My two cents worth FWIW is as follows:
There was some concern at the factory many years ago about cooling issues
generally. On the wet liner 4 cylinder engine, cooling could become a problem
if 'crud' build-up started to accumulate and especially behind cyl no. 4 and
this was particularly so when the engine was in a tractor. Farmers often topped
up coolant from a pond or somesuch :)
On the in-line six, much concern was expressed about the 'siamesing' of
cylinders three and four where there was no coolant passage but later use of
the car in hot climates such as Africa, the Middle East and Australia seemed to
make this concern ill-founded.
Similarly, on the Spitfire and particularly when cyls 2 and 3 were offset from
1 and 4 (de-axe) though again ill-founded. However, there was much harsh
comment when the Spitfire engine grew to 1500cc as (I feel fairly sure) the
coolant passages only were only in front of number 1 and behind number 4 - so
effectively the whole lot were siamesed together to keep the block to the same
overall length.
All that said, cooling never seemed to be an 'issue' when operating in very hot
climates. The secret is to ensure all coolant galleries are clear of
obstruction throughout the system including radiator and heater matrix, the
thermostat is fully operational as per spec and the water pump is in good
condition and doing its job.
The only troublesome engine was the Stag V8 in which the wrong alloy was
specified by Purchasing in contravention to the spec laid down by Engineering
and also the casting itself was so complex that many engines still had lumps of
casting sand and wires frames embedded in the block that refused to be
extracted. When Joe Pawlak was rebuilding the engine in the car I drove across
the States and Canada in 2009, he showed me all the foundry residue he finally
extracted when the engine was rebuilt. As a result, 'uncle jack' never
overheated once to any noticeable degree except twice. One was sitting in a
queue on a stinking hot day at the Canadian frontier south of Montreal and once
in traffic crawl around San Francisco. Switching on the heater was *all* I had
to do to knock the temp gauge back to normal. In fact, although I checked
coolant every day before start up, the only time I topped up was in Tallahassee
a day after trip start with one paper cup of water - and I used no more for the
next 18,000 miles!!!!!!!!!! Come to that, apart from oil changes at 6,000 mile
intervals, I only used two pints of oil in the whole journey - and no leaks
anywhere:)
Jonmac
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