How do I plumb in a heat exchanger?

[Dr Mark Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Dr Mark]

Following on from the other thread, my SVO is running well in my 1HDT motor, but because the HE was installed by the previous owner for showers, it's not the right unit, or in the right place for SVO.

Consequently, the system has enormous thermal lag. Even when the thermostat indicates the motor is at the right temp, and the remote engine temp gauge reads >70 degrees, it takes a good 10 minutes for the CAV filter to get hot enough for me to switch to SVO.

The plumbing is that it comes in, goes through the HE on top of the tappet cover against the firewall, from there into a Frantz, and from there through about 70cm of hose to a CAV, before the injector. I want to fit the second HE immediately upstream of the CAV but am a little puzzled by how to plumb it. The inlet ports on the Helton unit I am looking at appear to be about 12mm - far smaller than the heater hoses. How do I plumb it in? Does it have to tee off a larger heater hose? If so, how do I ensure the coolant circulates?

[Tony From West Oz Vice Chairperson of WARFA Find all posts View Profile Close Tony From West Oz]

Re: How do I plumb in a heat exchanger?

Your Franz is sucking all of the heat from your fuel, before it gets to the CAV.
As stated before, (on another thread I think) install a small prefilter like this


before the heat exchanger. This avoids the need for a second heat exchanger.
Simple to do and negligible cost ($5 - 7) for the prefilter.

[Dr Mark Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Dr Mark]

Re: How do I plumb in a heat exchanger?

The Frantz is a necessary part of my setup. Although it is (apparently) prone to cavitation it pulls out very fine particles and is much more use than an inline filter (every one I have seen has ports too small anyway). The vid on the Helton website shows the bloke teeing off from the coolant line but I don't understand how the flow is directed into the branched line

[Alga Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Alga]

Re: How do I plumb in a heat exchanger?

The idea is to have the HE as close to the main filter as possible and plumb it in before it goes into the heater. Have my inline filters after the HE and as close to the change over valve as possible. My 1hdt had a HE for hotwater on it, they stupidly took out the plumbing for the A/c, so they could out the hotwater HE in. Have removed that and once the a/c is reconnected next week, will put the HE as first out of the engine, it will sit on the main filter bracket, with the inline between it and the change over valve.

Also insulate my lines from the HE to the IP and insulate the Helton HE, which makes an amazing difference to performance and temp of oil. Also have a 12v push pump between the metal fuel line and HE, which does make a difference to performance.

Heading to Aus for muso festivals at the end of the month, so won't be changing over to VO until after than. Will be a shock paying for fuel, but much better than stopping all the time to change inline filters and will be a once off. Luckily have the rest of the bands going as well, so will share the cost of dino.

Have been caught out before by changing a vehicle to vo only to have lots of blocked inline filters, from all the crud coming off the tank and line walls. That normally takes a few months to clear up properly to get 2000+klms from an inline filter, until then may get from 60klms to a couple of hundred and mostly all have to do is blow the filter out and off you go again.

Been using inline filters for well over 10 years and liked them so much, had 3000 made specifically for VO filtering. They work really well and at the price I paid, 1/3 you pay in the shops and those shop ones are for petrol and tend to block quicker. Mine seems to work well, until they suddenly collapse with junk and you start to slow down, which is an indication you need to change the filter.

Franz filters tend to lose a huge amount of heat according to one I know who put one in his car. Ended up taking it out after many months of trouble, one time he had to clean the entire system because the toilet roll had disintegrated into a blobs and blocked the lines and ip. He switched to inline filters and seemed pretty happy with that approach last time saw him.

[tillyfromparadise Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close tillyfromparadise]

Re: How do I plumb in a heat exchanger?

Hi Alga,

Heading to Aus for muso festivals at the end of the month,...

Tasmania is actually part of Aus

[Johnnojack Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Johnnojack]

Re: How do I plumb in a heat exchanger?

Dr Mark you seem stuck on using a Helton yet have already found one the many disadvantages they have compared with a proper flat plate stainless steel unit:
1. They have welded on spigots so the hose size is fixed and often wrong for fuel lines. A proper HE has threaded ports which can accept all sizes of hose spigots.
2.They are made of copper which while a good conductor has the problem of being attacked by vegetable oil. This is evidenced by crusty green muck building up in the pipes.
3. They have a smaller heat exchanging area and are therefore less efficient than a flat plate HE.
4. They are not cheaper than a flat plate but dearer, this is probably because they have been marketed as water heaters for camping showers where there is a huge market.
Pointless suggestion it seems but the Franz is still not a suitable filter for vege oil as many here have said and several including me have proven by their own experience.
On a positive note can you move anything in your engine bay to make room for vege filter and heat exchanger on the same side of the engine as the IP?

[Tony From West Oz Vice Chairperson of WARFA Find all posts View Profile Close Tony From West Oz]

Re: How do I plumb in a heat exchanger?

The Frantz is a necessary part of my setup. Although it is (apparently) prone to cavitation it pulls out very fine particles and is much more use than an inline filter (every one I have seen has ports too small anyway). The vid on the Helton website shows the bloke teeing off from the coolant line but I don't understand how the flow is directed into the branched line

Mark,
Franz is your fixation, it is not a "necessary part" of your conversion. It is the CAUSE of most of your problems.
I am fed up with your stubborn adherence to YOUR Mantra of having a Franz filter in your conversion.
I will not provide any more advice on your conversion until you wake up and get rid of the Franz. It is pointless, giving advice as you will not act on it anyway!

I have 2 Franz filters available , if anyone can use them, for FREE, as they were the cause of too much angst in WVO applications and were removed from service, providing improved WVO performance using one 10 plate FPHE, an inline fuel filter and the stock standard fuel filter for veggie fuel.
They may be of use as bypass engine oil filters though.

[Alga Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Alga]

Re: How do I plumb in a heat exchanger?

Dr Mark you seem stuck on using a Helton yet have already found one the many disadvantages they have compared with a proper flat plate stainless steel unit:
1. They have welded on spigots so the hose size is fixed and often wrong for fuel lines. A proper HE has threaded ports which can accept all sizes of hose spigots.
2.They are made of copper which while a good conductor has the problem of being attacked by vegetable oil. This is evidenced by crusty green muck building up in the pipes.
3. They have a smaller heat exchanging area and are therefore less efficient than a flat plate HE.
4. They are not cheaper than a flat plate but dearer, this is probably because they have been marketed as water heaters for camping showers where there is a huge market.
Pointless suggestion it seems but the Franz is still not a suitable filter for vege oil as many here have said and several including me have proven by their own experience.
On a positive note can you move anything in your engine bay to make room for vege filter and heat exchanger on the same side of the engine as the IP?

Johnno, been using heltons for over 10 years in 5 vehicles, the longest 60 series cruiser just sols and have never seen any green muck coming from the HE's. I use reducers when dealing with different size hoses and the vo HE's are not designed for heating water. The water heating ones are different..

Had more trouble with flat plate HE's blocking, but that may be just me and the fact at the time had no experience with vo in cars. Temp of the oil at the iP is always around 70-85deg with my heltons, when you insulate them and they are much cheaper than all the flat plate I've seen. Which are designed for wine and spirit production mostly.

What I like about the barrel he's is they fit in small places really easily and have a small footprint, but everyone has their own preferences which is good.

[Dr Mark Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Dr Mark]

Re: How do I plumb in a heat exchanger?

Johnno, been using heltons for over 10 years in 5 vehicles, the longest 60 series cruiser just sols and have never seen any green muck coming from the HE's. I use reducers when dealing with different size hoses and the vo HE's are not designed for heating water. The water heating ones are different..

Had more trouble with flat plate HE's blocking, but that may be just me and the fact at the time had no experience with vo in cars. Temp of the oil at the iP is always around 70-85deg with my heltons, when you insulate them and they are much cheaper than all the flat plate I've seen. Which are designed for wine and spirit production mostly.

What I like about the barrel he's is they fit in small places really easily and have a small footprint, but everyone has their own preferences which is good.

Yes that's what I like about them too. And the oil is already coming in at 55 degrees, which is running fine in the car, I just want to reduce the thermal inertia of the system by fitting it upstream of the CAV and reducing the time for the switch over to WVO. So it doesn't need to be the most efficient HE in the world. How do you plumb it in? Is it just teed off the main heater hose and you just rely on enough coolant flowing through the smaller diameter to get the job done? I'd also be happy

[Alga Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Alga]

Re: How do I plumb in a heat exchanger?

I run the heated water from the engine directly to the HE, then back to the car heater inlet. If you use a T, you may find you only get a good supply of hot water when the car heater is switched off and with a T, you then have to plumb the HE back into the system. If you connect it directly from the engine to the HE, then back to the car heater, you get a constant supply of hot water and don't have lots of connections. Keep it simple I always say and it will work.

[Dr Mark Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Dr Mark]

Re: How do I plumb in a heat exchanger?

I run the heated water from the engine directly to the HE, then back to the car heater inlet. If you use a T, you may find you only get a good supply of hot water when the car heater is switched off and with a T, you then have to plumb the HE back into the system. If you connect it directly from the engine to the HE, then back to the car heater, you get a constant supply of hot water and don't have lots of connections. Keep it simple I always say and it will work.

Gotcha! I've finally worked the plumbing out - I didn't realise the heater loop as a completely different circuit from the coolant circuit - and in fact that's what the current HE is running off. I'll tap into it upstraem of the HE, plumb my 2nd HE in, and it'll get hotter quicker than the other one, which is what I want

[Alga Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Alga]

Re: How do I plumb in a heat exchanger?

Gotcha! I've finally worked the plumbing out - I didn't realise the heater loop as a completely different circuit from the coolant circuit - and in fact that's what the current HE is running off. I'll tap into it upstraem of the HE, plumb my 2nd HE in, and it'll get hotter quicker than the other one, which is what I want

Is the second HE for hot water, or the vo, If it's for the vo, you could be wasting your time, as the vo will only get as hot as the water from the engine. Know someone who uses a double barrel HE for vo and hotwater, but they live in the NWNSW and there's a massive difference between using vo in warm/hot climates and cold, where I live.

On a Triton I had, tried a double barrel to get the oil hotter. Didn't work as no matter how I set it up, the oil temp was close to the same. When you loop your return line, the recycled fuel is already pretty hot having gone through the HE, then engine piping, which gets pretty hot and then back into the new heated oil.

[Dr Mark Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Dr Mark]

Re: How do I plumb in a heat exchanger?

It's for VO, because the first one (on the car when I got it), is for hot water. So the oil never gets hotter than 55 degrees, which is kind of OK, but it's a bit smokey when driving around town. I want a VO HE upstream of the CAV and downstream of the other HE. If it's coming in at 55 it doesn't have a whole lot of work to do to get up to 70 ish

[Dr Mark Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Dr Mark]

Re: How do I plumb in a heat exchanger?

Had difficulty ordering a Helton, so jumped onto EvilBay and came up with this thing - it looks the goods, and a $92 delivered it's a bargain

https://vod.ebay.com.au/vod/FetchOrd...&ul_noapp=true

[83Patrol Donating Member Find all posts View Profile Close 83Patrol]

Re: How do I plumb in a heat exchanger?

Had difficulty ordering a Helton, so jumped onto EvilBay and came up with this thing - it looks the goods, and a $92 delivered it's a bargain

https://vod.ebay.com.au/vod/FetchOrd...&ul_noapp=true

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