I'm sitting here in an internet cafe in Mainz reading Cobra forum. Internet is cool...
The question was why my dry sump can't use a thermostat. The way a dry sump works is the
oil is sucked out of the pan and goes to a 3 stage
oil pump. That pump then send the
oil to an external oil tank. From that tank the oil return to the oil pump to be boosted up to around 90 psi. It then goes to the filter and cooler and continues to the inlet on the front of the motor. With a wet sump like most engines the thermostat simply stops the oil from going to the cooler until the oil is warm enough to open the thermostat. HOWEVER the oil pressure in the motor is normal while its waiting to warm up. ie no restriction. In my situation there would be no oil pressure until the thermostat opens. I could rig a bypass of some kind but it would require some kind of Y fitting that would still allow oil to get to the cooler but more importantly feed the engine while it was warming up. If you could see the oil lines (number 10 and 12 fittings) you'd understand why it would be very difficult to plumb this thing. It could be done but it would be easier to bypass the cooler altogether and up the coolant thermostat to make the block run hotter. I could also insulate all the stainless lines and the tank to retain heat. I'm going to switch to Mobil 1 5-30 oil to also mitigate the low temp.
Thanks for the help guys its really great to have input from different perspectives.
Hope to see some of you at this years Run & Gun in Sept. I'm really looking forward to it.