Coolant temp warning high on nanocom

Hello peoples, hoping you all had a good weekend, having recently got a new tipper trailer a couple of weeks ago I thought I would watch the coolant temp on my Nanocom whilst driving about... Today with the trailer loaded and going up a very steep hill ( Classic Devon) the nanocom started beeping at me saying coolant warning high ... Pretty scary to be honest! However the temp didn’t go above 98 degrees and luckily was almost at the top of the hill so the temperature went down again fairly quickly... Is this normal temp when towing with a td5 defender? I haven’t had any coolant loss and it doesn’t use any but It did give me a scare

Were you in Instrument Mode? There is an option for the high temp warning and can set it at what ever you like.

tom1979 said:

Were you in Instrument Mode? There is an option for the high temp warning and can set it at what ever you like.

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Yes I think I was, the one where it shows the boost pressure

Discodevon said:

Yes I think I was, the one where it shows the boost pressure

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theres a setting to change it. I think mine is set to 106*C

tom1979 said:

theres a setting to change it. I think mine is set to 106*C

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Is it safe to set it that high though? I was under the impression 100*c it would be cooking the engine?

Discodevon said:

Is it safe to set it that high though? I was under the impression 100*c it would be cooking the engine?

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thats why it’s a pressurised system to increase the boiling point.

Towing uphill can bring the ECT above 100*C and that's quite normal. The scary limit is at 110*C that's why at that point they set the electric cooling fan to kick in for additional cooling. If you have bigger than standard tyres too then ECT going above 100 is not strange at all

sierrafery said:

Towing uphill can bring the ECT above 100*C and that's quite normal. The scary limit is at 110*C that's why at that point they set the electric cooling fan to kick in for additional cooling. If you have bigger than standard tyres too then ECT going above 100 is not strange at all

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Thank you very much for the reply, you have put my mind at ease! I’m going to change my coolant soon before winter really sets in, and am thinking of buying Millers extra cool coolant additive, is there any reason why I shouldn’t use this additive in my td5?

I know nothing about that additive

I had this warning showing on my Nanocom when I first bought it... worried the hell out of me, so much so I bought and fitted a new thermostat, radiator and viscous fan...
The temp warning can be changed in the settings menu, which I knew nothing about. You live and learn...

I use Evans Auto Cool 180 Waterless Coolant in mine. It boils at over 180 degC so removes that problem, has a vapour pressure 75% less than water-based coolants, so less pressure on hoses and clips, has no water to corrode stuff, is non-toxic and has a claimed life of 20 years or a million miles.

Brilliant so far.

Do not use that waterless coolant. Its snakeoil and likely to do more damage to a road engine.

One thing to note as well is Evans will actually cause the engine to run hotter than water.

If it was such a miracle fluid then it would be the standard the world over.

The proper mix of antifreeze and water + a healthy coolant system is all you need. Adding anything else just means your coolant system isnt working properly.

bankz5152 said:

Do not use that waterless coolant. Its snakeoil and likely to do more damage to a road engine.

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Out of interest, what do you base those somments on Bankz5152?

Cheers

neilly said:

Out of interest, what do you base those somments on Bankz5152?

Cheers

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Honestly nothing concrete. However there are various threads on here about the subject, i remembee asking a few years back and was shutdown pretty sharpish.

bankz5152 said:

Do not use that waterless coolant. Its snakeoil and likely to do more damage to a road engine.
One thing to note as well is Evans will actually cause the engine to run hotter than water.
If it was such a miracle fluid then it would be the standard the world over.
The proper mix of antifreeze and water + a healthy coolant system is all you need. Adding anything else just means your coolant system isnt working properly.

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Companies producing snake oil rarely do so for over 20 years. There are pros and cons of any product and the big one for waterless coolant is that conversion is expensive due to the cost of purging the system of water and the cost of the coolant itself. However, due to its longevity the through life costs are far lower in comparison to conventional coolant,.
Most engines run cooler overall, although the lower specific heat capacity does result in slightly increased temperature at the cylinder head (~15deg C). In extreme high performance engines this might be an issue and its use in racing circles is discouraged as pure propylene glycol is inevitably more slippery and flammable than a 50/50 mix of water and ethylene glycol. For a road vehicle the pros massively exceed the cons as long as you can afford the conversion and live somewhere that replacement coolant is available. Eurocarparts sell it in the UK.

https://greengarageblog.org/17-waterless-coolant-pros-and-cons

bankz5152 said:

Honestly nothing concrete. However there are various threads on here about the subject, i remembee asking a few years back and was shutdown pretty sharpish.

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That is pretty flimsy evidence for an accusation of snake oil. I found the post in which it was described as such and the reason given was "an expensive solution to something that wasn't a problem anyway." The same could easily be said of synthetic engine oils. The protection from the right grade of mineral oil is adequate, but they need changing more frequently as they break down more easily. Are synthetic oils snake oil?

Si Click said:

I use Evans Auto Cool 180 Waterless Coolant in mine. It boils at over 180 degC so removes that problem, has a vapour pressure 75% less than water-based coolants, so less pressure on hoses and clips, has no water to corrode stuff, is non-toxic and has a claimed life of 20 years or a million miles.

Brilliant so far.

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Hello there how did you manage remove all your old coolant before the transition to the waterless stuff? Do you see any temp difference on the nanocom?

Phil Baylis uses it in his Td5 for racing, saying that he can run his engine at 120 degrees and not worry like before. Wow that’s pretty impressive!

That's interesting as at 120*C the ECU cuts fuelling to protect the engine and goes to overheat default which is deffinitely not apropriate for racing

the gist for racing is to enhance the cooling system as to keep the ECT as low as possible to have power not to let the engine heat up without fear as the FT is directly linked to the ECT (around 20*C lower) being cooled by the same coolant and starting from a FT of 70*C the ECU will inject less fuel wit each degree so the higher the FT goes the more powerless the engine will be

Discodevon said:

Hello there how did you manage remove all your old coolant before the transition to the waterless stuff? Do you see any temp difference on the nanocom?

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Once the system is drained it needs to be purged and every bit of water removed by using their Prep Fluid which hygroscopically absorbs the remaining water. My engine temps on Hawkeye appear totally normal.
Evans will not boil until about 180 deg C, long after the engine has totaled itself. The benefit of course is that the system does not pressurise itself and you are not reliant on system pressurisation to prevent the coolant boiling. In a conventional system pressure rises and if it blows somewhere, pressurisation is lost, the entire coolant boils and the engine can catastrophically overheat seconds later.
The problem for racing is that if a car dumps its coolant on the track then the surface becomes far more slippery than it would with conventional coolant.