Date:         Mon, 17 Jul 95 19:30:56 CDT
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@vanagon.com>
From:         Joel Walker <JWALKER@ua1vm.ua.edu>
Subject:      Re: Sqirting water on an oil cooler et al

On Mon, 17 Jul 95 17:20:39 CDT Stuart Hutton said:
>> Scott Beckstead claims that cooling the radiator makes an engine retain
>> heat, but I've been driving for 30 winters now and I ain't buyin'.  I
>
>I'm not doubting what Scott has said, actually.  But, I guess I don't really
>understand how it short-circuits the cooling process.  Hot coolant is inside
>the radiator, air blows through the fins, air heats up and carries away the

the big confusion here is the use of the term "water". in its liquid form,
Scott is right: you dump globs of water on the surface of the radiator and
the liquid screws it up. but if you put a mist, the droplets of water are so
small that they are almost instantaneously evaporated, removing heat ...
or so it was explained to me. :)

there is a BIG difference between "water" and "water vapor" ...and the big
trick to making something like this work is getting the water into a vaporized
form of mist, rather than a liquid form.

joel