Yea, I know. There is a grey body thermostat and you can do the inline mod.

Grey body still throws temp swings and inline isn't clean. Looks messy. Yea, I know, it works, but I'm trying to innovate.

Either you are with me, or hit backspace and back out now.

I already have a spare the manifold, all we need is a thermostat to fit, and a machine shop in North Jersey. Hell, if you have a machine shop and are willing to take the project on, I'll ship you the manifold and whatever thermostat we can come up with that will fit closest.

Drow, that Dorman 902-109 could work, but you have to squeeze the hose between the alternator and the AC compressor.

Also, you don't need a bypass for the heater core. That's already on the manifold. At least it is on my 4.0L

Realistically, all we need is a thermostat small enough to fit in the intake with a little boring it out. Then you eliminate the T, install and 90* bend with a bleed valve in its place. Eliminate the thermostat housing and hose to the T. Eliminate lower rad to thermostat hose and run thermostat hose to block hose directly to the rad. Sounds confusing, but lift the hood and look at your cooling system . Then look at any regular thermostat in engine vehicle.

 

i going to have to pickup a spare manifold to experiment on,
they ones on eBay are crazy like $75 for a lower intake.
I'm sure dorman make must have something we can use / modified.
I like the way that unit slide right into the manifold.

 

"Yeah can totally be done. I got that one working good eventually. the intake needs to be machined so that the thermostat can sit almost inside the motor where the coolant gets pushed out that tube on the side to the heater core. I used a small honda or toyota thermostat and bored the intake manifold out. It was hokey. I am going to try it again soon. If i had a lathe, it would be easy to fly cut the perfect thermostat hole in the intake manifold. Maybe even a fly cutter on a drill press."

Conversation I had with RoverMasterTech a while ago.

 

fly-cutting the manifold would be best get it to sit in the manifold a bit, also would not require as big a outlet as the lip would be in the manifold.

Dorman has a couple of 90 elbows, they also have a long straight one ac delco 15-11006 that i wonder would be able to run under the alternator with a different hose

 

I'll take some pictures of the manifold when I get home and we'll go from there.

 

You do realize this mod would turn a simple 30 minute thermostat change into a more time consuming ordeal and increase chances for local galvanic corrosion. I'm with you but question the time/cost/benefit of the project.
......

 

Fully aware. But I'd rather spend 2 hours replacing a thermostat as opposed to 16 hours replacing head-gaskets.

Besides. what really has to be moved, engine belt and AC compressor. I'll take that any day of the week.

Local galvanic corrosion? You mean like the aluminum intake manifold with the steel water neck that's there from the factory? Its already there. Might as well address it.

Spare intake cost me $80 bucks.
A new thermostat may cost $50.
Having a machine shop spend 20 minutes to bore out the intake, 0-200 give or take?

I'd rather spend the $400 on this project than lifting my suspension, or buying a roof rack. Not that there is anything wrong with that but to each their own. But I'd rather do things the way they should have been, not the way they are.

 

I'm all for the R&D and thrill of a new project, but why are you opposed to the inline stat mod? Aesthetics?

I love my inline stat - it's clean looking, is a vast improvement over the overly complex unecccessary pressure system deployed by the factory and provides totally reliable consistent temperature. It goes with out saying, stat changes are quicker than changing a tire.

 

Aesthetics, R&D. Boredom and because I'm a picky bastard who like doing what everyone has thought of, but no one wants to do..

 

I did it before. I had to bore the outlet a little bit bigger with a harbor freight uni bit. It would be easy to set up a jig on a drill press and you could do them in 5 mins. The hardest part is machining a bit of metal out of the face of the manifold to make room for the flange of the thermostat.