suggestion for new block heater

The Volvo in my Ocean Alexander smokes quite a bit when cold, and is a hard starter. I am considering adding a block heater to aid in starting in the cooler times of the year.
If you have any experience or have added a heater to your engine I would like to hear your experiences.
Some questions I have are how long does it need to be on to make any difference in 40 degree weather, what is the expected like span of a block heater, install type etc.
I had a wild idea to see if I could use the heat circuit for the water heater from the engine to the water heater and use the water heater to provide heat.. but it would need to bypass the eng. circ. pump/thermostat and I am not sure it would work. I would need to install a rather expensive circ. pump.

Thanks,
HOLLYWOOD

Check out Seaboard Marines Pad heaters from Wolverine. They heat the Oil pan from below. Inexpensive and work well.
For the heat circuit your considering, an immersion type heater would probably be needed.

These are the heaters we used on the Alaska Marine Highways ferries to keep the auxiliary engines warm.

Tank Style Engine Preheaters - Diesel Engine Block Heater | Hotstart

They are very safe and effective.

hollywood8118 said:

If you have any experience or have added a heater to your engine I would like to hear your experiences.
Some questions I have are how long does it need to be on to make any difference in 40 degree weather, what is the expected like span of a block heater, install type etc.

Click to expand...

I had a pair of DD8V92s that smoked like crazy at start-up. They had block heaters but they were not connected. When I say the engines smoked like crazy, I mean folks in the marina really complained! After connecting the heaters to the power source, the smoke was gone! I left them on all the time in the winter months.

Hotstart has your coolant heater/pump. no price though.....

Marine Engine Heating Products | HOTSTART

They say the thermostat is fixed at 100 to 120 degrees f, isn't that a tad hot?

Last fall I installed a Zerostart 3200004 block heater in my old Allis Chalmer (D262 International Diesel) forklift. Thirty five bucks are so. She is a tired old engine, smokey, and always a challenge to start in winter. The model I installed goes inline on a radiator hose, needs to be mounted vertically. It worked better than I could have hoped. http://www.phillipsandtemro.com/UserFiles/File/2011_Zerostart_Catalog.pdf

If you want to go cheap, plumb in a hydronic circ pump ala the Taco or similar and pump the jacket water through a pipe that contains a 110V water heater element of around 500W or so. Use a normal water heater thermostat to control the temperature. All the parts you need (except maybe the pump) can be bought at Home Depot, use a metal electrical box to contain the connections and attach the t-stat to the outside wall of the pipe that holds the screw in element. The system will keep the engine very comfortable and the whole engine room dry. It will be warm enough to make you happy to stay down there for a while.

The photo shows the red pump with the heater above it ... kind of hard to see black on black but the whole thing could be about a third as long, it was sized to fit the plumbing arrangement on my tugboat engine.

I put these in a couple years back.
Kim Hotstart PER-751FP

Quick start and min smoke from a couple old Perkins. So far been happy with them. Takes 8 hrs or so to heat up, so If I know I'm headed out I'll turn them on the night before. Does make the engine room toasty.

Maybe there's an app so they could be turned on remotely.

Is your goal to heat the engine block or just to start the engine quickly?

If you just want a quicker start, Perkins uses an after market cold starting aid which is an oil igniter and atomiser valve and is plumbed into the intake manifold. While holding the switch down for 10 seconds and then hitting the start button, the engine fires almost instantly in any weather.

The whole thing is about the size of a spark plug and screws into a small hole drilled into the manifold.

You should be able to purchase an OTS block heater to fit in the waterjacket for your engine.

SUMMER or WINTER the block heater will help cold starts and warmup.

Some technique in cold starting may be required.

We crank for 30m seconds allow the starter to cool for 45 , and repeat.

3rd time lucky if its only freezing or so. Below freezing a hit of ether is fine .

But JUST A quick SQUIRT!

I have Kat magnetic oil pan heaters on the Hinos & the Westerbeke gen. I use SAE 30 oil & think having warm oil helps with the start-up lubrication during the cooler months, smoke never has been a problem

just ordered a heat exchanger and circ pump both for less than $200.
Topsflo 10PV 12V Solar Powered Hot Water Circulation Pump Digital Thermometer | eBay

Edelweiss said:

Is your goal to heat the engine block or just to start the engine quickly?

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Both,
On volunteer the John Deere NEVER cranked for more than 5 seconds, cold and in December it always amazed me.

The Volvo in the new boat has less than 400 hrs since a rebuild, is a bitch to start ( 3- 20 sec cranks ) and smokes like a WW2 destroyer trying to hide from a wolf pack!.
Took it out last night and apologized to the new neighbors before I started her... they said " oh I am sure it's not that bad ".. but I did notice that had their boat shut up tight on my return!.

I am getting ready to start troubleshooting the hot start and the injectors on the old girl to see if I can lessen the issue.

On the positive side, locals have reported a less than usual crop of mosquito's in the area.....

Thanks for all the ideas,
HOLLYWOOD

I will neither confirm or deny the below image was taken at start up.....

Sailor of Fortune said:

Check out Seaboard Marines Pad heaters from Wolverine. They heat the Oil pan from below. Inexpensive and work well.
For the heat circuit your considering, an immersion type heater would probably be needed.

Click to expand...

I have those for both engines and love em.

Best $75 boat thing I've probably done.

>I am getting ready to start troubleshooting the hot start and the injectors on the old girl to see if I can lessen the issue.<

Click to expand...

Start with a compression check.

I had the standard block heater (like a Hotstart that goes into a freeze plug hole) in my Dodge/Cummins pickup. When the temps would start to get into the 30s at night (in Connecticut) I would plug in the block heater and set the timer to go on for approx 1 1/2 hour before leaving for work. That was enough time to warm the engine to make it think it was over 56 deg F (the switch point for the wait to start circuit) even when the night temps got into the single digits.