Notes on 3rd Video

December 28th 2007 (135,800)
Its been cold here (for us anyway - down to the 30's at night) so I haven't been switching over on the short drives to work. I've come to the realization that for the protection of the engine one can not switch over on short trips - especially when it is cold out. I knew this but there is always the instinct to switch over ASAP and be driving for free or helping the enviorment. Perhaps part of my issue is that I have the small diesel tank and I have to be aware of how much of the diesel I use before refilling the small tank so I tend to go to veggie for that reason. But remember I have a trunk!

I found this helpful thread about how to protect your engine on the Biodiesel & SVO Forum

About a week ago the glowplug indicator came on on my TDI. This has made me deal with the 3-port switch placement from the previous modification- that being the installation of the Frybrid HE/filter. The problem is the 3-port switches were mounted to the cowling so I needed to be around whenever anyone service the engine. This hasn't been an issue because the only thing I've done since the switches were moved to the cowling is have an oil changed.

Now that the car needs to go in for service I need to make the system "mechanic friendly" so it's out of the way and provides easy access to the bulk of the engine.

At the same time I decided to do something I have not been looking forward to and that was removing the aluminum lines I had run under the muffler heat shield from the engine bay to the Vormax in the trunk. The problem with this method is that there is no heat exchange between the lines so I'm getting no heat advantage along this run. In this situation cold oil is entering the first heater exchange and as opposed to it being partially heated before the HE and hence getting hotter earlier.

The whole point of these mods is to get the oil as hot as possible when it is first injected into the engine. Although I've seen a significant jump in temps since adding the FPHE it still takes 5-10 minutes for the oil to get to 160 after the switch in this winter weather. This is why I will now generally wait a few more minutes after the water gauge hits 190 to switch over. This extra time hopefully lets the IP get hotter because right now when the water temp reaches 190 the IP is still only warm. This implies to me that the IP is acting like a heatsink and absorbing heat from the heated oil as it passes through it. I can also see the temp raising on the oil near the oil temp sensor the long I wait before switching over - my oil sender is on the looped return line

The only thing left to add is a coolant shut off valve for the hot summer journeys to Las Vegas.

Here is the latest video concerning the above mentioned installation