Keeping Me and My Engine Warm

“An everlasting itch for things remote” – Moby Dick

This Pasadena night, nearly forty degrees, is too much magnetic.  Like a dyslexic bird who knows it’s time to fly somewhere but can’t quite get the direction right, I can’t remember feeling more drawn to a location for pleasure.  Strange that Rome, Naples, Barcelona never drew me like the cold dark place I am headed.  I suppose birds who go this way in winter never deposit their genes into offspring.  They are like old soldiers who never die; they just fade away.  Was that MacArthur? 

I put winter tires on the Jeep.

I’ve been waiting five months to be where I’m going.  I feel ready for the far-fetched goal of reaching Fairbanks by car in mid-winter.  I have never driven so far in so cold, but I have read books.  I know what to expect.  

What is it that confers upon us our greatest delight?  To me it’s discovery.  To know that I am walking where no others have walked, beholding what human eye has not seen before.  To give birth to an idea, discover a great thought.  A nugget in the dust of a field that many brains have plowed before.  To do something, see something before anyone else.

What is there in British Columbia, Yukon Territory or Alaska for me to see that others have not seen before me?  Nothing.  Those brave souls who built the Alaskan Highway, believed by locals to be unbuildable, must have known a great satisfaction in having completed it.  

In northern Canada, this insignia tells
the Mounties that your tires are legal in winter.

I have not been anywhere remote since Joshua Tree last July in 110-degree heat, and during these month of preparation, the Jeep was fitted with an engine heater, antifreeze that won’t freeze in sixty below, tires that wont slide too easily on ice, and windshield washer solution that won’t turn to rock.  I made these modifications myself, to the chagrin of my mechanic who said he’s never been asked these questions.   

This trip is more different for me than anything I have ever done.  I will not be Nordic skiing away from a heated motel room in International Falls, Minnesota, as I did in 2009-2010.  This winter, unlike any others, is young. 

  

My Jeep owners manual says, “The engine block heater, if equipped, warms the engine, and permits quicker starts in cold weather.  Plug it into an electric outlet at night.”  I have read that most motels in the far north provide plug-ins for this purpose, so.  But my jeep does not have a block heater.

Oil pan heater from China that I installed
on this home-made bracket and placed it under the engine

I spent many hours at auto parts stores, and on the internet, even with stores in the far north, and found no block heater that fits my jeep.  I now know much more about my jeep than I want to know.  Only one block heater online came close.  With only nebulous specifications from Zero Start 400 Watt Cartridge Engine Heater, I ordered it on line and took it to Williams Automotive, where I’ve  had good service for the past twenty-five years.  He tried to install it and concluded that it will not fit.  I returned it to Amazon.com for an easy refund.  It seems odd that my 2014 jeep, built for rough roads, could not be fitted with an engine heater so it can start at sixty below zero.   

Under the Jeep, wires from the oil pan heater
 rise to top of engine for connection to electric outlet.

I was down to less effective ways of heating my engine: dipstick heater and pan heater.  The easiest and cheapest is the dipstick heater.  You remove your dipstick and put the heater in its place, where it heats the oil in your oil pan.  Dipstick heaters are outlawed in Canada due to engine fires, but they are still sold in USA.  I bought one online and had to return it because it never heated up.  I bought another one and it burned out in the first hour. 

An electric cord from the oil pan heater comes
out the front of the Jeep for connection to outlet at night.

I was down to only one possibility: oil pan heaters.  These are electric pads that you place on the outside of your oil pan.  I found several online that would fit, and by far the cheapest comes from China for $7.50 with free shipping.  I installed it, and it works fine.  But I thought two of them would do a better job, so I ordered two more.  They were still in China a month after ordering, but they finally came and I installed them with brackets that I fabricated out of sheet metal.   

The coolant we use in our California cars is no good in the far north.  It will freeze solid at a mere -34 degrees Fahrenheit, and probably ruin your engine.  That’s because it’s mad of  50% ethylene glycol and 50% water.  Up north you need 60% ethylene glycol to carry you down to -60 degrees.  So I did the calculation, and removed 48 ounces of California coolant and replaced it with the same amount of pure ethylene glycol.

Maybe now the Jeep and I are ready.  Just maybe.