Floor Pan Cooling Flaps

[S Schroeder]

Hi All-
I was reading my Haynes manual last night and came across two cooling flaps that are attached to the floor pan on the post 73 cars. Do these help considerably? Should I install them on my earlier car? My car seems to stay within the specified temp range, just wouldn't mind having more piece of mind. Thanks - S Schroeder

[Ascaris]

I have them on my 75. Not sure how much they help since I have never driven without them. I'm replacing the floor pan right now and will put them back in place anyway.

[7391417]

The purpose of these flaps are supposedly to create a pressure difference in the engine/trans portion under the car, therefore providing better cooling.

[djs]

To expand on this, when the car is moving forward, the floorpan flaps help to pull cool air down through the engine compartment through the engine lid grill, thus allowing more air to be available to the fan for cooling.

This is a worthwhile and inexpensive update for older 914s.

[Dave Bell]

Very interesting, I wasn't sure what those flaps were for until now.

Another good thing to do to help cooling is to give the engine a good cleaning top and bottom and keep it clean.

I just took the car out to the local do it yourself car wash this week end. Used up a can or two of engine cleaner inside the compartment and a few cans underneath the on the engine, tranny, etc. I took a set of car ramps down with me and backed the car on to them to make the washing easier.

The whole thing is clean and certainly running cooler now, and the ramps, (which barely fit in the front trunk with the tire removed), were a hit with the other customers at the car wash.

Any other simple ideas our there for making the engine run cooler? I'd like to hear them.

- Dave

[Dave at Pelican Parts]

Simple? Remove the rain tray. It is supposed to help a little bit. I have not had any troubles in light rain (or hail, but that's another story!) but it might not be great for driving in heavy rainfall.

--DD

[mikeyz]

Careful using gunk or other types of engine cleaners in public coin op car washes. The drains are not set up for solvent and the enviro cops can cite you......

[Dave Bell]

I was under the impression that the coin op car wash places were set up to handle all the junk that comes off cars and engines which includes old petrol products that themselves act as solvents of a sort. I guess others are too. The guy in the stall next to me was spraying gunk on his engine, etc.

As for removing the rain tray... it probably will work even in heavy rain. The second time I cleaned the engine, I gave up trying to cover anything inside and after all the high power blasting of hot water and hot soapy water, the car had no problem starting up... and that with a distributor.