Waterwetter

[Glenn]

I had a Valkyrie for a number of years, which is a great long distance cruiser, and spent a lot of time out west in the heat. The Valkyrie gives off a lot of heat, which is understandable given the size of the motor. I added a product called "Waterwetter" to the cooling system and it did drop the engine temp about 15 to 20 degrees. Doesn't sound like much but you could tell the difference. Has anyone tried it in the FJR?. I'm going to add to the cooling system as soon as I figure out how to access the tank. There is no obvious fill cap so I assume it is under the plastic.

 

[GalaxyBlue]

I remember this being discussed before, But the search came up empty for me...

As i recall, It really does not improve anything except in race applications. Street use, Would be a waste, IMO

 

[radman]

Does nothing. Designed for use in race cooling systems where antifreeze mix is outlawed, prevents localized boiling and raises boiling point a hair. Is not recommended for use combined with glycol, a good recommendation as antifreeze has many of the same properties as well as providing many more benefits. Had it in Frank for a season, just to see, did nothing for temps or anything else that could be substantiated.

 

[timk]

I put it in my Venture at the suggestion of one of the sites frequent techno guys. Shortly after he said there was a chalky film on the innerds of his bike when doing some maintenance. I got it out of the Venture after only 10 days.

 

[Bike Effects]

I have been using Water Wetter in my R1 for years and my FJR since the first scheduled coolant change. No problems, but although it is supposed to avoid hot spots in the cooling system, it is difficult to tell the effect as a rider. Remember, we do have thermostats that keep us at a minimum temperature.

 

[beeroux]

Never to be seen in my bike.

GZ

 

[Rickster]

MSDS Link

Direct from Red Line:

SuperCool with WaterWetter® (80205) is a pre-mixed coolant for motorcycles,...

This product doubles the wetting ability of water to improve heat transfer and reduce cylinder head temperature.

Compatible with all glycol antifreeze and coolants, this product is blended with deionized and purified water and WaterWetter®, the most effective heat transfer agent available with corrosion inhibitors to satisfy the same ASTM corrosion tests which glycol-based antifreezes are designed to pass (ASTM D2570 and ASTM D1384). Red Line's WaterWetter® provides excellent rust and corrosion protection for modern cast iron, aluminum, and brass systems.

Use with a long-life antifreeze if freezing temperatures are to be encountered. This product does not contain anti-freeze and its freezing point is 32ºF or 0ºC. Available in 1/2-Gallon containers.

WaterWetter by it self:

WaterWetter® is a unique wetting agent for cooling systems which reduces coolant temperatures by as much as 30ºF. This liquid product can be used to provide rust and corrosion protection in plain water for racing engines, which provides much better heat transfer properties than glycol-based antifreeze. Or it can be added to new or used antifreeze to improve the heat transfer of ethylene and propylene glycol systems. Designed for modern aluminum, cast iron, copper, brass and bronze systems. Compatible with all antifreezes, including the latest long-life variations.

--------------------------

I can't find any reference to a specification in the owners manual.

Service Manual has a note:

Recommended antifreeze High-quality ethylene glycol antifreeze containing corrosion inhibitors for aluminum engines

Mixing ratio 1:1 (antifreeze:water)

So I would be unsure if WaterWetter by itself would cause warrantee or Y.E.S. claim issues.

 

[Windblown]

I use water-wetter in my trackbike. Never had any mystery build-up in the cooling system or issues with it whatsoever. My guess is that if someone used it and started seeing deposits it was due to them using water with minerals in it. I only use distilled water in cooling systems.

I haven't noticed water-wetter to be particularly more effective than a water/anti-freeze combination for temp control.

Since an engine is going to generate "X" amount of heat which all needs to be disapated in some way (except for the heat the engine is designed to run at) then I'm pretty sure a more effective cooling system would be noticed as more hot air coming off the radiator and therefore the ride would feel just as, or more, hot to the riders legs.

 

[HaulinAshe]

Our field tests have repeatedly shown that distilled water is the most effective coolant. Any additives, including EG, only serve to prohibit buildup of deposits, deter corrosion and of course raise/lower the boiling/freeze points. If you could get by with it (which you can't) 100% pure distilled water is the MOST efficient coolant.

 

[jestal]

Water is indeed a very good coolant due to the high specific heat value and low viscosity, but, it is not the most effective coolant at all for automotive or motorcycle engines.

The cooling system has to do two jobs, eliminate waste heat from the system (keep the coolant gauge in the green) and minimize thermal gradients inside the engine.

Water does a good job of keeping the guage in the green but a very poor job of minimzing thermal gradients inside the engine. On an unregulated (no thermostat) type system or a system running very cold plain water might run at slightly lower temps and thus look like a "better" coolant but the results are decieving.

Due to it's relatively low boiling point, plain water will experience nucleate boiling on the hottest of metal surfaces inside the engine, like the exhaust port walls, which reduced heat transfer localling thus increasing thermal gradients inside the engine. The localized boiling and bubble formation on the hot metal surface tends to isolate the metal from the coolant for a moment and thus drive metal temps much higher.

Race engines that must run plain water have systems designed for plain water that are prepressurized to 25 or 30 PSI and will hydraulically increase the pressure inside the engine even greater thru the use of flow restrictors, etc. NASCAR,Champ Car and IRL type engines are very typical of this. To do this they typically run systems that sacrifice flow rate for hydraulic pressure which is not the best of situations but the race engines need only last a few hours, not years and years.

Putting plain water in a conventional cooling system dramatically reduces it's capability regardless of how much "better" at heat transfer the plain water might be. At normal system pressures of 15 PSI water will boil at 240 F or so. This means the system will loose total control at that point where a 50/50 coolant/water system will stay in control until 265 F. Plus, localized boiling (and resulting high thermal gradients) will occur much sooner. This has a real effect on engine life. Race engines and track bikes run for relatively short periods of time on plain water might not exibit symptoms of high internal thermal gradients but an engine operated for long periods of time on it will suffer.

Ethylene Glycol is a relatively "poor" coolant compared to plain water due to the reduced specific heat of EG (less heat carrying capability) and it's higher viscosity (reduces flow in the system) but it makes up for these dificiencies in terms of overall system performance by dramatically increasing the boiling point of the coolant which reduces any tendency for localized boiling inside the engine as well as raising the overall operating temperture of the system from 240ish to 265 F for a 15 PSI system.

I ran a number of engine cooling tests on "water wetter" type products a number of years ago and did not see any real gain in system performance or efficiency when used in conjunction with a 50/50 ethyleneglycol/water system. The systems did not run cooler and had no more capacity than without the water wetter. Plain water systems benefit some from the addition of the water wetter but, even then, the effect is not that great. I have never seen any actual "corrosion protection" from the water wetter materials I tested. They would probably help "corrosion" inside an aluminum head slightly due to the slightly reduced tendency for nucleate boiling but it is nowhere near the protection a properly formulated silicated coolant (conventional green stuff) or an OAT coolant like DexCool.

Since a street engine is running on the thermostat most of the time it is highly unlikely a water wetter type material would improve cooling system performance.

 

[05fjrman]

I put Engine Ice in mine. Can't tell any difference. Supposed to have the same effect as Water wetter, but with a lower freezing temp, meaning I won't have to drain my motor every season.

 

[charismaticmegafauna]

I wonder where the idea -- "Colder is better" comes from? The old Kawasaki Concours had a coolant radiator and an oil cooler radiator -- and the temp guage spent alot of its time displaying the opening and closing of the coolant thermostat (trying to get the engine 'up to operating temp'). Appears to me that there's plenty of cooling capacity on the FJR, too -- at least on my FJR.

The engine temp is controlled by a thermostat and cooling fan/s.

BTW, jestal, v/nice dissertation on cooling -- illuminating. Thanks

 

[evil_henchman]

While it's true that pure distilled water should have the best heat transfer capability there's a big drawback that's best explained thusly:

Fill a pan with water, put it on the stove, and turn on the heat. Notice all the bubbles that form all over the sides of the pan? Every one is a "hot spot" where water is not in contact with the pan surface. Added together that's a lot of surface area.

Now repeat the exercise only this time add water wetter (or any other whetting agent as they're known in industry) and you'll see few if any bubbles sticking to the sides of the pan making for much more efficient heat transfer. I don't know why redline doesn't explain it that way. That's how it was presented in water chemistry class. I guess they think people are easily bamboozled with pictures of molecules and words like "surface tension".

As far as I know all glycol coolants have whetting agents in the mix so you gain nothing with water wetter if you're using glycol.

 

[otrfjr]

Jestal,

Did you see anything that would substantiate Water Wetter's claims to reduce surface tension in water (or something along those lines IIRC)? If the benefits you saw with straight h2o + water wetter were slight, then I'm guessing the 50/50 ethyl glycol blend which is close to optimal for most of us on the street would show near zero 'cause WW can only work on half the solution (by volume). But that doesn't mean it doesn't work, only that it's benefits are so small as to outweigh the $10 worth of trouble on the part of the owner. Right?

I ran a number of engine cooling tests on "water wetter" type products a number of years ago and did not see any real gain in system performance or efficiency when used in conjunction with a 50/50 ethyleneglycol/water system. The systems did not run cooler and had no more capacity than without the water wetter. Plain water systems benefit some from the addition of the water wetter but, even then, the effect is not that great. I have never seen any actual "corrosion protection" from the water wetter materials I tested. They would probably help "corrosion" inside an aluminum head slightly due to the slightly reduced tendency for nucleate boiling but it is nowhere near the protection a properly formulated silicated coolant (conventional green stuff) or an OAT coolant like DexCool.
Since a street engine is running on the thermostat most of the time it is highly unlikely a water wetter type material would improve cooling system performance.

 

[jestal]

Excellent illustrative experiment Evil Henchman. That is what I was trying to say......

The water wetter does appear to reduce the surface tension of the water which is why it works in the experiment evil henchman outlined. The bubbles forming on the hot surface collapse easier with reduced surface tension. In plain water the WW will definitely have some effect but the total result is still not as good as a 50/50 EG/water mix in comparision. The EG minimizes or eliminates the nucleate boiling problem you can visualize in the experiment described by raising the boiling point of the mix (not by lowering the surface tension of the water) so the localized bubbles do not form...until a much higher temperature, anyway. The WW added to a 50/50 mix doesn't show any improvement because the problem it is trying to fix doesn't exist....the nucleat boiling is prevented by the raised boiling point so the reduced surface tension (even if it existed in the water) doesn't mean anything.

Think of it like this in the experiment above. In the pot of plain water you will see the bubbles form on the hot surfaces. Add WW and the bubbles will reduce and not be nearly as evident. BUT, the pot will still boil at 212 F regardless of whether it is the plain water or with WW added. Add 50/50 ethylene glycol, however, and the boiling point will instantly increase to 240 F or thereabouts whether WW was present or not. The higher boiling point of the mixture is what makes the EG mix superior for cooling performance.

WW has a place in race and comp engines that MUST run pure water for safety/rules reasons. It should not be misconstrued, though, as a replacement nor a "better subsitute" for a proper 50/50 EG/water mix. WW just makes the plain water systems cool a little better than they would otherwise, that is all. Personally, I cannot understand their claims for making a 50/50 EG/water system work better or reduce temperatures. There seems to be no practical reason for those claims other than just marketing hype to get you to use it.

In the tests I ran the cooling systems were under heavy load (like towing a heavy trailer out of Death Valley in the summer up a 17 mile grade....been there, done that) and operating at the limit of their capacity. Adding WW did not reduce the temperature of the system which is a direct measure of the system performance at that point as it was WELL above the 'stat temperature. In systems with plain water (which I have limited testing) the WW lowered the operating temp under full load/capacity conditions by a few degrees (which might be important under some conditins) but did not significantly improve cooling system performance like changing to 50/50 EG would. The WW worked, it was better than nothing if you had to run water but it is no panecea and certainly no subsitute for 50/50 EG/water.

I have never tested the corrosion protection claims that WW makes. I am very skeptical, though. It is difficult to get the correctly formulated OAT and silicate corrosion protection packages to work in testing and I have never seen any success with "additive" type corrosion protection poured into the systems. The OAT and silicated coolants are blended solutions that are not reproduceable by pouring an ad into the cooling system. So...the jury is out on that claim.

Possibly the corrosion protection claim comes from the reduction in nucleate boiling.... When nucleate boiling happens with aluminum heads nasty things happen. That is why you hear about aluminum heads failing or cracking on NASCAR engines occasionally. If the WW helps that it would "theoretically" provide some sort of corrosion protection I guess, but not in the overall system protection sense where the silicated and OAT coolants actually passivate the surfaces preventing corrosion.

The FJR seems to have an excellent cooling system from what I see of it. Plenty of capacity. The "heat" issues often discussed have nothing to do with cooling system capacity in my opinion. The rider discomfort comes from the hot air being improperly/poorly ducted from the radiator and/or heat from the exhaust/catalyst. The system runs on the thermostat temperature nearly all the time from what I see so adding WW or any other magic cooling system elixor is not likely to do anything other than cost/waste more money.

 

[DailyCommuter]

I put Engine Ice in mine. Can't tell any difference. Supposed to have the same effect as Water wetter, but with a lower freezing temp, meaning I won't have to drain my motor every season.

So basically the claims are untrue. No difference on your temp guage or anything? I'm surprised. I was gonna buy it but now I'm not sure. Maybe not now.......

 

[radman]

Ford insists on the addition of what I believe to be a wetter product in all of it's Powerstroke Diesel engines in addition to antifreeze. Powerstroke engines had a number of cylinder failures due to cavitation (or localized boiling) in the cooling system, the very thing wetter products claim to prevent. In the case of Ford's product, I guess it worked. The process that occurs with a diesel is kinda unique though, don't know that it would apply here.

 

[ONE MORE BIKE]

Has any one tried Evans waterless coolant.

It is touted as life time. Never needs changing.

 

[wallypiper]

Some great posts in this thread.

I just want to clarify that the temperature displayed on your gauge or via the LCD bar graph is coolant temperature, not engine temperature.

Your engine always generates heat and the amount of heat is determined by the horsepower being produced and some combustion parameters such as mixture, burn characteristics etc.

If you don't change anything else but you do put in water/waterwetter and the displayed temp goes down, that indicates two possible effects.

First, the heat is being rejected from the coolant in the radiator more effectively which is a possiblity since the water/waterwetter mix is a more efficient heat transfer fluid than the EG or a water/EG mix.

Second, heat is being transfered from the engine into the coolant less effectively so that the coolant temp is lower but the engine temp is higher. That is not what you want.

I run water/waterwetter for track days on my SV and never change it for street riding. The SV doesn't have a gauge but there is no indication of coolant loss over time so I don't think the mix is boiling off although it might be boiling locally in the engine and recondensing in the reservoir.

jestal, I'm not sure where your number comes from. The only chart I could google up quickly gave me this:

The boiling point of water at 30 psia (the 15 psi operating point of most cooling systems is psig and represents pressure above atmospheric pressure) is about 250 degrees. The motorcycle cooling systems I know of are all designed to maintain about 220-240 maximum.

For comparison, a 50/50 mix of propylene glycol and water has a boiling point at 1 atmosphere of 222 F. Ethylene glycol gives you a couple more degrees (and toxicity) at 225 F. So the typical 50/50 mix gets you about a 10-13 deg increase over pure water. Doesn't seem like much but given the narrow margin for error between normal operating temps and the boiling point, its good insurance.