Keeping your engine cool?

One more vote for a clutch fan and a good shroud. I won't go near junk plastic electric fans. Only cars I've ever overheated had electric fans.

 

Ok, I got a chance to look at pictures of my car (car is stored elsewhere) and saw 1 of the engine bay. Apparently I'm already running a stock shroud. Must've forgot about it since it's black! Any other thoughts? Here's a pic. Sorry, it's not too good a shot.




It's primitive technology that is further comprimised in the name of vanity.-HAMBer Cleatus

 

It is hard to tell from the photo, but some of the early factory shrouds didn't enclose the radiator. Some were just a round section to help direct the air flow. You really want the shroud to totally enclose the radiator so that any air the fan pulls has to be drawn through the radiator. You want to use a large stock fan (not a four blade). At some point you may want to consider a crossflow radiator. Also ensure that the baffle is still on the hood that prevents airflow around the radiator. That helps at highway speeds to force the air through the radiator.
You must install a closed system cap and overflow tank for optimum cooling. Just keep the pressure appropriate for your vintage radiator.
Also make sure the air has a good place to exit the engine compartment. It is possible there is tin blocking the sides of the engine near the firewall. Open up these areas if necessary.
The auto manufactures spent a great deal of time and money designing cooling systems. Look at late model pickups for ideas, as they are the closest to your configuration. Follow the manufactures leads first before resorting to the aftermarket crutches.

~Alden

 

ditch your inner fenders, let the hot air out. otherwise it's like an easy bake oven in there. i gotta run a 160 t-stat in my car to make heat. it runs at 130-140 otherwise even in 80 degree ambient temps. by the way, i'm doing this with the cheapest flea-bay radiator i could find.

 

Any thermostat colder than 180 is a band aid and with a cooling system that is working anywhere near properly it will cause premature wear to the engine.

 

how does this help get this guys engine cooler? a 160 stat isn't gonna hurt anything.

 

I have a thread on here going over the same problem. When I got my '51 Merc (SBC, headers, TH350, A/C) it had a 4 blade steel fan, no shroud, and would get to 230 in 5 miles. When I started driving the car again, I had a buddy install a 16" electric puller fan. It's not enough.

Based on research and talking to some other Merc guys and great input from HAMBers, I intend to go to a 7 blade steel fan, shroud that covers the whole radiator, some material to block the sides and underneath my rad, and also checking my timing and a/f. Car cools quickly going 50+ mph, but sitting in Cubs traffic, I'm going from 180 to 230 in about 20 minutes.

 

Ditto. My 12 second Pontiac 400 will sit in traffic all day long and gets to about 175 wnen its 90+ degrees. A 160 stat is plenty warm.
heres my set up.
Holley 800 running at 13.2 on the wide band at idle, non restrictive exhaust to get the heat out, 14 degree initial advance, factory 4 row radiator, fan shroud with fan blades exactly half way in the shroud, stock power flex fan, stock water pump. Nothing exotic, just simple common sense.
I also run 160 stats in all my cars. The person that says 160 stats will wear out your engine faster is not informed. In reality, heat kills after getting above 200 and everything will live a long healthy life such as your rubber hoses, gaskets, plastic etc with a cooler engine. Most engines will run in the mid 170s with a 160 as 160 degrees is where the stat starts to open.

 

The only place were I would worry about running a 160 stat in is a cold climate where you might want a little heat on your toes. They are nether a kill or cure on older engines like gets thrown around when ever this subject come up. They are merely a setpoint that the engine has to get up to to be able to circulate the coolant. Now if you are running something late model in your rig with fuel injection and a computer, then run at least a 190.

 

Sorry, forum was a little funky that night, and I got a double post.

 

Water comes out of your tap at 120 degrees and can burn you. I live in the NW and even when its 30 degrees outside, a 160 stat keeps me nice and toasty. We aren't baking bread in out cars are we?

 

The more things you can get out of that engine compartment the better.. They soak up heat and hold it.. I noticed a difference when opening the hood on a hot motor, after I removed that big AC duct and blower...

The vacuum tank and all the MSD is gone now too. My motor runs better without the MSD!

 

That "shroud" is a waste of your time, money and dinkskinners (that's hillarious). Shrouds have to include the whole inside of the core to be effective. Something that's often overlooked is air escaping around, under or over the rad as it is coming in you have to force or trick as much incoming air as possible to go through the core this is often overlooked. As for thermostats the temp indicated on them is the MINIMUM temperature they will maintain I have rarely seen a lower temp thermostat actually help cool a hot blooded engine but I have seen overheating ones run cooler and better with a higher (195) thermostat, Ford at one time used a 202 in the 221,260 289 motors. An engine running at 160 or 180 is not running at its peak efficiency and will develope sludge and other issues including reduce fuel mileage.

 

search online: enoscustom (Enos Custom Components) for the water pump blade shield they offer-helps water flow better thru pump-that is what is in some of the expensive water pumps- sometimes a front electric pusher fan helps, sometimes it causes other problems-

 

icebox under the hood haha

 

Ya know, if you get it to run cooler and it sits at 160F, you will want to change the stat. That would be a nice problem to have. I did a 180 stat in mine, I'd love to see no more than 200F in summer that's my goal. 180-190F would rock.

 

It's been 110 here for the last few days. The 401 nailhead in my 50 Sedan Delivery runs about 190 in traffic. Installed an aluminum radiator and built a shroud that covers the entire back surface of the radiator.

 

Yup I need one of those.

 

Simple things usually work, so have you actually checked the temperature gauge to see whether it is anywhere near accurate?

On another hot rod forum I frequent a guy had a cooling problem, found his gauge read some 25 degrees over at 200c. Just a thought.

To my mind 220 is not overheating, if it is in a proper pressurised system, with sealed rad cap etc, but different people have different systems.

 

I had an Auto Meter mechanical gauge that was off buy 75 degrees..

I didn't buy it from Auto Meter, I bought it from a wholesale house..

Might of been a reject from Auto Meter because everything I ever bought directly from them was top notch..

 

I run a Cooling Concepts fan and shroud combo from Walker Radiator on my 32 roadster with full hood. In Las Vegas stop and go heavy traffic in a 110 degree heat, the roadster runs a constant 175 degrees. I hate the looks of it, hence the full hood, but it was the best investment I have ever made for the drivability.

 

I read this is a re-cored radiator, but is it a re-cored V-8 radiator? Or a radiator originally intended for a six? Just flat may not be big enough.

 

Battery tray's bolted to the inner fender, so that's a no on that

 

I forgot to say I've also used Royal Purple's "Purple Ice" radiator aditive - seems to work for me. The brand new Walker Radiator probably has something to do with the temps running cool as well.

 

Actually we used to get them punched full of louvers or holes depending on how much money we had on hand.

You may need to get or make a shroud that covers the radiator so that the fan pulls air across the entire radiator core.

I have put foam rubber around where the radiator mounts to the core support so that air cannot get past the radiator and just a guess your car should actually have a rubber gasket/flap that hangs down on the under side of the hood that kind of seals against the top of radiator or core support.

Once you make sure stat as much air as possible is flowing through your radiator look to your water pump. I use flow cooler water pumps there are other brands that are high volume as well. Flow Cooler also sells a disk that you put on the back side of a stock impeller in a stock pump that will increase the volume of the pump if you are stuck on running a stock pump.

Another thing to look at is the T stat that you are running. Don't cheap out on your T stat, I run fast acting stats like from MR Gasket or Moroso. They run around 12 bucks but it is money well spent over the couple of bucks spent of the cheapo stats that you get off the rack.

 

Better yet, get the inner fenders louvered. This will allow the air out without allowing spalsh off the tires in....and it looks cool.

 

It is great to check and do all the above , but it wont help if the water jackets around the cylanders are packed solid with crud . I have popped the freeze plugs in a few vintage engines lately and that was the case.

 

Whippet, glad that it works for you in your neck of the woods. Where I am at one of those blue northers can roar in here and take the temp way on down there, that and a 30 or 40 mile an hr wind with nothing to block it., and I will guarantee you nobody here using it as a daily driver in that kind of weather will stay with a 160 very long. Would be alright in the summer.

 

I can also confirm that that "shroud" is worthless through personal experience.

Here's what I did on my Thames/Anglia. The radiator is only 15" wide and the fan was 14" in diameter. I put on an 18" diameter HD flex fan (Derale 17018- 65% more surface area than the old fan) and built a circular shroud with two D-shaped supports to support the shroud. It now runs 180F at idle (used to climb to 220F which was the problem) and about 190 on the road.

There are some serious space considerations in there and I did the whole job without removing the radiator, which would have required pulling the whole front end off.











The engine is solidly mounted, so fan clearance is only about 1/2" on each side of the shroud. The engine is also at a different angle than the radiator, so the shroud is longer on the top than the bottom. Probably 85-90% of the radiator core is covered by the shroud, but what is in front of the shroud is really cooling effectively.

I think that a lot of air was coming from under the radiator into the fan so it really wasn't pulling much through the radiator. At 15-20 MPH the radiator cooled fine, just poorly at idle. I considered building a shroud for the original 14" fan, but decided that if that did't work I'd have to build another shroud. That's why I went into overkill mode on this- especially in southern California where it can get hot.

I may yet install a fan spacer so I can shorten up the shroud a bit, but for now I'm just going to drive and enjoy the car!

 

put the white prtective film that shipped new cars get during the summer heat

lookin cool is being cool