Heat management is an area that is often ignored during engine modification.  Power & heat go together - neither is available without the other, and although some heat is needed (the engine must reach & maintain it's full working temperature), waste heat must be carefully controlled.  In the same way that excess heat from brake discs must be evacuated by means of cooling fins & ducting, exhaust heat must also be removed.  Most of this heat is carried through the exhaust system & lost through natural means, but the exhaust manifold will radiate heat around the engine compartment, & also conduct heat back into the cylinder head through the manifold surface.  Exhaust manifold temperatures will often reach 900 degrees C.

We now manufacture a range of insulating products designed to keep cylinder head casting and inlet manifold temperatures down.  The Thermal Inlet Gasket will help prevent heat from conducting from the cylinder head casting into the inlet manifold, and the Thermal Exhaust Plate will prevent exhaust manifold heat from soaking back into the cylinder head.

In theory, because of the cooler & denser inlet charge, a small & immediate power increase should be evident (if you can run a little more ignition timing before pre-ignition occurs then power should rise), but their main strength will be in helping to keep temperatures under control during & after prolonged engine use.

Thermal Inlet Gaskets (T.I.G.s) - to reduce heat-soak from the cylinder head to the inlet manifold.

Drag race or pit-lane situations where a stationary warm-up period is unavoidable will always result in high inlet manifold temperatures (so making immediate power levels suffer), while hot starting after a period of engine shut-down will also be helped.  Andy Wickens recently fitted a T.I.G. to the Ferriday Escort and recorded an average 24 deg C drop in manifold temperature during a pit lane simulation (i.e. engine up to full operating temperature while stationary, then shut-down for a short period before re-start).

The inlet gasket can be supplied exactly as the original gasket or with water ways blanked off.  From a performance point of view it is preferable to keep all hot water out of the inlet manifold (coolant temperature is usually around 90deg C), but you must be sure that there are no engine management implications (i.e. any temperature sensors that read manifold coolant temperature).  It's worth noting that none of the current "favourite" engines, YB Cosworth, Zetec, Duratec etc have any water flowing from the head into the manifold, and race engines will never have heated manifolds.  Engines with plastic inlet manifolds are not affected in the same way, though most modified engines discard these in favour of cast alloy.

To achieve proper results from the Thermal Inlet Gasket you should consider asking for the "Blanked-Off" version, and look at a way of letting the management system do its job in the normal way - this may be as simple as relocating a coolant sensor.

This 4mm thick high performance composite gasket is available for most engines and is paper coated on both sides to aid sealing.  The gasket kit will also include insulating washers (to help slow down heat transfer along the studs) with 50mm studs (M8 only) and stainless nyloc nuts & washers.  Retail price for an average 4 cylinder engine is £43.00 (a discount is available when purchased with a Thermal Exhaust Plate).

The range of gaskets will increase steadily, and new gaskets can be produced within a couple of days.  The following Thermal Inlet Gaskets are currently held in stock, but anything not listed can be made quickly -
 

Engines with a "V" configuration generally have an inlet manifold design that does not allow this type of gasket, but the same theory can be applied to plenum chambers and carburettor base plates etc.  Prototypes can be created quickly in a variety of thicknesses - please call Mike Tanski on 01559 372143 for more details.
For engines with inlet & exhaust manifolds on the same side of the cylinder head, please go to Thermal Exhaust Plates below.  All of these items can be ordered online - here.

Now in stock - a thicker version of the T.I.G. that has rubber o-rings on each side, currently available for Cosworth YB, Zetec & TVR AJP, others added upon demand.  Average cost in 6.0mm inc o-rings is £68.00, one-offs are easily available, please ask for more info.

Thermal Exhaust Plates (T.E.P.s) - to reduce heat-soak from the exhaust manifold back into the cylinder head casting.

An exhaust manifold (especially turbo) is a large store of heat that should not be allowed to find it's way back into the head - limiting this heat transfer can only be a good thing.  Our Ferratherm material limits heat transfer to such a degree that an open Propane flame (approx 1300 deg C in air??) will only make the very surface of 3mm thick material glow red - no more than a fraction of the thickness can be made red hot - the rest of the material simply stays its own natural colour.

Please note that this is described as an Exhaust Plate - "gasket" is the wrong word as this material is very rigid.  The T.E.P. should be placed next to the head casting, and if there is any doubt about the flatness of the manifold flange then an OE type gasket should be used between the plate & manifold.  A conformal coating can be applied to the plate if required.

Engines with non X/Flow head designs (i.e. those with both manifolds on the same side) should have both the inlet & exhaust products made from the same ultra high temperature material.  We can also supply pre-cut heat shielding to go between the inlet & exhaust manifolds to help prevent heat transfer & fuel evaporation problems on carburettor engines (these can be tackled on an individual basis from a "cornflake packet" template).

Price for an average 4 cylinder engine is £46.00 including new 50mm M8 studs with flanged Stainless Steel vibration-proof nuts (a discount is available when purchased with a Thermal Inlet Gasket).  The following Thermal Exhaust Plates are usually held in stock, but anything not listed can be made reasonably quickly.  All of these items can be ordered online - here.