Why a FrostHeater?
Our weather turned especially cold in September and never really recovered, here in the Pacific Northwest. While the rest of the country appeared to enjoy nice warmer weather (as evidenced by the short sleeves at the Major League Baseball playoff games), we were breaking out our hats and gloves. After scraping ice multiple days, I decided something that got the engine warmer faster would be a good idea, both for the car's engine as well as it's inhabitants.
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| http://www.frostheater.com/ |
I looked for and found the FrostHeater, courtesy of the TDIClub. Everyone loves these things, and while they are more expensive than many others, they are 100% USA made and they do exactly what you would expect: the coolant is heated so the engine is warm when you try to start it. So simple. No weird hot-patch glued to the oil pan, creating a small area of intense heat, and not really helping the engine warm up. There were tales of those things falling off, too, so mid-winter you are suddenly without it. Not good. It's hard enough to work on the car outside when the weather is kinda crummy; full-on winter is beyond-the-pale unpleasant.
More Sadism
I brushed up against the sadistic nature of the German auto-engineers when I did the head removal on T's Audi A4, Nemo (See Sadist Engineering). That was nothing compared to what they set up when they did the hoses behind the radiator in the TDI. On the driver side, we have the oil:coolant exchanger where the oil is cooled or warmed by the coolant. This is actually a really great idea, but the way it was implemented puts your hands behind the fan housing, if you want to mess with those hoses. At some point, you will need to replace them. In my case, I was removing the hose that runs from the bottom of the exchanger to the upper radiator hose. The rear of the fan housing, at least in my case, is hard and sharp-edged. By the time I was finished, my hands looked like I had spent the day baling hay: covered with little cuts (20 or more of varying lengths and depths on each arm/hand) and pink from knuckles to elbows. Note to the reader: get a set of hose spring clamp pliers like those shown in the picture here. The skin on your arms, and potentially many hours of suffering, will be saved.Lower Hose
Again, I encourage you to get a set of hose spring clamp pliers. I have a set now, and will actually enjoy clowning with these clamps next time. Start by removing the under-engine pan. Then, put a catch-pan below the oil:coolant exchanger and remove the lower hose from it. Allow the coolant to drain. Once you're fairly sure you are not going to get coolant dripping on you, start positioning the heater unit. On this engine block (BEW, remember?), there are 2 holes which could hold the heater. You want the one that is closer to the passenger side, but not yet. First, route the hoses. The lower hose runs parallel to the bottom of the engine block and loops up and around to the lower fitting on the oil:coolant exchanger. I suggest attaching it entirely, with a hose clamp. It is easier to thread the bolt from the heater bracket into the hole in the block if the hose is partly helping you hold it in place. Even then, this is not easy unless you have abnormally long, thin fingers.
Heater Unit
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| Frostheater unit |
Upper Hose
In the instructions, the FrostHeater folks indicate that you should route the upper hose before you attach the heater unit. Yes, it could be helpful to do it first. I routed and re-routed this hose many times (both before and after the heater was bolted on), mostly because the directions and pictures were not very useful for this part. The hose runs around the oil filter housing from below. The directions indicate that the hose runs between the AC hose and the housing. While that's correct, they omit the part where it runs around the front to the oil filter housing to the upper radiator hose. The picture in the instructions doesn't show it. Anyway, once you have the hose routed, remove the old hose, and slap that new one on.
Retrospective
The instructions and the web site indicate this is a 45 minute job. It took me 5 hours, which further proves my shop-time math. We test drove it to work the next day to make sure any air bubbles worked their way out, and plugged it in overnight that night. The swift-start and instant-heat from the heater was very welcome. Everything behaved as expected: at start-up, the coolant temperature was at normal operating temp (NOT), and once we started moving, the temp dropped a little bit while the warmed coolant met the cold that was in the radiator. After the coolant blended, the temperature rose back up to NOT quickly, like, by the time we were on the main roads. While this install was a super PITA, we will enjoy this heat for years. Already this autumn we have greatly appreciated how little we have had to scrape ice even though all the other cars in the driveway had icy windows in the mornings. Having heat coming out the vents before we're out of the driveway is really really nice too.
The main take-aways from this are: get a set of those hose clamp pliers, give yourself lots of time, and recognize that the hoses are probably original, so they will be super stubborn to come off. If I ever get to driving Hapy in the winter, I would definitely install one of these. In fact, this install gives me a thought for how I could install the coolant filter I got over the Summer.
That's it for today. Thanks, as always, for following along.
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