Among the myriad levels of headaches I'm creating for myself with my swap, is the fact that my dry sump routing kinda wants to share space with the LS's stock heater hose routing. The good news is I don't want a heater. The bad news is that I still want it to be "right".
There's a bunch of posts and youtube vids and such that say to just pull out the bungs and plug the holes. And for every one of those, there's folks chiming in that doing that means that the thermostat doesn't see what it should see and they are going to kill their motor. And then an internet battle commences. Here's hoping we're better than that. :)
So, here is said pump, said heater hose bungs, and the thermostat removed but still oriented the way it wants to be. And I can see where the "you'll ruin everything" folks are coming from because the flat plate on the thermostat is blocking off flow to the wax plug portion of the thermostat and if that circuit is dead heading, then the thermostat would be delayed in opening. Now, I think it eventually opens regardless, because engines are hot and heat likes to flow, which is how the "I've been running it this way for years!" folks have been doing so.
What I'm considering is plugging the holes like I want, but also drilling a hole between the rear circuit and front circuit, as shown below in red.
In my mind that gets me the circuit delete that I want, but also lets the water have effectively the same paths that the General Motors gods intended.
What says the GRM knowledge base?
Wouldn't the flow between the two circuits be blocked off when the heater valve is shut anyway? Plus the heat would still be conducted into the wax through the disc-shaped valve at the end of the thermostat. Any difference in thermostat opening is probably miniscule.
I've bypassed heater cores on both my AE92 and Samurai, on the AE92 I just looped the hose and on the Samurai I put rubber caps on the fittings. The only problem I ran into is that the rubber caps seem especially prone to rupturing, I learned to keep spares in the vehicle and I may switch it to a looped hose in the future.
HotNotch said:
Ran this for a year before we ran heater hoses. No leaks, no issues
https://www.ictbillet.com/ls-ls1-heater-core-delete-hose-for-water-pump-coolant-bypass.html
Yeah, "Loop it" seems to be the easy answer for maintaining the flow but eliminating the heater. But the bungs and that loop would then be in the way of my oil pump lines. But the thought on drilling that hole between the two circuits is that I'd essentially be "looping it" internally.
GameboyRMH said:
Wouldn't the flow between the two circuits be blocked off when the heater valve is shut anyway? Plus the heat would still be conducted into the wax through the disc-shaped valve at the end of the thermostat. Any difference in thermostat opening is probably miniscule.
I've bypassed heater cores on both my AE92 and Samurai, on the AE92 I just looped the hose and on the Samurai I put rubber caps on the fittings. The only problem I ran into is that the rubber caps seem especially prone to rupturing, I learned to keep spares in the vehicle and I may switch it to a looped hose in the future.
I'm pretty sure that late model stuff all runs the water through the heater core all the time regardless.
