No...actually the experiment was completed, resulting in the conclusion that there were no known negative affects of not using a thermostat, but very negative affects can occur when using a thermostat, if it becomes defective. I don't know much about the heat transfer, but the coolant, being water, maintained a reasonable temperature with no thermostat in place. However, some may argue that with no restriction, the water is circulating too fast to adequately cool the motor. Therefore, the water temerature reading with no thermostat in place, is meaningless. My response to that would be...while the water may be circulating faster, by maintaining a reasonable temperature, and always being present in the motor, the block temperature is not increasing significantly, or the water temperature reading would also increase.