Plug attached to the back of the block?

lyeinyoureye · Post by **lyeinyoureye** » Thu May 17, 2007 1:43 pm

Does anyone know why someone would connect/bolt a three prong household electrical cord to the back of the block? Is this a block heater?

Post by **Fatmobile** » Thu May 17, 2007 10:35 pm

Vincent Waldon · Post by **Vincent Waldon** » Thu May 17, 2007 10:59 pm

We northern Canadians don't leave home without them.

For... hmmmm... about 8 months of the year.

Kidding.

6 months of the year.

Vince

lyeinyoureye · Post by **lyeinyoureye** » Thu May 17, 2007 11:47 pm

Awesome! I was planning on getting one, but this is a nice surprise. I wonder if it works? I may use it during winter, even though I shouldn't need it at ~20F.

Post by **Fatmobile** » Fri May 18, 2007 12:02 am

Plug it in and it sounds like an electric water heater.
You can hear it cooking when you listen close.... if it's working.

libbybapa · Post by **libbybapa** » Fri May 18, 2007 12:48 am

That's actually to power the electric motor in your engine, so you can do all your around town driving without burning diesel, IF you have an extension cord long enough.

Andrew

lyeinyoureye · Post by **lyeinyoureye** » Fri May 18, 2007 1:23 am

Arg... Where's one of those microwave dish power systems when I need 'em? And a UAV with a parabolic dish/GPS/and all that other crap needed to keep me in constant contact w/ home.

tylernt · Post by **tylernt** » Fri May 18, 2007 7:12 pm

They can go bad, my car came with one and I left it plugged in for an hour... nothing, not even warm.

It will still help at 20*F though, I know my car is harder to start anywhere below 40*F, so I wish my heater worked!

Op-Ivy · Post by **Op-Ivy** » Sat May 19, 2007 11:02 am

tylernt wrote:They can go bad, my car came with one and I left it plugged in for an hour... nothing, not even warm.

It will still help at 20*F though, I know my car is harder to start anywhere below 40*F, so I wish my heater worked!

I had this problem too. Turns out that the reset switch on the plug outside of my house needed to be reset

A1-2-A3 · Post by **A1-2-A3** » Sat May 19, 2007 10:23 pm

Some guys here in the prairies put two of them in. at -40cel and a wind you might start with the block heater. Its nice to run a pan heater as well for the oil and also a battery trickle charger to keep the battery up when its cold they dont have much power(colder temps less amps). I find if I don't start with the first two tries it will need a boost(glow plugs suck down the battery fast) with a brand new 900CCA battery -40cel plugged in two hours. You have to plug them in here at least 4 hours in the worst of the winter. A hour plugged in makes no difference at all when its very cold. It snowed just north of here today. Just two days ago it was 28cel. By wednesday it will be probably 30, hotter then hell. I hate pulling wrenches in the heat!! This summer is going to be damn hot!! If you live in the southern states get rid of you block heater you will never ever need it. We never plug in here with diesels till its about -10 or -15cel and gassers about -20cel. Its a waste of electricity, I think the VW block heater is 300watts. At 40 deg F its a nice day to me =5cel. I would never bother dragging a cord out in the driveway

We would have to buy a new block heater every year if we plugged in for warm weather as well. Also I heard a guy say no idling when the enigne is cold. Well we do idle here. Some people with diesels will idle all day here when its very cold, there are guys up in the artic that will idle all winter(school buses for exmaple) if they shut of they have to be towed in to deforst, oil turns to tar), you just have to run on high idle.
It don't get that cold for that long of a peroid of time where I am at, only two of three weeks of the year of that.

surfcam · Post by **surfcam** » Sat May 19, 2007 11:30 pm

I was up at the Ekati Diamond mine in the North West Territories. Where everything runs on diesel. They haul it all in on the ice road in the winter. They have a lot of Ford diesel truck that idle all day. But about every 10 minutes they rev up automatically. The first time it happened I nearly jump out of my skin. I thought someone was trying to run me over. But I guess it a system they have installed on their vehicles to counteract the bad effects of idling for long periods of time.

tylernt · Post by **tylernt** » Sun May 20, 2007 1:32 am

Ah yes, wet stacking. Apparently, unburnt fuel gets pushed into the exhaust system which is not good for emissions nor for your turbo as it combines with the soot and makes a nasty tarlike substance... yum.

Different engines are more or less susceptible to this issue... never heard of it happening with a VW diesel, but I suppose it's possible.