Mastervolt Whisper Power 3.5kw

[nautic a]

Originally Posted by Dockhead

Volkswagen Beetles were also "oil cooled", meaning they had a little oil cooler in the air blower stream. Most people call that air cooled.

Not sure if the Beetles had raw water circulating through the oil cooler (heat exchanger) though. It seems to me, it is not "air cooled" as you would like to think however, I am not an engineer.

[SVNeko]

Certainly not air cooled. Mine has 1139+ hard hours on it and is running strong. Regular maintenance is all that its had. No complaints about it other than support is a little shaky since the sale to whispergen. They seem to be getting their act together though.

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by nautic a

Not sure if the Beetles had raw water circulating through the oil cooler (heat exchanger) though. It seems to me, it is not "air cooled" as you would like to think however, I am not an engineer.

I'm not knocking air cooling per se. I have a 1970 Porsche 911S which I adore. It has a big oil radiator under the right front fender, a dry sump with separate oil tank holding 12 liters of oil, and two big oil pumps. Does it get some cooling from oil? Oh, definitely. But since it also has a ducted fan blowing air over heads and cylinders with cooling fins on them, it is officially air-cooled. 90%, at least, of the engine's waste heat is carried off by air. Elaborate measures to cool the oil are made primarily for the sake of better lubrication, not cooling.

Kubota make good engines, and those engines too are fine if they're used for their intended purpose - light duty occasional use without extended high revs or heavy loads.

You'll see here that the engine manufacturer do not refer to the OC60 as "oil cooled": http://www.kubotaengine.com/products...ries-2/oc60-e4

That's marketing hype from Mastervolt. Oil has less than half of the specific heat of water, and therefore less than half of the ability to carry heat. A truly oil-cooled engine would have to have massive cooling jackets circulating large volumes of oil. An engine pressure lubrication system is not suitable for cooling, other than specific parts, sometimes (some engines, like my Porsche's, use jets of oil to cool piston crowns, for example). The volume of oil circulated is far too small to provide any major part of the cooling.

[prdarbys]

Ours is water-cooled. It has a water jacket that goes through the engine with a water pump, a strainer, an intake and output. We love it.

[SVNeko]

Originally Posted by prdarbys

Ours is water-cooled. It has a water jacket that goes through the engine with a water pump, a strainer, an intake and output. We love it.

Its not really water cooled. The oil and generator head are water cooled. The block is cooled by air and the slightly cooler oil.