I live in las vegas, and the weather here in the spring-summer-fall is usually 70(and thats being generous, its usually like 85 or 90) at night to 120 in the daytime. I've heard that water is the best coolant, because it takes 1 BTU to heat it 1 degree or whatever.......my question is, if in the summertime, I change out the glycol/water mix in my system for a 100% distilled water. For those of you that don't know...distilled water is 100% pure water, and 100% pure water does not boil....


does anyone know if this will be harmful to the coolant system or not?

 

well, in a properly working, sealed cooling system the liquid won't boil anyways. And water does disipate heat more effiecently then coolant does. .......

 

the water will still corrode the system so you need some coolant to lube up and keep the system clean

 

well is a 3:1 Water:Coolant ratio good enough you think?

 

Water my in your opinion cool better but in mine it doesnt.
The other additives in the coolant help it dissipate the heat from the cylinder walls faster.
To see the effect I am talking about heat up a frying pan(really hot) and drop a few drops of water in it and see what happens. Now try it with a 50/50 mix.
Water wetter and those products were invented to take this one step farther.
On a heated motor the water doesnt actually touch the cylinder walls because of this effect.Cant remeber what it is called but there is a scientific term for this.I will try and find it.

 

I gotya dude I get it. I don't know how the coolant flows through the block on this motor, but your right, and its instant vaporization for the coolant that touches the cylinders but doesn't really touch it because its so hot.

As for additives, the science behind them is that it helps the heat make the shift between the mediums - as in the heat goes block->additive->coolant/water, dissipating heat better, rather than just block->water/coolant. Scientifically(and as far as I know), water is proven to be the best coolant material simply because its even on the heat exchange - it takes 1 BTU of heat to heat 1 oz of water 1 degree or something, rather than 1.5BTU's of heat to heat it 1 degree with the 50/50 mix....what you have to remember too is that the coolant is formulated to not freeze as well, making it's heat absorbing properties less able since its designed for dual purposes. But I don't know too much about the system in our cars, which is why I asked it here.

 

yeah it takes one calorie of energy/heat=the number your using. the idea of the additives is to make the water "wetter" by breaking its surface tension it allows it to "stick" better to the fins in the radiator allowing more heat out of the water instead of more into it

 

Want my advice, don't **** with it...just asking for problems.

You honestly think that 100% distilled water doesn't boil? Pour some in a pot on your stove and let it go...How could you even say something like that.

These motors go through INTENSE testing at very high temps, trust me, your coolant WILL Work.

 

Your prolly right, I prolly shouldn't **** with the system....as for 100% distilled water not boiling, what makes water boil is the impurities in there, mythbuster's proved that one the 2 coffee cups - 1 with regular and 1 with real distilled water getting beat on by 8 microwave generators kinda showed the fact if its really 100% distilled, it won't boil....

as for putting water on my frying pan versus water/coolant....its not a fair comparison simply because its an open air system where as your coolant is fairly sealed and gets a lot hotter and under a lot more pressure

and no one ever made any progress if they didn't take a risk....i'd rather find out 1000 ways not to do something before I found the 1 way to do it...

 

Good idea, coolent is an essential part of the cooling system. It lowers the freezing temp but also raises the boiling temp when properly mixed with water. Not to mention it acts as a lubricant for the water pump. Distilled water should be the only water used in a cooling system specifically because of electrolysis. Water wetter is a great idea as an additive, I've seen the stuff on how it works and it does.

 

cool man, thanks for the advice.....I'll see about picking some up this weekend. when its 120 outside any help is great in a cooler motor.