[DeTomaso] Thermostat Question for the team!

[Larry Finch]

All,

Dennis also posed this question to the Pantera international De Tomaso forum and Marlin shared the following:

OEM plate opening was .740”
OEM hat was .640”
Clearance of .100”

Marlin’s plate opening is .723”
Marlin’s hat is .723”
Clearance of .001”-.002” depending on tolerance variables
He said there is coolant flow pass the thermostat hat. 

Using Marlin’s thermostat with an OEM plate gives a clearance of .017”

Marlon said he re-designed the components to force more coolant through the radiator. 

The Cleveland small block is the only small block Ford with an internal bypass; other small blocks use an always-in-play external hose.

John Christianson (sp?) once calculated the flow in the Cleveland system versus the external hose system and found very similar flow characteristics. 

It may well be that OEM and Marlin’s components can be mixed and matched and any combination will perform successfully. 

Now the Ford engineers certainly could have designed the clearance to be larger or smaller, but they chose .100”. 

Tim Meyer has OEM-dimension components available.

Absent any actual real world testing, much less engineered tests, I see no reason to abandon the OEM-clearance when OEM components are now readily available. 

My 2¢

Larry 


Sent from me using a magic, handheld electronic gizmo.