Napa Radiator

[BlackMetal]

huh, im lookin at these things and they all seem to be 1 row, 1" thick as far as i can tell. is that enough to cool an engine? is aluminum that much better?

The fact that these F-body radiators only have one big row instead of multiple smaller rows is actually why they cool so good. Water flowing through a bigger passage is going to move slower and stay in the radiator longer. You can have all the rows in the world in a radiator but if the tubes are tiny, the water will pass through the radiator in an instant and not dissipate any heat. Having one row 1" thick lets the water slowly pass through the radiator and cool off a lot more.

As far as oil coolers I think it's crazy that some people say it's ok to delete it and not worry about it. These are turbo cars after all, battling heat is the name of the game. A lot of guys say "I bypassed the factory oil cooler and the temps in my oil pan only went up 2 degrees". That may be, but that just goes to show how pathetic the factory oil cooler is. It doesn't mean you don't need one.

The radiator cost me $105 delivered to the shop where I work. Spent somewhere around another $100 for a B&M oil cooler with Aeroquip hoses and fittings.

The oil cooler lines may not be high pressure but oil is still what keeps your engine going and I personally would not risk running an oil cooler set up with wimpy rubber hose and hose clamps. I would still use proper high pressure high temp line with quality fittings like made by Aeroquip. There may not be a lot of pressure going through the lines/cooler but an oil leak is not something to take lightly.

 

[Grumpy]

they should make a RADIATOR thread a "sticky" ... TTAs came with a F body style rad and it worked fine with them .. I haven't run an oil cooler since the early 90s BUT my cars run cool . oh ya we DRIVE the hell out of our cars This has been beat to death

 

[Mark E.]

As far as oil coolers I think it's crazy that some people say it's ok to delete it and not worry about it. These are turbo cars after all, battling heat is the name of the game. A lot of guys say "I bypassed the factory oil cooler and the temps in my oil pan only went up 2 degrees". That may be, but that just goes to show how pathetic the factory oil cooler is. It doesn't mean you don't need one.

So everyone needs to upgrade their coolers?

Do you have an oil temp guage, or just us crazies?? :biggrin:

 

[Project TNX]

I bought the AutoZone radiator and this cooler from Summit last week, I'm hoping to install it tomorrow. It looks straight forward enough.

Summit Combination Fluid Coolers: SUM-G4978 - summitracing.com

 

[dentmasters01]

just purchased the 433918 from autozone. $100.96 with tax.

The tranny line hook ups are on the back side of the radiator instead of the front like the factory......can you manipulate the lines enough to get them to fit ???

 

[johnnyttype]

another question, would the stock fan work well with the f-body radiator?

 

[Terry_H]

Did the Autozone Fbody radiator install a couple weeks ago. Big difference over the old clogged stock radiator. Also installed an oil cooler and trans cooler. Nothing in the radiator except water/antifreeze.

 

[buickbert]

Did the Autozone Fbody radiator install a couple weeks ago. Big difference over the old clogged stock radiator. Also installed an oil cooler and trans cooler. Nothing in the radiator except water/antifreeze.

seems like you are blocking off quite a bit of flow to the rad with those coolers on there is there any place to mount brackets and have the coolers "float" between the grill and radiator.

buickbert

 

[Terry_H]

When coolers "float" the fan becomes ineffective and temperatures can soar if the car is not moving. You can buy nice coolers that have their own fans and mount them basically anywhere. In my case, there are 1/2" spacers between the coolers and the A/C condensor. Nothing is really blocked since air passes through all radiators/condensors/coolers/intercoolers.

 

[SloGN]

they should make a RADIATOR thread a "sticky" ... TTAs came with a F body style rad and it worked fine with them .. I haven't run an oil cooler since the early 90s BUT my cars run cool . oh ya we DRIVE the hell out of our cars This has been beat to death

Yes the TTA's came with the same f-body 5.7 radiator. but they did inheed have a oil cooler on them. The oil cooler was a water cooler that bolted on the oil filter housing. and it hooked up to the stock water heater lines of the intake and dumping back into the top of the water pump. I will try and post a pic of the TTA set-up. if i was to get a f-body radiator this would be how i would try and keep oil temps down. i have enuff crap in front of the radiator now to keep air flowing thru.


HTH

Patrick Broughton

 

[johnnyttype]

took it from a post Grumpy made on turbobuicks.com!

 

[johnnyttype]

just purchased the 433918 from autozone. $100.96 with tax.

The tranny line hook ups are on the back side of the radiator instead of the front like the factory......can you manipulate the lines enough to get them to fit ???

i was just wondering the same thing. what do u guys normally do to move the tranny lines to the back of the radiator? r they the same fittings going into the f-body radiator or will u need a different size? thx!

 

[FlaBoy]

huh, im lookin at these things and they all seem to be 1 row, 1" thick as far as i can tell. is that enough to cool an engine? is aluminum that much better?

A lot of people think that the aluminum rads cool better because Aluminum transmits the heat better than the common copper/brass radiators. In fact the opposite is true, the copper/brass mixtures used in older radiators has a significantly higher coefficient of thermal conductivity (231.16 Btu/(ft h *F)) than aluminum (about 147 Btu/(ft h *F) ) (both values for a temperature of 125*C or about 250*F). The advantages of aluminum are its much higher yield strength which allows the manufacturer to use much larger tubes in the radiator. This increases the efficiency of the radiator in several different ways... less pumping losses and more flow(less friction with fewer larger tubes), decreased cross-sectional area (no more gigantic 500 core radiators), less weight than a comparable copper/brass one, etc. Also a consideration for a big auto manufacturer is that there are hardly any components on a car made from copper and brass, while many new cars are amde almost entirely from aluminum. An Al rad allows them to deal with a material theyre more familiar with, and to consolidate supply to fewer suppliers.

Strangely, Aluminum radiators as the next big thing is mainly a european and american concept. something like 80% of new japanese, chinese, and korean cars still use copper/brass rads.

 

[BlackMetal]

i was just wondering the same thing. what do u guys normally do to move the tranny lines to the back of the radiator? r they the same fittings going into the f-body radiator or will u need a different size? thx!

In older threads about the F-body radiator swap I've seen guys say it just takes some gently bending of the factory trans lines and you can get them to reach. They don't mention any different fittings or adapters so I guess it's the same. I already had an external trans cooler hooked up so when I did my radiator install so I didn't even bother to look if/how the trans lines would work with the new radiator. Frankly I don't think the built-in fluid coolers could be very effective and would still run an external cooler anyway.

 

[Red Regal T]

I've swapped F-body radiators into both of my TRs. You have to make sure you get the IROC unit. There are thinner radiators for other applications. Probably V-6 Camaro-birds. I also installed a Permacool motor oil/trans oil cooler for mounting in front of the radiator. I had new longer oil lines made up with correct AN fittings to reach the cooler.

 

[TurboMonte 2]

The fact that these F-body radiators only have one big row instead of multiple smaller rows is actually why they cool so good. Water flowing through a bigger passage is going to move slower and stay in the radiator longer. You can have all the rows in the world in a radiator but if the tubes are tiny, the water will pass through the radiator in an instant and not dissipate any heat. Having one row 1" thick lets the water slowly pass through the radiator and cool off a lot more.

As far as oil coolers I think it's crazy that some people say it's ok to delete it and not worry about it. These are turbo cars after all, battling heat is the name of the game. A lot of guys say "I bypassed the factory oil cooler and the temps in my oil pan only went up 2 degrees". That may be, but that just goes to show how pathetic the factory oil cooler is. It doesn't mean you don't need one.

The radiator cost me $105 delivered to the shop where I work. Spent somewhere around another $100 for a B&M oil cooler with Aeroquip hoses and fittings.

The oil cooler lines may not be high pressure but oil is still what keeps your engine going and I personally would not risk running an oil cooler set up with wimpy rubber hose and hose clamps. I would still use proper high pressure high temp line with quality fittings like made by Aeroquip. There may not be a lot of pressure going through the lines/cooler but an oil leak is not something to take lightly.

Boy have I been confused (not a big surprise to many of you), but I thought the stock GN in-radiator cooler was for tranny oil--not engine oil. Did stock GNs come with a factory engine oil cooler--I thought not?.

 

[BlackMetal]

Boy have I been confused (not a big surprise to many of you), but I thought the stock GN in-radiator cooler was for tranny oil--not engine oil. Did stock GNs come with a factory engine oil cooler--I thought not?.

The stock GN radiator has both tranny and oil cooling internal. Stock GN's do have a factory oil cooler. Look where the oil filter screws on, there are two lines coming out from right behind the filter, and they run to the radiator. That's the oil cooler passages.

 

[Boost231]

84/85 gn's only had the trans cooler in the front of it where as the 86/87 gns had the trans cooler on the back side and the oil cooler in the front. front being closest to the motor.

 

[TurboMonte 2]

OK, I'm starting to get my head cleared. I have a remote Biggie-type oil filter adapter that my hoses run to from stock oil filter housing location--no engine oil lines to any cooler. I do, however, have a turbo oil supply line from this remote-Big oil filter housing.

I have an external tranny cooler in front of rad'r receiving fluid from tranny & this ext cooler then discharged into what you're indicating as a stock/original engine oil cooler. Disch from this cooler (engine side of rad'r) then returned back to tranny with a temp gauge pickup (electrical type) in it.

When I rec'd car back from engine rebuilder, the tranny lines in/out of stock engine oil cooler were removed--using only ext cooler.

Typical "driving" tranny oil temp used to run around 150'ish deg F (after being tempered by radiator coolant), but now runs below my gauge min.temp of 100F.

What's a typical tranny engine return temp from expernal cooler only & do I need to check back of dash gauge for a loose wire??

 

[BlackMetal]

I'd check for a loose wire, no way is your tranny running below 100F.