In atempting to solve an overheating problem that seems to be caused by my radiator (original honeycomb, I removed it, shell and all, and backflushed with it upside down. This improved the flow rate by about 50%. In doing this I took off the Thermoststat housing and there was no thermostat?? but there was the rusted remains of what appears to be the holder for one. The Filling Station in OR did not have the part. but the housing and holder will work with a modern Chev thermostat. So is this a good work arnound and what Temp. should I use?

I would stronly recomend a stock replacement so the probe is correctly centered.Contact Gary Wallace 314-2931991 chev4cylcharter, he has a solid inventory and is a fellow member

Thanks Papa D

I'm on it - what is the optimum running temp. for these old 4 cyl's ?

The main purpose of the thermostat is for quick warm-up and then maintaining a constant temperature for the engine to operate.

I suggest a 160 or 180 thermostat.

memory is not that great, but the thermostat I got from Gary was either a 120 or 140.

Just remember the thermostat was used primarily for rapid warm ups on cold days to get the engine up to optimum conditions to prevent condensate in the crankcase and also to improve fuel efficiency. If you are just going to fire it up a putt around on warm days it really isn't that critical. If you are going to fire it up on cold days and or make lots of short trips then it might be a good idea if you don't plan on changing oil a lot. An old timer trick was to put something over the radiator like a blanket and let it warm up quick that way. As someone who runs an early 1900s boiler in a steamboat I own, I like things to warm up slowly and evenly. The old time steamboat explosions you may have read about were most often caused by rapid heating and or rapid pressure drops. Remember the old saying, "Haste makes waste." The cars that survived weren't usually treated to a heathy dose of "Haste".