Opinion on louvered hood, Top & Sides.From those that drive em in all kinds of weather.We just got back from Louisville Nats, Monterey Ca. to Louisville Ky. 5228 miles in a 34 Ford roadster, From rain in Az.to 100 deg. plus heat on Hwy 40.
They look great,vent engine heat well and are fun to ogle while you drive down the road.Pure hot rod! I don't have a cover for my engine and covering the hood when anticipating rain or when I want to wash the truck is a pain.The engine's hot from driving to that point?Also,I used to love opening the cowl vent,until I reverse the vent to open from the back,it's unusable?Good to allow heat in in the winter?
I've had two louvered hoods. They really are cool, and get lots of comments. The downside is any water on your car is now on your engine, in your ignition, all over your air cleaner, etc. Good luck trying to keep your engine clean. After awhile, I got really lazy about washing those cars. And, oh yeah, in the fall your windshield tends to fog on occasion. On the other hand, they really are cool, and get lots of comments.
X2 Depends on the car and setup (where your ignition is located, type of air filters you run.etc ) in regards to how and where the water goes. If you want to get real tricky you could run a liner on the inside of the hood tops to slow the water coming in, but still allow some heat to escape. But also depends on the application, you could even run a solid type liner to have the top louvers as dummies... I knew I was running plenty of louvers so planned accordingly when I built it. No water in the motor with the filters I'm running. They look great and work well for me (blown motor). windscreen hasn't fogged on me yet, when open or closed...
40standard, Just got realy hot in the car. Headers cracked, But they have about 27 K on them. Changed to Speedway Ramhorn manifolds when we got home.
You started two threads on this one and I answered on the other. I punch louvers for a living, so I deal with them everyday. I can tell you from experience that they will let out tons on underhood heat from a narrow engine compartment like a '33 '34. BUT, in a roadster situation, I would be carefull about punching the hood tops. They have a tendancy to exhaust the hot air right back over and around the windshield and back into the drivers face. You won't notice it untill it's 95 or so out, but after awhile it gets really frustrating and uncomfortable. In cooler weather it fells kinda nice. Most the time in a roadster application, I recomend doing both the hood sides and tops to balance out that situation. The more area it has to exhaust the heat, the less going up over you. Cowl vents in the summer do become worthless as stated above. As you can imagine I have run heavily louvered hoods on every vehicle I have built in the last couple of decades, but I have never had any wet ignition problems, period. And that's spending summers in Washington state's daily rain fest. If the thought of a spotted engine makes you nuts, roll out to your local sign making shop and buy a few square feet of the magnetic flexible sign material, and stick it up under the louvers if it looks like rain. Other wise, roll it up and put it in the trunk. Without getting too "Spammy", I do mail order day in and day out, and I honestly believe I offer some of the most detailed patterns and precise work available today.
My '40 has a louvered hood & I drove thru a good rain for 20 minutes south of Louisville Saturday morning. It was coming down in such a manner that we passed several cars that had pulled over on the shoulder. I have a Chevy with an HEI ignition & an open element K&N air filter. The motor never skipped a beat. I've also driven back from Knoxville in a few storms without a problem.
Mike, Get the Greenlee punch out and punch the aprons first B4 ya louver the hood. It'll help a bunch. Don
Well, speaking as someone who has owned cars with louvered hoods and does his own louvers, AND uses the cowl vent because I have yet to have one seize up or leak Freon all over the place, you could louver down the outside edges of the hood top so that the hot air misses the cowl vent. Works for me. And I have driven in some hellacious rain downpours and not had one missed beat or stalls. Added benefit? Stiffens the panel and prevents oil-canning. But that is just me.
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