Hello doing a stage one upgrade to my mini s did cat back miltek exhaust have jcs air box doing plugs and jcs 15%(?) pulley. Also replacing oil in supercharger, water pump, new radiator and fan car is at 100k miles anyway should I switch to a 180 degree t stat or stay standard? Thanks

 

I have a 15% pulley, Newman cam and a CAI. I put in a standard thermostat (195?) and my 06 is running at 181 on my scan gauge.

 

The "good" thing about running colder M7 180* thermostat is how the engine managment symptoms believe the engine has not fully reached operating temp increasing the fuel flow. W11 w/supercharger perfers a rich mix.

After adding the M7 180* thermostat and adding "Water Wetters" additive to the coolant, I only see 176* max.

 

Thanks both for the input, much appreciated!!-E

 

Whats the temp trip point for a CEL?

 

Way (from WMW) said this on another post

It is very hard to argue with his expertise, but this goes against what I have seen with other cars. I run a 160° in my Trailblazer SS and my Camaro Z/28. From my experience, so long as the oil is warm enough, the engine will be fine. Extra heat just causes the engine to make less power. I would think a cooler running engine in a Mini Cooper would be substantially better considering the supercharger and the intercooler that sits on top of the engine. I would think a 180° would put the engine into a little better operating temperature and a 160° would be even better! But no one seems to have ever tried a 160°, Just FYI: You can get a 180° or 160° for cheap at your local parts store by getting a thermostat for a 1999 Dodge Neon, they are the same part number!

What will happen if I put a 180° thermostat in my stock 2006 Mini Cooper S with the John Cooper Works kit?
.

 

Won't really do much other than open abit earlier as the fan setting are still set to kick on at higher temp. You need the fan settings to match the thermostat. So you might see cooler temp just for alittle while but with the cooler fan settings it can constantly be able to run at the lower temp..
I have a hci motor and all other mods and I never see above 195 now and my iat's are always like within 5 degrees of the ambient Temps too. And that's just with stock radiator,stock cooling fans and stock water pump but 180degree thermostat ( which a member on here has a bunch he's selling for like 1/4 price of the vendors btw)

 

An engine works the better the hotter it is.There is no doubt, it is a law of physics.

 

Then I guess it is done & over with. The hotter the engine, the better! And to think engine builders and racers have for years been playing with engine temps by running cooler thermostats when all the while all they had to do was simply open up a Physics text book and study the concept of thermodynamics! Weird!

 

Dude is correct, an engine does need to reach certain Temps in order to be fully efficient, yes you can run them cooler but it's not ideal for daildrivers as the oil gets condensation contamination due to never being hot enough to boil out the condensation build up.. so he's correct, there's a fine line and throwing in just a colder thermostat with barely any other mods you can't expect it to do the same as on a built or much more modified engine.

 

What he said. My advice would also be to stay standard. You can always make the switch to a lower temp one, only if needed.

 

Engine builders and racer struggled with engine overheating, their purpose was not to lower the engine temperature as low as possible, but to find the optimum engine operating temperature.
W11 engine have 221F for first step cooling fan start and 232F for second step.
At 194F engine start to do readaptation for Knock, throttle, missfire,LFT, idle and so on.Under this temperature they are no longer done automatically by ECU.

 

From what I understand, you do know your programming, so it is hard to argue with that, But could the 194° be changed to 159°? Several things to think about: colder air is more dense, compression & boost cause heat, engines run off of the work caused by the explosive effort of the fuel AND NOT the heat caused by combustion which is merely a by-product of the fuel burning/exploding, and engines ping when they get hot. And personally, I think oil at a 160° is hot enough to boil of water and flow just fine. The best way to answer the question is to have all three thermostats, combined with a programmer and dyno. I bought all three temp thermostats and I may try all to see the difference. I don't now if I would be able to spend the time & money taking it to a tuner & dyno.

My experience with other cars is the lowering the temp a little works just fine, so I think the 180° will be OK, but the 160° won't work without programming changes. My Chevrolet LT1 & LS1 V8 engines and my Scion xB 4cyl has a factory spec'd 180° thermostat and I put a 160° in the V8s and a 170° in the xB and they have been fine. My Jeep 4.0 straight 6 has a 195° and I tried both a 160° and 180° and settled on the 180° because it ran a little cooler than stock, but still had a decent temp for the heater. It ran at 210° with the factory 195° 'stat and the inside of the Jeep was miserabley hot in the summer. The 180° made that problem go away.

 

Minim coolant temp for adaptive learning can be changed for any value .Picture show both values , min and max temp.Because is european car values are in °C.