[decooney]

Well... I'm looking at this again myself. 180 vs. 160.

Just took a drive this evening, the cooler air is setting in now. I read everyone's posts here. The one that has me thinking the most is Bob Putnam's.

Here is a thought I'm pondering. I adjust my valves when the motor is hot. The motor runs well when its hot, valves sound right, all is well. This evening I'm on the freeway crusing along with my 160 degree thermostat, check the temp, and I'm running 163 degrees. Seems great, however, I can hear the valves a bit more. "Initial" throttle response is okay at 163, but not the best. Then run into some traffic, motor starts to warm up again, reaches 185 degrees, and wallah! Better throttle response, and I can barely hear the valvetrain again... Went back and forth with this paying close attention and it seems there is a sweet spot, and running my FE too cool is not good either. I was very focused on more carb re-jetting and tuning, but realized it may not be necessary if I can figure out how to keep the motor at optimum temperature for the majority of my driving.

I think I'm going back to a 180 thermo for the winter months for sure. Any thoughts?. My motor just seems to run better, crisper, responds better once I get to 180/185; not to mention the wear considerations, clearances, and oiling design issues mentioned above. It seems to me that just 20 degrees difference does have a noticeable impact on my FE.

Has anyone else noticed this too while running a 160 thermo on those cooler driving days with their FE?