan cooled if in the frigid.

[MetroMPG]

What would happen if you skipped the inverter and hooked the battery directly to the block heater element? I haven't done the calcs...

[93Cobra#2771]

For the first time in a long time, my last tank dropped below my lifetime average. Seeing 2-7 mpg less in these cold and wet times here in East Tn.

I was just thinking the same thing about winter sucking. :lol:

[FastPlastic]

Originally Posted by MetroMPG

What would happen if you skipped the inverter and hooked the battery directly to the block heater element? I haven't done the calcs...

I don't know about others. But I just wanted to throw in that my magnet mount has a internal temp control(250F if I remember correctly). So I'm guessing that style probably wouldn't work with 12V.

If you just do the math of Volts x amps = watts.

200watts at 12V = 16.666amps
800watts at 12v = 66.666amps

I believe that's per hour correct? I'm a little rusty with the power calculations.

[bbjsw10]

Fastplastic, that is constant draw. Not amp/hr.

I was thinking about a 12v heating element out of a camper fridge, 250w and will run off of 12v alone. I will never do it though too many dang projects already. I need to start finishing the ones I have now.

Hell it took me over a year just to complete the overclock on my computer, I need to catch up.

And yeah it sucks work won't let me plug in, plus I may be getting my hours cut. If so I may have to sell or trade in the Wife's SI for something a little cheaper, and that sucks. I love that car but at same time it is just a car.

[GasGuage]

Daggone, I was just getting excited getting my mileage up, & now I'm learning that it might go down because of colder weather. I never even considered that. Fortunately I park in a garage, & all of my driving is hwy. Guess I could just jerk the plastic radiator fan off for the winter & worry about the efan in the spring. that should make up for some mpg. Blocking off the grill should be in order too. I seen a Scan Gauge for $136 on Amazon last week. I started to buy it, but thought the Christmas presents set me back a little bit. I went back on last night to get it & the price jumped back up to $155. What luck. BTW, Merry Christmas everyone.

[NeilBlanchard]

Hello,

My car takes at least 6 miles to warm up fully, so a drive under 3 miles is going to never get off of the "choke" mode. It's not hard to imagine getting lousy mileage in that situation.

[GasGuage]

Yeah, driving those 3mi would be a bummer on gas. I have to drive at least 14mi to the nearest town. It's probably about 1/2 gal of fuel anyway you look at it.

[anomoly40]

My mom used to have a solar battery charger that you could plug into a 12v cig lighter about 5" x 14". I wonder if it would have enough of an output to make a difference.

Maybe use a Lawn mower battery so it isn't too heavy and offset the potential mpgs you might be getting. Maybe have a remote control to turn the heater on and off to conserve battery power.