Having an MS in Mechanical Engineering and having published papers on heat transfer, the misunderstandings of thermal and flow processes thrown about as facts by auto hobbyists and mechanics is amazing. I don't even try to argue with them because most don't understand the basic physics and can't grasp anything other than a relation with 1 causal variable (if A goes up, then B does this ...). Engine cooling has several independent variables, as this article discusses. Perhaps the strangest idea constantly passed is the mystical phenomenon this article addresses:
"Will it go through the radiator so fast that there won’t be time for cooling to take place? Not at all, from the expression, ..."
Strange as it seems, many hobbyists claim you must slow down the coolant flow to increase the engine cooling. To any engineer, that is bizarre. It even sounds totally non-intuitive, thus "mystical", and guess what?, it is wrong. You can find on the web a writeup by a Robertshaw engineer who also dropped his jaw when he heard that "slow the flow" concept. He did some research and found where it originated. Early cars, say a 1932 Ford, had weak springs on their radiator cap vents. At high rpm, say moonshiners on a run, the water pump pressure was so high that it caused the cap to vent and loose coolant. The solution was to add a flow restrictor to reduce the pressure. Of course, a stronger vent spring would have been better. The solution worked, but their explanation was strange and carried on. A good guess is that some geezer "experts" will try to argue with me and this article, but I can't be trolled by those without a degree.
