i can only get about 5 min. out of my truck before something goes wrong and i notice the engine is smoking while fixing it. i do run it quite hard, but is there any way to keep it cooler? i do not mind losing any speed if i need to.

i richin my engien when that happens, it actually happened an hour ago when i was tryiong to start up my truck...i richin the engine and drove it for an hour straight non-stop....

that was fast, i mean, i poster 2 min. ago. thanks a lot by the way. now i'me off to nurse my burnt finger, stupid cooling head[:@]

ware a baseball bat glove...trust me it SAVES your fingers!

yeah those are great ideas!! you can also try an aftermarket cooling head......somthing huge and obnoxious that looks great......maybe one from hardcore? try racinghardcore.com they look great also

higher nitro level usually brings down the temp.

are you sure about that? i thought that more nitro means hotter temps? i guess i thought wrong..lol

Not only does higher nitro make my temp go up, but it goes up enough that I have richen the HSN to compensate even between 15 and 20%....

higher nitro content will actaully make your engine cooler if tuned properly.

i would like to hear this from someone who actually works in the nitro department...lol...maybe we can get a representative from a few different fuel makers to answer this question

If this is so, then why do you need a cooler plug and head shims which reduce compression to stop detonation/pre-ignition which worsens with higher temperatures?

I guess in theory, as the Nitro seperates from the oil base, it removes heat as it evaporates; ie your hand feels cold when spilled on it as it draws out heat and evaporates...

Higher nitro fuels cause engines to run hotter. However, since an engine (one that is capable of accepting higher nitros without detonation) produces more power with higher ntiro, it can be richened a little more which keeps the temps in check. Too often, people running 10-15% nitro fuels OVERLEAN their engines in order to maintain the same performance as on nitro/or try to keep up with others running higher nitro.

you sometimes need head shims cause the higher nitro level increases power and compression. it does infact make you engine run cooler, if you dont believe me go ask the pros. i leard about it here on rcu by a big article about nitro fuel. more nitro also increases power because it is more flamible and you can lean it out with out higher tempatures. go ask nitroaddic, if he's still around. i havent saw him post lately.

Some of the posters are posting bad info in this posting. I suspect its their lack of anything higher than a highshool education which is not their fault-they still young.

Increasing the nitromehtane volume in a fuel DOES NOT increase the compression ratio of the engine as previously stated.
Installing head shims DECREASES the compression ratio which normally decreases power but allows power gains (without encountering detonation) with higher nitro fuel.

Power Increases (rpm, top speed, any variation of kinetic energy) cannot be achieved without increased heat rejection by the motor. In fact, most of the energy from the combusted fuel is wasted as heat and a fairly small amount is translated to kinetic energy that is used to rotate the crank which powers your wheels. Therefore, any increase in power (rpm, top speed, etc...) must accompany increased heat generation by the engine. You can't have it anyother way without violating certains laws of physics.

The question is whether the increased fuel flow with higher nitro (more nitro requires a needle valve setting that is opened up a bit) use provides cooling to the point that the engine runs cooler overall. My experience is that the there may be a minimal amount of extra cooling in the crankcase ( the fuel flows through the crank via means of a hollow crankshaft) but there is an actual increase in head temps.

Use of higher nitro fuels allows a richer mixture to be run than is run at lower nitro without as much noticeable loss in performance. This is what I suspect is seen as the "cooling effect" from high nitro fuels.

ok buddy heres what happens. higher nitro content will make higher temps with an exception. when you get higher nitro content you can run the engine richer. since nitromethane can burn without oxygen(partially because it has oxygen in it) you can richen the engine and get more power, also you get more oil which cools the engine more. sorry i made the mistake of saying your suposed to lean it out in my previous post. since there is more nitro content and about the same oil content then there must be less methonal content. the methonal is the reason you need oxygen, so less methonal equals less oxygen. and you say it doesnt produce more compression? explane to me then why people detonate engines with higher nitro?

Eric, you have misunderstood someone or been badly advised on the following idea, this one at least. Adding a head shim DECREASES compression, which is how detonation is avoided. It works like this: [and bear with me as I do not know what the compressed volume of the avg. 0.15 engine is but that is not important here] Imagine here how this works, Your engine displaces 2.5 c^3(cc), a measure of volume. Now, as the piston reaches top dead center (TDC) that is the point of maximum compression acheived by the piston. Now assume with no shim that once the piston is at TDC there is .03 cc of volume left in the head when compressed. Now you add a shim (or more than one) and the compressed volume goes up from the height of the shim. Now with the shim, the total compressed volume has increased to .035cc from .03cc. As you can see, it takes less force (less compression) to shove 2.5cc into .035cc than .030cc, as there is more volume in the head with a shim. The same thing applies to real cars. When you increase the volume of the combustion chamber in cylinder heads, you lose compression. Different thicknesses of head gaskets can be used to slighty alter the compression ratio. Some people like to run thicker gaskets with nitrous to help curb a bit of the compression, the same goes for other forced induction systems as well. That's it. Increase the volume in the chamber at TDC and you lower the compression.

i would have to go with Frost on that one^

The higher nitro content creates a more volatile fuel. As fuel and air is compressed, its potential energy will continue to increase until the point in which it reaches a peak and the mixture will ignite. If it is over compressed in your REAL car, the mixture will ignite BEFORE the spark plug fires. Obviously if this happens too early the piston still must go all of the way up before it can go down, as it is driven by the others rotating the crank. This roughly equivalent to hitting the top of the piston with a hammer. It is heard as a rattling during acceleration sometimes called spark-knock. This is how nitrous oxide with too much timing advance can knock a hole in cast or hypereutectic pistons. In your glow motor it is similar, on a much smaller scale. The inertia of a spinning crank will work AGAINST a motor that is detonating (pre-ignition), so it is working against the burn instead of with it as it should. This can bend or break the connecting rod or the crankshaft. At very least it will seriously rob power.

sorry to confuse you and make you type all of that, i understand the whole shim thing just made a typing mistake. i ment to say that you need head shims because the higher nitro content increases compression... sorry about that ill correct it. i was actually thinking about finding a way to shave the head so i get more compression out of my engine, but i fear that i will get piston tap.

Actually it lowers the point of volatility, the compression ratio cannot be changed except by changing the volume of the combustion area.

Hmmm im gonna get some popcorn and watch this conversation grow...[&:]

frost, i also understand your second post there, and that is why you need head shims. that happens often in glow engines because the glow plug is constantly "glowing". but by increaseing the nitro percentage and richening the motor you will increase compression for 2 reasons. first the more liquid in the engine equals more compression. this is demonstrated when you flood an engine and it locks up. since liquids are much harder to compress than gases then it makes more compression when there is more fuel. second, since there is higher nitro levels that means that the fuel will burn more rapidly with a larger force.

But hold up, that's not what you said, you stated that merely by changing to higher nitro changes compression. It does not.

well by shaving the bottom of the head off lets say .05 in. so that it sits lower, it will decrease the combustion chamber, and slightly increase compression. it is the same concept as taking out a head shim except there is no head shim.