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Water Wetter


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I put Water Wetter in my bike this year because more and more organizations won't let you go on track with regular anti-freeze. I store my bike in our garage which is attached to the house, so while it usually doesn't go below freezing, it's still possible. Does Water Wetter prevent the coolant from freezing? Or should I drain and replace with antifreeze just to be safe?

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  • 3 months later...

You can also use Engine Ice. Most track day organizations will let you use it and it won't freeze. I found it did a good job of cooling my 1998 VFR800, which tends to run hot.

 

Kelly

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Just looked them up, it's a bit of a BS-fest on their site. Engine Ice is propylene glycol, so it's simialr to standard ethylene glycol but it's non-toxic and you need a bit more of it to get the same antifreeze protection. It also tends to be more expensive. As I understand it, racetracks don't want you using ethylene gylcol because if it spills, it doesn't evaporate very quickly. Propylene glycol will evaporate even slower.

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I have Engine Ice in my Gixxer now. Yep, it was expensive and I haven't noticed any different performance with it. On hot days and cold days the thermostat still reads just the same as when I was using regular coolant. Not sure if going by the thermostat reading is the technically correct way to tell the actual coolant temperature, but I've bought some plain old antifreeze coolant from the local auto supply for my next coolant change. It seems to me like coolant is similar to oil in being one of those things that will benefit more from regular changing and maintenance more than any particular brand or type that is used.

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The running temp is controlled by the thermostats in the cooling system so you could fill it with all sorts of things and still get the same running temp. There are two advatages to propylene glycol, neither of which will help you go faster. It's non-toxic, and it is possible to run an engine hotter on it. We're only talking about a few degrees hotter though, and the short story is on an engine that uses air flow to cool itself (unlike a static generator for example) the advantage is really tiny, like a percent. That and you'd have to change the thermostats (somewhow) and hope the extra temperature doesn't break anything else.

 

The anitfreezing action is a bulk effect i.e. you need large amounts of glycol in water to make a difference, unlike detergetns or corrosion inhibitors etc. which work in tiny amounts. The upshot of that is that all sources of material work the same, Castrol's ethylene glycol won't do any more antifreezing than Motul's.

 

What annoys me is the attitude of suppliers that they can put a load of waffle on there to confuse people then take their money.

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