Permanent oil cooler vs thermostat

[Bean]

Hi Lt86,

a good resource to read you can find here http://www.billzilla.org/4agstock.htm he covers many things related to our engines. It's been written a long time ago but most of it still applies today.
Regarding the coldstart he only covers the fuel side so I won't go into that. The air needed for the coldstart is controlled by a small part underneath the throttle body and controlled by water rather than oil. There's a wax element in there which allows more air into the system when 'hard' as soon as it heats up it will close a passage way and idle will decrease to normal (750-850rpm if set right). The issue in cold weather winter is more down to the fact the plenum and throttlebody is 'cold soaked' and will take a while to warm up. Not much you can do about it, apart from waiting for summer.
Depending how cold it is it should take around 5min to warm up.

The oil cooler isn't very big and airflow through it is also not excellent so it doesn't do much harm even in Winter. you can tape a piece of cardboard over it (fully or partialy) and check the difference in oil pressure.

Hope that helps