Zlicious

Hey guys,

I recently flushed my radiator system and filled back up with mostly distilled water and a little of dex-cool anti-freeeze (If I were to guess, I am running about 90% water and 10% dex-cool) I was also going to add 1 bottle of water wetter but I heard ONE person say to not mix dex-cool with water wetter. Everyone else says it is completely fine to do so. I just want to make sure from some of the experts before I do pour one bootle of water wetter in.

TIA

0Randy@DRM

We run it about 99 percent of the cars that come into the shop!!! I wouldn't worry about it at all.

Randy

Zlicious

Great, that's all I needed to know. I will be adding the 1 bottle of water wetter when I get home tonight.. I heard A LOT of good things about this product.

RoHo

It will take at least 4 or five bottles before you will really see any effect, I put one bottle in my Z and saw no change at all.

I was whining about this to my buddies here is So Cal that have high travel sand cars with built LS1 and LS7 and they said that they are using a minimum of 4 bottle, most of the time 5. At 4/5 bottles they can run hard all over the desert and still keep things in check.

I have 4 bottles sitting on the shelf, just waiting for a little time to jack the Z up to drain a little water out to make room the water wetter.

jan eric

Where is the drain? How do you access it?

DntXme

Why would you only use 10% dex-cool? You are not getting the cold or hot protection you need.

At 10% you are most likely around 25 to 30F for a freezing point, whereas at 60% dex-cool you would be at almost -65F.

On the boil over side, your protection is diminished from somewhere around 265F-270F down to 250F or so.

The whole freezing point depression, boilng point elevation properties are lost without the 50-60% mixture.

HISSMAN

(The reason I am digging up an old thread also is because I am in the process of reading everything on this board dealing with the ZO6 since I am nearly going to buy one soon to park next to the snake)

Anyhow. If you live in an area that hardly ever sees temps below 30 degrees then there is no reason why you can't run a mix of 80/20 water:antifreeze. With that add 3oz of Water Wetter to the mix per gallon, and Bob's your uncle. Or do like me. I run an 80/20 mix during the warm months, and flush my system and run a 60/40 mix (water:antifreeze) during the cold months with 3 oz per gallon of WW. For my track setup I am 100% water and 3oz of WW per gallon.

A lot of people seem to confuse the orange stuff in the Prestone bottle for coolant. This is wrong. It is antifreeze until it is mixed with water and or ran through the cooling system of the car. Antifreeze does do a very good job of not allowing your block/radiator to freeze at cold temps, but it also hinders heat transfer from the block to the radiator. The more antifreeze in the mix, the slower the heat will transfer from the block to the water circulating through the system. Nothing will transfer heat better than pure water.

Where water wetter comes in is to aid that process. Look at it like this. Heat up a pan of oil and watch the oil move away from the heat source. Water will do the same thing when it is in your block. Hot spots in the block will cause bubbles to form in that area and prevent heat transfer to be as efficient as anyone with a sports car would want it to be. Water Wetter, unlike anti-freeze reduces surface tension of the water thus causing the bubbles that are forming to be smaller. They will still form, it is a natural property of water, but they will have less surface area and the water will have a greater contact with the engine. This is all kinda dumbed down a bit and the real answer is a little more scientific, but it is what it is. Also, to much anti-freeze can actually restrict corrosion and freeze protection. But that would be at levels above 70%.

Here is a quick reference I developed to show when the coolant would freeze, and at what percentage of antifreeze to water.

15% anti-freeze - Protection down to 20 degrees F.
25% anti-freeze - Protection down to 10 degrees F
30% anti-freeze - Protection down to 0 degrees F
40% anti-freeze - Protection down to -15 degrees F
50% anti-freeze - Protection down to -34 degrees F
60% anti-freeze - Protection down to -57 degrees F

These numbers are based off of a 12 quart cooling system capacity.

This is how I understand it as taught by Prestone.

HISSMAN

Cool. I found this worksheet that has some good info.

http://illuminations.nctm.org/lesson...DontFreeze.pdf

427Z0SX

Since distilled water transfers heat the best, is it safe to use it only (or with water wetter), provided my car never sees freezing temperatures?

Thanks,

HISSMAN

I would still probably go with at least 20% anti-freeze/dexcool. Even though the water wetter claims to give you all of the conditioning and corrosion protection needed, I would hesitate to use no anti-freeze at all on a street car. There are some that use 10% and have no problems. I am just finicky about using non on a street car.

Dreamin

NO! Anti-freeze / dexcool provide anti-rust protection. I'd still run 20-25% dexcool.

ALTECH

So, if the ambient temperature is always 85+, 100% of DexCool is not the best?

DntXme

Sorry for my ignorance. I stated in my previous post that the Boiling point elevation benefits of the 50% water - dexcool solution would prevent boil-off and other associated problems with higher temperatures. I completely ignored the differences in heat capacity of pure water versus the 50% dexcool mixture. I support the notion that the a smaller % of dexcool is the way to go. I will be making that change this weekend. I have a Mallett LS7 Solstice that has a tendency to run a bit hot here in southern California. Thanks for insight everyone. I'll be going to a 25% mixture of dexcool-water

HISSMAN

I am assuming that you mean 100% of the Dexcool that came in your Vette. If so, then that is actually 50% Dexcool and 50% water. So, that is a 50/50 mix. Going with a greater concentration on water such as a 80/20 mix will aid in heat transfer and allow your engine to cool quicker after hard runs, and heat exchange through the radiator will be much more efficient.

-Jeff

RoHo

Since my last post regarding water wetter I drained some water out and added FOUR (4) bottles of water wetter as per my sand car buddies recommendation and it did NOT change my temps one degree, I think this water wetter thing is smoke and mirrors.

Save your money.

HISSMAN

Are you still pretty much 50/50 anti-freeze/water? If so, I doubt that you would see any difference. Also, did you just drain fluid from the degas reservoir? If so, then it is likely that the Water Wetter is not even circulating through the system. I think that you went a bit overboard on the amount of WW you added to the system. One 12 ounce bottle will treat up to 16 quarts of water. Or four (4) gallons. You probably used enough for 4 ZO6's. In any case, I am not 100% sold on it lowering temps either, that is why I didn't mention that aspect in my earlier posts. I just use it as an additive to aid with conditioning and corrosion protection as well as limiting hot spots when I am running less than specified levels of anti-freeze.

VNAMVET

.....of course it is..................now you need a "turbonator".......70MPG!

HNK

http://www.e30m3performance.com/myth...ter_wetter.htm

HISSMAN

According to that I guess I was paying attention in class. Great find!

Zlicious

I have been running this combo now (mostly water, some dex-cool) for this entire summer (doesn't get below 55* anymore) and I love it. The car runs great and COOOOL. Once fall comes around, back to 50/50.

I recommend this to anyone that is looking to run a cooler motor.