Cold Weather Grille

[Toby]

I froze my *ss off driving to work before the holidays, and came up with an interesting heating solution...

Something similar to the cold weather bras on big rig semi grilles, I cut out an 1/8" fiberboard panel and zip-tied it directly behind my grille!

The immediate results were:

-Both my closed "fresh air" vents are much less drafty at speed.
-My heater unit is finally able to blow warm air for a couple minutes at a time.
-The engine actually heats up and maintains a steady "neutral" water temp.

The immediate concerns are:

-Will pulling the occasional warm air directly from the engine bay cause my demise by carbon monoxide poisoning?
-Will having my engine warm up much faster in such cold weather be okay for the engine itself?

I've got at least another month of biting cold to go until Spring, and just wanted to know if dressing warmer is still the safer option...

[mascher]

Generally there shouldn't be a problem with CO. In any older car it's a bad idea to sit and idle for long periods with the windows closed because of the risk of CO poisoning.

Don't worry about the engine warming up too quickly. If it turns over, it's not too cold to operate. Since the thermostat isn't open the cooling system isn't doing very much with respect to the engine temperature.

When you see a truck with the front blocked they are actually blocking of the radiator. You will probably get better results if you block off the Mini radiator directly.

Cheers,

Kelley