Thread: What happened to your Discovery 2 today?

I should point out that as a tuner and fellow D2 TD5 owner, we don't really want lower temperatures.

Operating temperature needs to be reasonably high for engine efficiency, between 90° and 100° is probably a pretty happy spot to be, much lower and you are losing the benefit of extra heat in the combustion process, going much higher also introduces problems and takes away what you might call "head Room" as far as temp goes.

A bit of an FYI.. The coolant overheat light comes on at 128° Celsius, a lot of owners will report that they have wrecked heads at lower temps than this on the nanocom, I'd also be pretty sure that they were out of coolant at the time, so we have no idea how hot they really were.

If I was thinking to go away from the viscous fan, I'd probably use the engine ECU to fire the extra fan, it would keep things pretty simple IMO.

replaced the rear door handle cover with a fibreglass one off ebay ...

20220227_120544.jpg

quite solid .. less flimsily flexible as the plastic one.
As it comes with no instructions, the natural way to install it is with the rubber gasket as the plastic one uses, but it don't fit. So the main rubber gasket isn't used. If it were to be used again, it needs the tabs trimmed off for it to 'possibly' fit right.
rubber gasket for handle is still used tho.

Also, the other major difference is that the original type is installed independently of the handle .. so no need to remove the handle to fit or remove.
But the fibreglass type needs the handle installed/removed at the same time, as the handle is fitted over the rear face of the cover.

The only other thing I changed is that the cover comes with two M6 bolts with washers(whereas the original uses studs in the cover and hence nuts inside the door to hold the cover).
Trying to install/remove bolts and washers in the confines of the door is almost certain to see the washers bolts fall within the narrow crevices of the internal door frame ... so I used two flanged bolts instead.

The external bolt is reused from the original, but again it's a bolt and washer, and I used a flanged bolt and original large washer there too.

Overall, for $200 feels a lot more solid than the original 'flexi' cover ... obviously it can break if you tried, but opening and closing the door, it feels more solid. Fit and finish is good and all bolt holes and access holes are where they need to be to fit it.

Looks smick Arthur, did it come complete with the badge?

Originally Posted by V8Ian

Looks smick Arthur, did it come complete with the badge?

no badge included .. original insert used. It's a bit crusty .. typical faded/UV damaged plastic .. but good enough for now.
Fits perfectly too .. maybe just a tad tighter than the original cover fit.

Originally Posted by AK83

Just one thing I've thought about with your 'test mule' .. why did you keep the thermostat?
Did DC recommend too?
I would have thought that with the EWP, it would act like a pseudo thermostat itself, only coming on when temp reached a maximum point, and not coming on at all until this warmed up point.
So .. (i'd have thought) no flow, basically, equal too the thermostat doing it's job of blocking flow.

Does the controller have the ability to vary the EWP flow rate at different temp points?

That is, say, you get to 70°C .. have it flow just enough to minimise a quick rise in temp and to flow through for the HVAC .. and then obviously flow faster when temps get 'up there'.

I've done the mod that trout did to the grille too ... zero difference to both my D1(tdi) and D2(td5) in terms of helping keep coolant any cooler.
In fact both vehicles driven without grille at all for a couple of days too .. and zero effect on maintaining cooler coolant.

Thermostats in these vehicles (and all others basically) don’t block flow - they redirect it.

Having no flow leads to nucleate boiling and this is bad news, especially in alloy heads.

It’s one of the concerns I have with this project above - the coolant only flows when the pump pulses - so these hot spots are getting plenty of opportunity.

And yes those EWPs can increase flow - however the cooling systems thermo efficiency and the radiator ability to shed the heat come into play here.
Obviously the fans also come in at this point - forcing air across the transfer surface.


Funny thing - of all the cooling system designs and failures I’ve had to deal with. The most common involved anything DC.

Their 16” fan - flat out - is pushing 2120cfm
That’s pathetic!

Ford EL are around 3,500cfm at full noise.

Factory Viscous is nearly 3000cfm at full noise,
Idling it’s pulling around 1,800cfm


Thermal load in the TD5 when low range work is underway is quite mild.

Originally Posted by AK83

Just one thing I've thought about with your 'test mule' .. why did you keep the thermostat?
Did DC recommend too?
I would have thought that with the EWP, it would act like a pseudo thermostat itself, only coming on when temp reached a maximum point, and not coming on at all until this warmed up point.
So .. (i'd have thought) no flow, basically, equal too the thermostat doing it's job of blocking flow.

Does the controller have the ability to vary the EWP flow rate at different temp points?

That is, say, you get to 70°C .. have it flow just enough to minimise a quick rise in temp and to flow through for the HVAC .. and then obviously flow faster when temps get 'up there'.

I've done the mod that trout did to the grille too ... zero difference to both my D1(tdi) and D2(td5) in terms of helping keep coolant any cooler.
In fact both vehicles driven without grille at all for a couple of days too .. and zero effect on maintaining cooler coolant.

Originally Posted by shack

I should point out that as a tuner and fellow D2 TD5 owner, we don't really want lower temperatures.

Operating temperature needs to be reasonably high for engine efficiency, between 90° and 100° is probably a pretty happy spot to be, much lower and you are losing the benefit of extra heat in the combustion process, going much higher also introduces problems and takes away what you might call "head Room" as far as temp goes.

A bit of an FYI.. The coolant overheat light comes on at 128° Celsius, a lot of owners will report that they have wrecked heads at lower temps than this on the nanocom, I'd also be pretty sure that they were out of coolant at the time, so we have no idea how hot they really were.

If I was thinking to go away from the viscous fan, I'd probably use the engine ECU to fire the extra fan, it would keep things pretty simple IMO.

Originally Posted by Tombie

Thermostats in these vehicles (and all others basically) don’t block flow - they redirect it.

Having no flow leads to nucleate boiling and this is bad news, especially in alloy heads.

It’s one of the concerns I have with this project above - the coolant only flows when the pump pulses - so these hot spots are getting plenty of opportunity.

And yes those EWPs can increase flow - however the cooling systems thermo efficiency and the radiator ability to shed the heat come into play here.
Obviously the fans also come in at this point - forcing air across the transfer surface.


Funny thing - of all the cooling system designs and failures I’ve had to deal with. The most common involved anything DC.

Their 16” fan - flat out - is pushing 2120cfm
That’s pathetic!

Ford EL are around 3,500cfm at full noise.

Factory Viscous is nearly 3000cfm at full noise,
Idling it’s pulling around 1,800cfm


Thermal load in the TD5 when low range work is underway is quite mild.

No the mechanical thermostat well and truly gone as well as the second coolant rail for it. I now have the modified Mits 3.5 Magna Coolant pipe (cut about 4 inches from it)direct from the Radiator to the coolant rail. There are two short hoses off the thermostat to coolant rail as per the previous pic posted one is removed totally and I have literally repositioned one of these to the other side of the cut down coolant rail as per this pic
20211211_142701.jpg
Attachment 177305

So yes the EWPC does set the thermostat temp, adjustable from 40C onwards. In discussions with DC the EWP does not always 'flow' and I have included the chart as to pulse versus flow rate before, the pulse is not necessarily about saving amps on the system but rather allowing the temps to build, too much flow and the temps would take longer to build and reduce warm up times. The kettle does not start producing 'bubbles' straight away or nucleating as correctly described, but takes time to reach this temp, the temps required to nucleate in a pressurized Kettle would be correspondingly higher. This as to why the system allows the coolant to heat before cooling it. Once the temp threshold is reached the pump is in flow mode, probably just a trickle until building to full flow as necessary -DC don't disclose proportional flow rates only that the system increases to max, but this is infinitely adjustable of course.

The coolant has a natural flow by the way, as it cools down it contracts / pulls and as it warms it expands / pushes somewhat through a closed system, how much this is I could certainly not quantify, even as to it being consequential either.

I did start running the system at much lower than DC recommendations (75C) and got alarmed when it hit 87C on a 27C day- they recommended 92C based on TD5 specifications which I now run the system on, with the fan therefore coming on at 95C and takes it back to around 90C.

As Shack noted that there are optimal temperatures for combustion and this is why I went to DC recommended settings as they also indicated this as being important. It just means an acclimatization to the HIGH temps on the EWPC versus Nanocom but one I am more comfortable with as I have increased my real world usage. Maybe more applicable in petrol vehicles than diesels that lower temps are reputed to give better economy and higher temps better performance, but no engine gives best performance when first starting up from cold.

Again I must stress that these are the Actual Coolant Temp in the upper radiator hose and not the TD5 sensor temp, sure there is a disbelief in the validity of my theory / claim of this being actual temps but having dealt with the Nanocom outputs and the EWPC display in real time and the EWPC constantly shows a higher than Nanocom temp at all times. By the way, if I had the VF with it constantly blowing air over the sensor I doubt the two would probably ever approach parity. I say this as when the temps merge and the EF comes on, the Nanocom goes down quicker.

I am happy to be corrected as always, but still no one else with a pure coolant sensor has given confirmation or called BS as to this, anyone????

The CFM flow rates I have thought about and although I have not seen the actual literature where standard VF and Ford are validated, can accept them. Sure I became skeptical (worried / concerned) as to the ability of the DC fan to cope based on the previous notated experiences of others and the initial temps experienced with the EWP incorrectly installed. Even then that just the DC advice of direct shroud less placement of the fan on the radiator core could suffice. To date it has done so admirably and I am just looking to add surety and capacity with the ACCF should it be needed.

I do note that the fan is concentrating most of its cooling capacity mainly to the upper hotter margins of the radiator and especially the inlet and in so doing is taking on hotter coolant as much as possible. The radiator itself can cope with reducing lower temps pretty admirably as witnessed by the UK users who remove the fan totally so it can clearly cope cooling cool coolant comfortably (this is A+ in C's LOL) without fan assist.

Therefore it may well be that the VF and EF fans would pull the temps down quicker than the 'pathetic' DC one, they may, but I don't have the empirical evidence to confirm one way or the other. I have read though the ford dual fan had not worked with the TD5 but better success with the V8. The output of the VF is also dependent on the 'mechanical' element being in optimal order and a somewhat difficult task to qualify as you have to know that the parameters are being met when lock up occurs or that it is even locking up correctly. There are plenty of tales of broken or failing VFs out there as well and these were I guess not instantaneous but rather a decline to failure.

So with two DC fans operating, a 'pathetic' 2120 and therefore even more 'pathetic' 1500 14" one coming to replace the ACCF, it may operate as effectively as the standard one with the impost of greater amp draw when both are used - Tombie you really don't like DC lol !!

I have to add that I believe that the EWP has a greater bearing on the system than the FAN, even in the standard system the fan is not working at all times and therefore flow is the important component. The radiator cools as needed in normal operating conditions without much assistance. I think I can state pretty categorically that an EWP (even a DC one) offers greater flow control than a mechanical pump for any engine temp irrefutably so at lower engine speeds where engines spend more time.

Must say that I was sort of expecting higher loads in the low range work and I tried pushing it as much as possible to stress the system. Big throttles and extending as much as possible, not recommended driving I agree, justify it by saying I was trying to test the suspension ATB's and TC as well, yeah, as if. The system during this time sat entirely as expected and as previously noted it was only aggressive pressing on driving at with speeds in around 40-50kph that pushed the system up higher (still maintained though), bigger longer throttles, hard breaking and extended time in lower gears on winding roads.


As to the cutout of the front grille, it is interesting as when the TD5 starts warming up and it appears to me as noted above in the low to mid speed range, this being the time that the air flow has to overcome the higher demands when revving the engine and requirement then to cool it, get through the front furniture (ACC. IC and ATC then hit the radiator) which appears to be admirable at around 70kph onwards. An impediment to airflow has to have some bearing on this. Am loathe to put lights there as already have the winch poking up. Mmm does it improve? anecdotally we have a yes and no, thinking it still might be worthwhile anyway and wont decrease flow. But I want to keep the badge so my cut will be at the left edge of the badge and the rest removed.

discovery2a.com/SLS_Retrofit.html

The work begins.
Wait for the YouTube channel and Patreon

Originally Posted by RRT

......


As to the cutout of the front grille, it is interesting as when the TD5 starts warming up and it appears to me as noted above in the low to mid speed range, this being the time that the air flow has to overcome the higher demands when revving the engine and requirement then to cool it, get through the front furniture (ACC. IC and ATC then hit the radiator) which appears to be admirable at around 70kph onwards. An impediment to airflow has to have some bearing on this. Am loathe to put lights there as already have the winch poking up. Mmm does it improve? anecdotally we have a yes and no, thinking it still might be worthwhile anyway and wont decrease flow. But I want to keep the badge so my cut will be at the left edge of the badge and the rest removed.

20220228_091609.jpg

Use a good mesh type and replacing the badge is also easy to do.
Haven't done it on the D2(as you can see), but easy to do using sikaflex, or plain ol silicon(like I did on my D1 version) .. and let is set.

I didn't do this mod on the D2 for cooling, only because, the only way I could open the bonnet when the cable snapped was to break, the already broken grille! ... even more. So it ended up in many pieces, but most of them not reusable for an unskilled plastic worker such as myself.

EDIT: to install the mesh, I used a couple of zip ties and soldering iron. Made small blobs on the grille first, lay the mesh, placed heavy stuff on it to keep it in place, added melted zip ties in blobs on the blobs to weld the mesh into place. Very gentle curve on the mesh to follow the profile of the grille.

Before I added the mesh, I ran it with the emptied out grille anyhow .. ie. no central bar .. this was the most missing piece and the easiest to hack away to access the bonnet release.
Note I have a spare grille in perfect condition, but brother likes the mesh .. so it stayed.

But with grille/without grille/with mesh grille ... temps hardly vary .. and if they do it's more likely ambient conditions and or driving conditions.

Mesh is stainless, cost about $40 for a sheet that did both D1 and subsequently D2 .. If I can locate them again .. a mob out in the Laverton area .. just off Dohertys Rd.