Radiators

[Route666]

I was reading super dave's thread on coolant which got me thinking. Why not use a really low viscosity oil in your radiator instead of water or antifreeze or coolant? It would inhibit corrosion right? (I'm not sure if it's electrolytic or not though) Oil is used in heating radiators, so it must be good for transmitting heat, otherwise they'd fill those things with cheaper coolant.

Maybe the heat is too high in the radiator for oil and it breaks down?
Hmm, I just thought that maybe oil isn't used as it might destroy the hoses. But surely you can get hoses that resist oil, or make an oil that doesn't eat hoses, like brake fluid.

I dunno, just thought I'd chuck some ideas around. Also, if you used engine oil, a manufacturer could combine the oil and water passages, making the cooling more effective, and make the engine less complex, and weigh less. Sure, the risk of losing engine oil in a radiator blow-up would be bad, but the radiator system would have to be upgraded to cope with being an extremly vital component.

sooo.... ideas? (I wanna use oil dammit!)

 

[burnout289]

i'd be worried about spillage. when it leaks, and it will eventually, oil is worse than a mixture of water and antifreeze since there's usually more water than antifreeze.

how does oil's freezing temp compare with water/antifreeze mix? and would the oil flow quickly enough? i don't really have any idea how quick an engine oil pump is, but it'd seem like the cooling system has to flow faster... i could be way off.

interesting idea.

 

[Route666]

Well, my original idea was just to replace the hoses, (so they won't be destroyed by the oil) and fill the radiator with a really low viscous stuff. Cooking oil maybe? I think that would break down pretty easy though, but it is the best thin stuff I could think of, but just use the water pump to push thin oil around.

We'll get to the water/oil system hybrid later.