Interesting High Altitude 617.950 Behavior:
 

Thought this was interesting so I decided to post it here for all of you. Last month, my wife had the 116.120 down in the high desert visiting relatives. The elevation was between 4000 and 5000 feet (asl) at her destination. She reported that the car was way down on power and even idled roughly. The condition went away when she returned here to the Central Valley at 440 ft/asl.

I don't think I have ever seen one of these cars react to high altitude conditions in such a manner. have any of you????

Thanks....Robert

If the engine is a turbo model I'd suspect that the pressure line on the overboost control system has come loose.

Appears intact and has great power at or near sea level....

The engine runs too cold. It needs an 80c thermostat to function properly.

Runs no different without a thermostat, with a 60°C or with an 80°C, as I have experimented with every configuration.

You must be reading books on theory again....:)

Incorrect. The engine will overheat in the rear two cylinders without a thermostat.

No, I have real-world experience with which I use to earn a living. What has your guessing done besides cause a power loss at altitude?

As previously stated, I have tested every possible combination on this car and the cooling performance/power output never changes significantly, regardless of the engine's operating temperature.

In fact, if you really want to split hairs, the car has better overall throttle response the colder I run it.

Currently, I am running an 80°C Whaler Thermostat, since the dealer in Fresno no longer carries the 60°C unit. And, again, as previously stated, it has no affect on the power output at either sea level or up in Big bear, at about 6700 feet....Robert

Incorrect.


So much for "factory-available". I wonder why they don't make them? :rolleyes:

They still make them, Fresno just doesn't stock them.

There is no opinion involved with factual information.

Yet you openly reject both.

I guess at the end of the day each can do what they like. If you wanted to put square wheels on your car you could. Or running a non diesel rated oil in a diesel ~ a very quick way to void an warranty that may exist.
I am running 85c high flow thermostats in my 602 & jeep as using anything cooler appears to result in them taking too long to warm up in the winter as they are driven at highway speed as soon as they are out the front gate (plenty of air flow).
Maybe its just me, but I like to have a warm heater in the winter.

A 60c thermostat would result in freezing my #### on cold mornings.
Maybe the 60c is a low flow design & for some reason it works. I think it would take too long for the motor to warm up.

Well not knowing what is in mine, it never makes it to 80 on the gauge. Even climbing for 10 minutes straight on a hot day it gets to 70. Most of the time it sits on 45. it's odometer is stuck on 273k miles. It couldn't be that bad for it. Please be absolute and tell me my knock will go away with a 80 degree thermo and it will be out and replaced by midnight!

You guys are great reading though! I can't wait to see what comes next!

Dr. Bert and myself live in the same climate at about the same sea level. I'm running an 80* unit with the manual transmission. I can tell you ditching the autobox dropped my temps to the point that the car runs around 70* at the temp sensor on the coldest of mornings and around 90* on the hottest of days. I think the car is very happy with these temps.

With the autobox it would run between 90* and 110* back when I was still seeing those temps I wanted to install a 60* unit, but never was able to find one in stock when I needed one.

Maybe F.I. up in CO or the engineers back in Germany might have wanted the car to run hotter for their ambient temps. But I can tell you... and sure Dr. Bert can second this, the central valley of California is pretty much a hot plate!

If you temp was 110* with a (presumably) fully open 80* thermostat, what would it have been with a fully open 60* thermostat?