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Covering Grill in front of Radiator when Very Cold

I live in a city that can be bitterly cold in Winter in Alberta. I see a small number of passenger vehicles and quite a few trucks that cover their front grills with a type of cloth when the weather is very cold, minus -15 to minus-35 degrees in winter. Obviously this must be to prevent the cold air from being drawn through the radiator by the fan or even if the fan is not pulling in cold air just the forward movement of the vehicle drawing in cold air.

These cloth grill covers have a flap or flaps in the center that you can open and close. I am interested in purchasing one of these. Can the car overheat if the flap is closed for too long? At what minus temperature can you keep the flap closed all the time. At what minus temperature must you make sure that the flap is open.

Thanks in advance Denny B

Reply to
Denny B
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Those are generally used for Diesels (trucks you said, right?), which don't spit out much heat to the heater core/rad due to efficiency. At -35C, I doubt your rad fan is coming on too often.

Steve Ottawa

Reply to
Stephen Bigelow

On my old 65 fairlane 289, it would NEVER get hot when it was cold. I just put some cardboard in front of the radiator. I still froze, just not as solid ;)

Bob

Reply to
BOB URZ

The thing to observe is the engine temperature gauge -- if you don't have one, you may want to put one in. Let that be your guide. Do keep an eye on it though -- overheating is much worse for today's engines, with their calculatedly lighter construction and profusion of aluminum bits, than for old-fashioned ones.

Such a flap might do you some good if your thermostat is opening too quickly for comfort, which it probably is unless the car was specially equipped for a far-north/mountain winter. And it's easier than changing a thermostat (well, not that that's hard, but a really cold winter day just drains my enthusiasm for working on cars -- especially the watery parts of cars).

Unfortunately, the initial part of warmup, when the thermostat is closed anyway and therefore only a token amount of water is circulating through the radiator, won't be much assisted by this. And THAT'S the part of the morning commute that builds character.

Cheers,

--Joe

Reply to
Ad absurdum per aspera

it reduces your wiggle room. Under the right conditions, it will overheat. And it will get you when you are tired or not into being totally aware that you have blocked the air when were driving up a long easy grade with passengers and such. Maybe you had something more pressing on your mind. Otherwise it works within those conditions. for all quotes there is an equally opposite quote

Reply to
Askari

no as bad as a manual on off electric fan though for all quotes there is an equally opposite quote

Reply to
Askari

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