Anyone tried Poster Board or Duct Tape?
 

Well i know people used coroplast but im just wondering if anyone use poster board lol. it might sound stupid but im just curious and for the duct tape...has anyone used it for the grill block? i know my civic bumper can probably get a smooth grille block with just the duct tape over the grille opening has anyone done that or would i need some kind of plastic board?

creativity is great, I actually have choroplast, cardboard, and an industrial air filter blocking my radiator (heat is still below 80 C though GRRR), I would imagine duct tape and poster board would work great, I think there is a red cavalier on here that has made a lot of use of red color matchedish tape.

i ask because black duct tape would match my car perfect i have a black 1995 Honda Civic LX Sedan lol if you look at a honda civic bumper duct tape would make the grille opening delete match it like a front air dam bumper.

the problem is most duct tape uses cheap adhesive and will leave residue or pull paint off if you leave it on for even a few days or in excessive heat/cold. poster board is like paper... water soluble. you'd need to paint/coat it somehow or it'll melt like a newspaper left on the porch in a rainstorm

Yeah, I figured you were just using this for short term experimentation. Duct tape either turns into a gloppy sticky mess, or dries hard and starts delaminating. (I confess though, I duct taped over a rust hole on Marvin to keep spray out of the door until I get good weather to do bodywork, but I'm not worrying about what it pulls off when it comes off, and I'll be sanding off any guck anyway)

silvergt -

Like everyone else said, I would use it to "prove the mod", with a plan to replace it with something more permanent. Keep the duct tape off painted surfaces if at all possible.

CarloSW2

You folks are going to keep blocking radiators and throwing blankets where you shouldn't be putting anything at all until one day you're going to be sitting on the side of a highway with a serious problem, and hopefully it won't be on fire.

Why not just put a higher temp thermostat in and be done with it, or keep choking up that engine and watch one day that crap is going to backfire.

it has nothing to do with increasing heat of the engine. it's reducing airflow to a minimum to maintain engine cooling. most vehicles are capable of not overheating even on 110f day in stop and go traffic. blocking some of the airflow when it's less extreme is obivously feasible and widely practiced on here. If you're gonna be a troll, at least make sure it's relevant as he might well have been talking about wheel fairings.

Aparently you have not visited northern Minnesota / North Dakota, I would say at least 60% of the vehicles here have something covering their radiator openings in the winter. as stated earlier, this much air is only required in the desert with the a/c on going up a hill with the wind. When it is -30F outside, the cold air blowing into the engine bay is enough to keep a small car from ever reaching operating temperatures. I've run these on every car I've owned, and not once have any of them ran hot.

As kamesama said, grill blocks are aero mods which need to be limited to maintain cooling. I think folks with small engines, doing extreme aero, generally find they need only 20-25 sq inches to support cooling. IIRC, basjoos has a 4x6 inch opening, and he wishes he could reduce that sometimes.

On engine temps: A higher temp thermostat doesn't help much if the engine never reaches those temp's. I have almost all of my grill blocked, and the engine was still running ~130*F this winter, well below 'stat temp. I had to block the radiator too, to get the engine up to operating temps.