Heat at last!!! :-)

[ryanprins13]

I came to the conclusion that the heater has hot enough air coming out the vents, just its on the small side and the car is very poorly insulated so the cabin cools off faster than it heats. What do you have for an equivalent of princess auto? They sell basically standalone heatercores with fans. They are meant for bobcats and other machinery. I believe if you put one of those in your car and possibly modify the bypass hose below the thermostat housing to allow more flow you will have more heat than you could ever want for pretty cheap.
I tried a 120v heater in the car connected to my block heater timer but it doesn't work that great and your alternator probably wont run it.


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[BeeDuhb]

This last winter made me want to get this kind of setup going! Joking aside, has anyone resorted to some form of a power inverter and a space heater thrown in the back of the car?

[ryanprins13]

If you need to block off radiator when it's cold, tstat is letting water slip past and mix with head/block/core circuit. I've blocked it and it does make a a difference. Only advantage is making ridiculous hot heat because the radiator can't shed it.


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I mostly agree but thats not quite 100% true. Blocking the rad makes more of a difference than that. Even with a perfect thermostat it will still open at some point and coolant thats -30 will enter your +195 engine. That coolant has to travel all the way across the engine to the far side where the thermostat is before the thermostat will close again. So your engine gets a cold shock and cools off quite a bit, warms up, cold shock, warms up, cold shock.... And so on. It helps to smooth that out a bit to block the radiator.
The other benefit is blocking airflow over the motor. The engine doesn't loose heat to ambient from the outside of the block as fast. That why i block the entire front of my car.
An engine that doesn't warm up in the cold has a failing thermostat or other component and blocking the rad doesn't fix that, with a proper thermostat a festiva will heat up to 195 and hold it roughly there even in -40f. Blocking the rad just makes it nicer and easier on the car. As long as you remember to take it out when it warms up.



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[jason_]

Wet carpet is a bust with recirculation as well.

Unless the build is wild, I always buy the hottest tstst available.

If you have a very good, tight sealing, responsive tstat, you can have a radiator the size of Wisconsin, and won't a difference.

If you need to block off radiator when it's cold, tstat is letting water slip past and mix with head/block/core circuit. I've blocked it and it does make a a difference. Only advantage is making ridiculous hot heat because the radiator can't shed it.

Also note it takes a tremendous amount of btu to heat -20F* air to a toasty 160*. Especially if blower is on high-speed pumping a lot of CFM....

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[WmWatt]

My mechanic says to always keep the outside air flow when the heater's on to keep the windows from fogging up. He says recirculating inside air is recirculating moisture from people in the car breathing all over the place. Or just ask everybody in the car to hold off breathing until you get where you're going. It's pretty cold here in the winter so opening a window just a crack creates a cold blast. Maybe not a problem for me but sometimes I get fussy passengers.

[meyek91974]

My Festival only has heat and not a/c. Could I just remove the outside air vent hose, block and seal it off, and seal the flapper to remain on cabin air? If I need outside air I can open the window

[ryanprins13]

^+1
If i move that slider to just recirculate cabin air when the ambient temps are below -15c its only about 5 min before the windows start fogging up and that doesn't work at all to defrost them first thing after i start my car when its that cold. I may have to try that when its warmer out but my cars heat is adequate above that anyway...


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[william]

Tom I blocked off my freshair vent from the out side on my previous car years ago because the seal from box to cowl was bad this worked wonders but note that your car will hold humidity and I was getting frost on the inside of my windows.

[jason_]

Never too much heat. I love heat. I'll crank it full blast with the windows cracked. I'd rather waste it in the cab then through the grill.

Never too much heat. Especially the colder it gets. When it's 40 and colder, all my cars are default full blast.

I go as far as a 190 stat plus still blocking 2/3 of the radiator. What is open I leave for the fan.

I want that 170* air coming out the vents.

Did I say I like heat? Maybe I'm getting old.

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[TominMO]

Went for a drive today. Outside air temp is 40 degrees. Fresh air vent is sealed off. Even with the motor never heating up as much as it should (gauge only got just above the bottom "normal temp" line), it was uncomfortably hot in there. The gauge went up to 1/3 in the normal zone when the car was iding afterward; then the heat was even hotter.

I would urge everyone who does not have good heat to make sure their fresh-air flapper door closes completely.

[TominMO]

Tom, did you have problems with the engine temp warming up before? Or just getting heat in the car?

Just heat in the car.

[skeeters_keeper]

Tom, did you have problems with the engine temp warming up before? Or just getting heat in the car?

[bravekozak]

I need to find this little black plastic piece from a JY Festy.

My new favorite piece to pull off of two FeStiva$ next time I go before Christmas.

How thick and what size is the damper foam that is needed?
Time to source some for a [GB] group buy.

[14carrot]

Pictures? Lol. My heat isn't working right either.

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[TominMO]

I took a look at mine yesterday after seeing this thread since I was getting cold air even when I had everything off. My fresh air/recirc cable was off the black arm that opens and closes the door. Tom, did you disconnect the cable to see if the door opened and closed easily? I think your problem may be that you need to pop the cable from the holder and put it in a different place so that the door will close all the way.

No, actually the cable was doing its job properly. What happened is that the plastic piece that connects the door to the arm got a stress crack, and now the door hangs down no matter what you do with the arm or cable. I need to find this little black plastic piece from a JY Festy. It is easy to remove, and hopefully I can just do a simple replacement with a good one. I also want to look at Aspire fresh air intake boxes to see if they look like a viable substitute.