Rad upgrade and coolant hoses

[neptune]

On 28/10/2018 at 18:48, Weekend Warrior said:

Thanks Neptune ,your car looks familiar I managed to get to a couple of the Nothhants meets at Sewell when I first was looking to get a car ,then a couple when I first had it ,Ive a feeling I sat in your car outside the pub ,but could be wrong .

Unfortunatley ive been working away for the last year and a bit so I’ve not managed to get to amother one yet .What width of rad did you go for ?

 

I went for the 55mm version after many recommendations on the forum.

[tc3nitro]

16 hours ago, Rhett - Joint Black Country AO said:

It’s all I purchased, I did keep one original hose though, the bottom hose to the rad which is the bent hose or offset hose, not really sure what the official name for it is though

Thanks ! The lower one is already silicone so I never considered replacing that.

[CarbonWest - Chris Broster - Bristol & Bath AO]

On 29/10/2018 at 18:23, maurici said:

As usual, I´m late where i could have helped... XD.

Polo Rad; For heavy use, for me is insuficient by all means. of course will depend a lot of the tunning of the engine, but in my car wouldnt even keep the car stady at 90ish when in traffic after a heavy blat. If someone wants one, for 20 quid plus postage, drop me a line, is taking space and is pretty much brand new.

Fan: For me, the ideal bit is using a very small SPAL, lightwight and very little intrusive trhough the airflow... and mounted direct to the rad, with the fitting kit trough the fins (I know most people don´t like it because will damage 20 fins of the thousands around the car, but is the neater solution for this application by far... then the fan sroud is self sealing against the other side of the rad, and no dodgy solutions are needed).

The foam solution is really dodgy, never seen that in a OEM car, and will fall appart pretty fast if the car is used often.

Rad: Coolex 42mm polo twin pass. Sweet and stupidly cheap, pretty much a direct fit (no if you use ducted nose, but easily sorted, only needs a bit of fiberglass cutting) That cheap that I can´t quite justify having the s***ty polo one...

Since the upgrade the car will sat on 82 degrees (thermostat temperature) in any situation, and the fan doesnt´t stays on more than 40 seconds when an extra push is needed. All of this, with a water-oil exchanger to keep the oil pretty much stable at 100 degrees (is being cooled down with the heater bypass... 85 degrees waterflow, so... happy wit that).

In the zetec, by the way (as in any other car with hidraulic tapets) is really really important a fast warmup of the oil and keeping it stable at the right operating temperatures, so, a laminova cooler, or some sort of arrangement like this is as important as keeping the car cool... (would avoid air blast coolers for the oil if the watercooling can handle it...)

I´m happy to trow some pictures of my instalation if someone have any insterest. As very often, is not nice to see... but is the most practical way I found to make it work. and is absolutely reliable.

**Edit. I´ve found enough pictures...

 

The rad. Appart of a bit of cutting in the ducting and doing the attachment holes a tad bigger... worked pretty much straight away. Hoses were a bit long (can be seen in the picture) and a new bleed from the top was connected to a T piece in the expansion tank vent line.

 

Also the fixing kit... can be seen in the image above... and bellow from the rear.

Then the oil system. Sorry, is really dodgy, but works perfect. It comes from an HVAC chiller (rated at 35 bars, so super safe) from a scrap car... using some random OEM hoses with the right shape and bends (ish) a visit to the scrap yard should sort this...  and a high pressure hose for the oil lines, with some very dodgy clamping and retaining... System is been tested at 10 bars with heath and pulling, so a bit of a peace of mind. I know n0-one will do that with their oil lines, but I needed a way forwar as I was stucked using a conbination of HVAC lines and aluminium stubby pipes... 

 

 

I think the whole install is about 300 quid including the visit to the scrap yard... the tricky bit is having a decent oil fitting in a random laminova cooler... and despite i though I would show my arrangment for the oil fittings, rather don´t do it XD.

Maurici, 

could you tell me where you got the rad fan fixings from if you can recall? 

Regards

chris 

[Dave Eastwood (Gadgetman) - Club Chairman]

Use through rad type fixings at your own risk. Maurici May have had no problem, but lots and I do mean lots of others have.

Ive had it myself, though thankfully it was a £30 Polo rad they destroyed and not a £1/200 welded alloy type.

The plastic through pieces literally fretted away on the rad tubes like a saw, cutting nearly all the way through in two places, and far enough through in one to start a small weep of coolant out of the hole. Oh, and it was only a relatively light weight fan, so not even like they were trying to support much mass.

If you buy a Coolex type rad, you can order it with proper fan mounts already on it, ideal for our usage.

[maurici]

6 minutes ago, Dave Eastwood (Gadgetman) - Club Secretary said:

Use through rad type fixings at your own risk. Maurici May have had no problem, but lots and I do mean lots of others have.

Ive had it myself, though thankfully it was a £30 Polo rad they destroyed and not a £1/200 welded alloy type.

The plastic through pieces literally fretted away on the rad tubes like a saw, cutting nearly all the way through in two places, and far enough through in one to start a small weep of coolant out of the hole. Oh, and it was only a relatively light weight fan, so not even like they were trying to support much mass.

If you buy a Coolex type rad, you can order it with proper fan mounts already on it, ideal for our usage.

Because you was way too gentle when tighting it. The fastening force is made by the rubber bits on the outer face of the rad, and the plastic trough shouldnt touch the tubes at all. The rad trough system its been used for AGES in all kind of competition cars, even 'baja' cars that suffer more thab any other car on jumping and shaking... if they werent effective wouldnt be used in cars where the budget is a problem. Different issue is if you dont understand how shouldnit work.

 

Regarding where to get them, i use long and thin zipties with rubber busshings to spread the load because i have this on hand, but in ebay any "rad fixing kit" will do the job if fastened correctly.

[Dave Eastwood (Gadgetman) - Club Chairman]

I’m not the only one, by a long, long, long, long shot!

 

[Dave Eastwood (Gadgetman) - Club Chairman]

Oh, and fitting was exactly as per instructions included with the fittings, and tightness checked regularly. Fair enough that the instructions may we’ll be wrong, heaven knows I’ve come across that frequently enough!

The problem with this one is that if you do get it wrong, it can destroy your radiator.

[maurici]

May have happened to a lot of people. Theb loads of people is made it wrong. It has to be tight.

I would agree but, that if you made it wrong you can break a radiator.

[Dave Eastwood (Gadgetman) - Club Chairman]

Mine was regularly as tight as it could possibly be. I suspect some of the through rad mounting kits are just basically rubbish.

 

[Dave Eastwood (Gadgetman) - Club Chairman]

There are times when securing to the rad would be a very handy "get out of trouble" solution; if @maurici could do us a write up, with photos, of the optimum way of doing it, I'm sure that would help quite a few - we'll put it in the FAQ section. (Happy to help if any help needed, always ready to learn  ) - we're half way there with the front view photos above, already!  )

[AdamR]

22 minutes ago, Dave Eastwood (Gadgetman) - Club Secretary said:

There are times when securing to the rad would be a very handy "get out of trouble" solution; if @maurici could do us a write up, with photos, of the optimum way of doing it, I'm sure that would help quite a few - we'll put it in the FAQ section. (Happy to help if any help needed, always ready to learn  ) - we're half way there with the front view photos above, already!  )

I'll do one when I fit my fan, will be using items supplied by Maurici and under his guidance.

For reference, the fan on my previous car was fitted like has been discussed in this thread, no issues even though it had worked loose. I fitted a new rad and re-fixed it with the same method, that didn't come loose at all and that was with a fair bit of track abuse (kerbs etc)!

[Dave Eastwood (Gadgetman) - Club Chairman]

1 minute ago, AdamR said:

I'll do one when I fit my fan, will be using items supplied by Maurici and under his guidance.

For reference, the fan on my previous car was fitted like has been discussed in this thread, no issues even though it had worked loose. I fitted a new rad and re-fixed it with the same method, that didn't come loose at all and that was with a fair bit of track abuse (kerbs etc)!

Thought you might be, but didn't want to jump the gun! That would be really handy. I do wonder if half the issues aren't the method per say, but the shockingly poor quality fixing kits that you tend to get supplied. Kind of ironic if plain old tie wraps, used with the right grommets, washers or what ever do a better job!

[tc3nitro]

On ‎16‎/‎10‎/‎2018 at 10:30, BugMan said:

+1 for Auto Silicone hoses (ASH), but you need to know what you want, especially at the trade counter, they are not the people to ask for advice, but great if you have a shopping list.

http://www.autosiliconehoses.com/

They are in Mirfield which is just down the road from me, so very convenient 

AutoSiliconeHoses.com
AP House
Holmebank Business Park
Mirfield
WF14 8NA
0844 800 5199

I would like to warn anyone making the trip to these clowns...

Please call them and check they have what you require before you visit. I made the trip yesterday to get some hoses that were showing in stock on their website but out of the 5 I needed they only had 2.

 

Customer service was shocking.....Obviously cheap for a reason !

[maurici]

1 hour ago, Dave Eastwood (Gadgetman) - Club Secretary said:

Thought you might be, but didn't want to jump the gun! That would be really handy. I do wonder if half the issues aren't the method per say, but the shockingly poor quality fixing kits that you tend to get supplied. Kind of ironic if plain old tie wraps, used with the right grommets, washers or what ever do a better job!

Apparently they do.

Ive only used once a propper kit supplied with the SPAL fan... and it went absolutely all right, but is true that i do normaly use plain zipties with rubber grommets and 2 metal washers, and they allow a better adjustment as you can click every 0.5mm rather than every 2 or 3 mm for the "fitting kits"

I do have a spare rad, and if adam has a fan kicking around Im happy to do so even before he is finishing his build. Will keep you posted!

[AdamR]

I have a fan and a radiator it needs mounting to...