604 Oil temperature

[Doug Riparetti]

What kind of oil temperatures are you seeing with the 604 motor? Brand new motor, with the recommended 30 minute break in at 2000 to 2500 rpm, no problem with oil temperature. I just shook down my car for the 1st time and ithe oil temperature was 260+ degrees, water temperature was 185-190 degree, scared the crap out of me. Are you running a standard oil or synthetic? I am racing for the 1st time Friday the 22nd and I am a bit concerned, help!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Doug

Seaside California

[claybuster]

Take the oil temp gauge out forget about it. Not being a Sm..t A.s, but wetsump motors run hot. Your water temps look good. It might come down after some run time.

[Chris Steele]

It will come down after running it some. Synthetic oil will reduce it too. These engines have fairly tight clearances from the factory. My new 602 is very hard to turn over when using a ratchet and 5/8 socket on the crank bolt, harder than any I've ever built or had built before the crate craze.

What kind of oil you using?

[Racer 63]

Ran our crate for the 2nd time and motor overheated bad after only 4 laps in heat race. Motor started to lose power and then miss. At the least it must be a head gasket. Any thoughts on this? Have not yet checked the oil for water but when it cooled we fired it for a few seconds and the breathers seemed to be pushing steam.

[Chris Steele]

Dagum racer 63, how hot did you get it? Did it run hot the first race? Tell me what your cooling system consist of...pulley ratio, washer/thermostat, shroud, etc.

[Racer85]

Take the oil temp gauge out forget about it. Not being a Sm..t A.s, but wetsump motors run hot. Your water temps look good. It might come down after some run time.

clay buster is absoultly correct. My 604's oil temp scared the crap out of me at first. I even put a oil cooler on it. My old engine builder assured me the same thing wet sump motors run hot oil temps. I have tried several oil brands (mobil1, royal purple, kendall, and schaffers). I had the best luck with Schaffer's. Just ran it on a mile track at Duquoin and oil temp went to 265 but stayed there and that is better than the other oils on short tracks.

[Chris Steele]

I have heard a lot of people love the Schaffer's oil. We have had our best results with the Joe Gibbs XP1 Racing Oil. We run the Gibbs oil 6-8 races between changes.

[Racer 63]

Unloaded this morning and cracked the plug on the pan. No water at all. Radiator was still half full of water. Gonna run over to see the Busch race at Dover today with a bunch of friends but are gonna do some tests on it tommorow. Compression etc. Chris, I'm no engine guy but we have that kit that comes from KRC. Looking at it it must be a slight reduction. Kit came with 180 stat. Belt seems tight. Fan is 19" 4 blade maybe an inch from radiator. The shroud is most likely one of the problems. It was made to deep from what I've read on here and talked to a few at the track last night who said the same thing. We do have some aluminum in the front to channel air toward the radiator. Motor got to 250. We don't have an oil temp gauge so have no idea about that. The first night we didn't get many laps cause we were in a crash on the first lap of the heat race. Ran hot laps though both that night and last and saw no problems with the temp. Idiot light or sensor is not working is why it got so hot last night. We were working the motor harder in the heat though cause I finally got to experience what it feels like to be up on the bars and lift the LF off the ground. Strange feeling after racing street stocks for so long.

[Chris Steele]

racer63, you have any holes in the nose? We cut two rectangular holes in our nose because the air flows better through square or rectangle than round holes. Round holes can cause the air to turbulance (as explained to me by an airplane engineer). We tape them up for the practice and heat race/qualifying, then untape for the main event. Mine ran 210 tonight and I also have the KRC set up, 4 blade GM fan (Afco 4 blade fan don't have as much blade pitch as the GM fan does) shroud, ducting from nose and a scoop. One guy around here has a 4 blade GM fan and a shroud...no ducting or scoop and he has problems getting warm enough. He has 1 to 1 pulleys where the KRC pulleys are 15% reduction. I have ran a 180* thermostat and now run a 5/8 reducing washer because I started getting scared of the thermostat sticking. Water pump mfg. Stewart recommends 1 to 1, their stage 3 pump and NO restrictor. Good luck with your heating problems.

[Racer 63]

We have one side opened down where the decals for the fake grill would go. Should it have holes higher up on the aluminum between the nose and hood? Or will this let the air flow out instead of going through the radiator. What about a double pass radiatior you guys discussed on 4m? We have piece of plastic protecting the rack but do I need more to act a scoop? Thanks

[billetbirdcage]

Be careful of some serpentine pulley sets as they need more contact around the pulley to drive something then a v-belt. Open LM had problems with the KRC serpentine pulleys as they would slip and not drive the fan properly. A contact of 90 degrees isn't enough to pull a good fan with a serpentine.

[Chris Steele]

racer63, our holes are lower than yours. We have them at the bottom of the plastic nose, but I have seen some in the filler panel between the plastic and the hood. I currently run a single pass radiator on my car. There are several running double and even triple pass radiators. I have a scoop directly under the bottom of the radiator to help deflect air up to the radiator. The slippage billet is referring to is supposed to be eliminated with the KRC idler pulley. Does yours have the idler pulley? If so, you might want to look at the angle of the pulley on it, mine was crooked because they did not have the correct spacers for them. I had to grind a little off of one and add washers behind another one (this shouldn't effect your heating problem, but it makes the belt ride flatter on the idler pulley).

[perfconn]

Take a lesson from the Super Late models.They run engines making over 800hp and don't have overheating problems.
1-no holes are required in the nose
2-stay away from the serpentine belts
3-run the 4 blade 32* pitch fan blade
4-run the right timing
5-run good gas
6-don't run the carburator lean
7-single pass radiator will work
8-run an oil cooler
9-keep the radiator clean

[Racer 63]

Yeah, I dropped the motor off at the approved builders this morning and we had left the water pump and pulleys on. First thing he pointed too was the pulley on the fan. The ridges were shiny where the belt had been slipping, at least thats what it looked like. Thanks guys