Leaving you engine on tickover

[Tony Brooks]

 

Yes, Tony, it was hot water coming back into the engine coolant inlet that I meant, not hot water out of the taps.

 

We have a coolant temperature gauge on our engine room wall that is remarkably steady, after an initial rapid rise. We 'gunned' it on a quiet bit of the Thames last year, mostly at full throttle and 8kts groundspeed, in order to see if we would have any cooling problems going up the Ribble Link to the Lancaster Canal.

 

No variations on the gauge, the keel tank eventually let some warm-ish water through. I believe it's cooling properly. Yes, we also have a clarifier. It takes about 1.5hrs to heat THAT properly, from startup.

 

I would expect hot water from the calorifier in under half an hour of moving off with no significant initial warm up period. However this will only be from the top of the calorifier. That 1.5 hours still points to a stuck open of exceptionally coll thermostat. The "initial RAPID rise" however suggests the thermostat is fine so maybe the calorifier is very old and the coil is furred up on the outside. This would becomes more likely the higher the running temperature is above about 60C.

 

The only way to check for/cure that is to disconnect the doemstic water pipes, plug the bottom fitting and see if you can introduce sufficient lime scale remover into the thing but it would take a lot of lime scale remover AND it would require a really good flush before reconnecting the doemstic water.

[BD3Bill]

What sort of cooling do I have then? One cooling pipe goes into the floor under the front of the engine, and comes up again near the rear.

 

Is that keel cooling?

 

ETA it takes HOURS for warm water to come out of the floor pipe.

 

 

I would expect hot water from the calorifier in under half an hour of moving off with no significant initial warm up period. However this will only be from the top of the calorifier. That 1.5 hours still points to a stuck open of exceptionally coll thermostat. The "initial RAPID rise" however suggests the thermostat is fine so maybe the calorifier is very old and the coil is furred up on the outside. This would becomes more likely the higher the running temperature is above about 60C.

 

The only way to check for/cure that is to disconnect the doemstic water pipes, plug the bottom fitting and see if you can introduce sufficient lime scale remover into the thing but it would take a lot of lime scale remover AND it would require a really good flush before reconnecting the doemstic water.

 

 

Loafer has a BD3 engine I think.

 

Warming up takes a long time as the 3 litre lump is a heavy beast at 450kgs, plus gearbox...

 

I have had the same issues ( see 'Smaller Calorifier thread ) with it being slow to make a tank of hot water.

 

I fitted a heat exchanger system ( copyright of Smileypete of this parish) instead of using the Cal-coils, reduced the time to about an hour.

 

At the end of the day it's a tractor engine designed in the early 60's when having a tractor sat stationary in the yard running PTO machinery was still required, i.e. a cool running engine anyway...

 

Cheers Bill

 

P.S. and no my thermostat isn't a wrong un :0))

 

No disrespect to Mr Brooks, sorry if this sounds flippant, respect due Sir.

 

Edited January 26, 2016 by BD3Bill

[Tony Brooks]

 

 

 

Loafer has a BD3 engine I think.

 

Warming up takes a long time as the 3 litre lump is a heavy beast at 450kgs, plus gearbox...

 

I have had the same issues ( see 'Smaller Calorifier thread ) with it being slow to make a tank of hot water.

 

I fitted a heat exchanger system ( copyright of Smileypete of this parish) instead of using the Cal-coils, reduced the time to about an hour.

 

At the end of the day it's a tractor engine designed in the early 60's when having a tractor sat stationary in the yard running PTO machinery was still required, i.e. a cool running engine anyway...

 

Cheers Bill

 

P.S. and no my thermostat isn't a wrong un :0))

 

No disrespect to Mr Brooks, sorry if this sounds flippant, respect due Sir.

 

 

No problems. Product knowledge always trumps theory every time. It is also almost certainly a direct injected engine and those tend to run a bit cooler because there is no throat that requires effort to force the new charge through on each cycle. However I was comparing what he said with my DV36 that is also a direct injected 3 cylinder.

 

To produce a given power requires a given amount of heat input so once the large mass of metal (450kg) of metal has been heated the only way for one engine to need to dump less heat than another is related to its thermal efficiency and that tends not to alter that much. I still suspect it may have a low temperature stat ini t.

[Loafer]

 

 

 

Loafer has a BD3 engine I think.

 

Warming up takes a long time as the 3 litre lump is a heavy beast at 450kgs, plus gearbox...

 

I have had the same issues ( see 'Smaller Calorifier thread ) with it being slow to make a tank of hot water.

 

I fitted a heat exchanger system ( copyright of Smileypete of this parish) instead of using the Cal-coils, reduced the time to about an hour.

 

At the end of the day it's a tractor engine designed in the early 60's when having a tractor sat stationary in the yard running PTO machinery was still required, i.e. a cool running engine anyway...

 

Cheers Bill

 

P.S. and no my thermostat isn't a wrong un :0))

 

No disrespect to Mr Brooks, sorry if this sounds flippant, respect due Sir.

 

 

Yes it's a BD3 and has always been a slow heater. For Mr Brooks, also no disrespect. I DO get warm water out of the taps after about half an hour, but it takes about 1.5hrs to heat the whole cauliflower enough for 2 proper showers.

 

I don't believe I have anything wrong, meself like.

[Tony Brooks]

 

Yes it's a BD3 and has always been a slow heater. For Mr Brooks, also no disrespect. I DO get warm water out of the taps after about half an hour, but it takes about 1.5hrs to heat the whole cauliflower enough for 2 proper showers.

 

I don't believe I have anything wrong, meself like.

 

That sounds much more like it. As you say all probably OK. The calorifier is probably taking all the heat from the coolant so the thermostat will still be closed - hence the long warm up time.

[ditchcrawler]

 

Yes it's a BD3 and has always been a slow heater. For Mr Brooks, also no disrespect. I DO get warm water out of the taps after about half an hour, but it takes about 1.5hrs to heat the whole cauliflower enough for 2 proper showers.

 

I don't believe I have anything wrong, meself like.

Nor do I

[Loafer]

 

That sounds much more like it. As you say all probably OK. The calorifier is probably taking all the heat from the coolant so the thermostat will still be closed - hence the long warm up time.

 

I actually have a stop cock in the clarifier circuit (to prevent my hot water from keeping the engine warm at night). I thought about experimenting with a closed circuit from cold, and see if it heats the water up quicker!

 

No, I can't believe I thought that either! Doh

Edited January 26, 2016 by Loafer