Better engine cooling

Well the way I see it is heat rises. When your driving along a scoop will force air into the engine bay ontop of the manifold. However around that area you will still have hot air rising.
It may push some hot air out under neath but I feel that it won't make a dramatic difference.
I'd be changing the coolant to start off with. Doing the trans oil cooler like Kevin did in an auto and making some vents in the sumpguard.
An always on switch will help too ss Nachaluva suggested. At work when we gas up a car, mainly cars with viscous fans not thermo fans we use a water spray bottle to wet the condenser. This brings the pressures down in the a/c system which then produces cooler vent temps in the car. This will bring the radiator temps down.
A simple jet washer system could be effective like how your windscreen wipers work.
I plan to try this as my aircon struggles to get down to 10degrees on a 40 degree day.
 
taza said:
An always on switch will help too ss Nachaluva suggested.

At work when we gas up a car, mainly cars with viscous fans not thermo fans we use a water spray bottle to wet the condenser. This brings the pressures down in the a/c system which then produces cooler vent temps in the car. This will bring the radiator temps down.
A simple jet washer system could be effective like how your windscreen wipers work.
I plan to try this as my aircon struggles to get down to 10degrees on a 40 degree day.
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I wouldn't go an always on switch for the fan myself. This is because I know exactly at what temperature the fans go on and off. Having it turned on before that would reduce engine efficiency, or at least I was advised this.

Re: the sprayers: how can they not work? Once when my car got to a temp I wans't happy with, I had a spray bottle full of water and I left the motor running and sprayed the bottle at the grille. The water was sucked in by the fans, and the temp soon dropped enough for the fans to go off. I knew at this point that ECT was reliably 92 degrees.

I'm keen on this was well: maybe a second reservoir bottle, or a T branch of the existing. the question is how much water makes a difference I guess...
 
Pull the temperature for the pines for Sunday and you will find it varried from 40 to 45. My theory, hot wind, slow speeds, soft sand and us flogging our cars was the cause. After red lining it climbing hills my temp gauge started going down even driving slowly. I have Subaru cloolant in mine at the moment so its not that. I just think it was to dam hot.
 
The reverse facing bonnet scoop or bonnet vents like an Mitsubishi Evo would work well to allow more hot air to escape & increase the efficiency of the radiator. But remember we're talking sand driving here so low speed, so the scavenging or venturi effect would be negligible. Its just a place for the hot air to rise & escape.

The always on fan position is only for times when engine temps are an issue. Ie, sand driving on a hot day, working the engine hard (WOT, high revs, 1st gear LR), low vehicle speed so minimum air flow through the radiator & high outside air temp so less heat transfer. In situations like this having the fans always on cant drop the temps too low cos its basically being pushed to the limit of its cooling capacity. In this situation you dont want the fans turning off. Of course, not everyone needs this, but if RedXS is having chronic cooling probs, he may need to.

RedXS is a manual but Kevins suggestion can be done for the engine oil. Many cars come standard with an oil cooler integral in the radiator. If his cooling system is good but he still overheats then an aftermarket oil cooler may help

The first thing I would do is check the cooling system. Reverse flush the radiator (with the heater on high) or get it checked by a radiator place. Then fill with Subaru coolant.

Do this first & if you're still having overheating probs, consider the others. But IMO this the must do :iconwink:
 
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blanket25 said:
Pull the temperature for the pines for Sunday and you will find it varried from 40 to 45. My theory, hot wind, slow speeds, soft sand and us flogging our cars was the cause. After red lining it climbing hills my temp gauge started going down even driving slowly. I have Subaru cloolant in mine at the moment so its not that. I just think it was to dam hot.
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Exactly! This will push the cooling system of any car to its limit. There are however things you can do to improve its efficiency. If you drive in sand on very hot days regularly (eg, typical WA trip lol), then I would doing this :iconwink:
 
I guess for low speed front mount oil cooler would be better than top mount as the fans will draw air through.

RedXS, did you say your rad was new and if so do you know what coolant is in it?
 
Yes I replaced my radiator about 4-5 weeks ago, its a genuine one and I used Nulun coolant with 50/50 water mixture, it was just bought at supercheap and was apparently the best one in the store for my car and with the highest boiling point.

I don't think my car has a bad over heating problem, it'll just be the one in the convoy that needs a cooling break first, I think stilson and blanket would have need their own cooling breaks on that day, just later on.
 
Gidday NL

The power has been off for most of the last 18 hours here ... I first started typing this yesterday arvo. Fortunately, I have a plug-in for the browser I use that saves what I am typing, character by character, apparently!

Here we are in one of the more affluent areas of the "World's most liveable city" and yet we have a power outage lasting from 1825H yesterday until 1150H today, with two short returns - one of 23 minutes last night and one of about 60 minutes this morning ...

Must be all that "gold plating" of the electricity supply system that a certain (ex-)politician spouted loads of garbage about ...

NachaLuva said:
RB, driving on sand is different. Very slow car speed so airflow through the radiator is low with the engine working hard. It pushes the cooling system hard.
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I do understand that. When the fans cut in, they should be pushing air through the radiators at well over 50 kmh. Maybe someone knows the figure? Whatever it is, they are moving both a serious volume of air and at a pretty high speed over a radiator that is not some under-sized runt of a thing, with a cooling system capacity that was marginal for the UK, let alone Oz, like some of my past cars have had.

My concern is that the airflow is being badly impeded in the cars involved.

The fans may well be trying to suck the air in through the radiator, but if it cannot escape to the rear of the engine bay, there will not be much, or not adequate, air flow to keep the engine coolant (and oils ... ) within safe operating temperatures.

It might help if people study the design and clearances of the standard ABS sump protector, and make certain that anything they put in to replace it has sufficient air by-pass area/s. Things like driving lights (etc) can also severely restrict air flow.

I also agree with Greg (?) who suggested a light spray of water through the front grill. The evaporation will dramatically lower the temperature very quickly. Far better to fix the underlying cause, IMO.
 
I built a rad sprayer for an offroad 244 Volvo rally car (yep) would last for 3.5 min and drop the temp from 115C to 115C.

Red, just check you have the fan shroud fitted without any gaps to ensure every bit of air the fan moves is coming though the rad
 
stilson said:
I built a rad sprayer for an offroad 244 Volvo rally car (yep) would last for 3.5 min and drop the temp from 115C to 115C.
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Jeez, dropped by that much eh! :lol:
 
stilson said:
I built a rad sprayer for an offroad 244 Volvo rally car (yep) would last for 3.5 min and drop the temp from 115C to 115C.
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Kevin said:
Jeez, dropped by that much eh! :lol:
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:rotfl:


Red XS said:
Yes I replaced my radiator about 4-5 weeks ago, its a genuine one and I used Nulun coolant with 50/50 water mixture, it was just bought at supercheap and was apparently the best one in the store for my car and with the highest boiling point.
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Red, just check you have the fan shroud fitted without any gaps to ensure every bit of air the fan moves is coming though the rad
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+1

They may not have done this properly when you had the radiator done

Also check they used a new radiator cap with the correct pressure

I don't think my car has a bad over heating problem, it'll just be the one in the convoy that needs a cooling break first, I think stilson and blanket would have need their own cooling breaks on that day, just later on.
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Be careful of overheating...Subie engines dont like it. It can warp the block &/or heads causing head gasket probs. Apart from all the usual stuff of breaking down oil, etc
 
Red, just check you have the fan shroud fitted without any gaps to ensure every bit of air the fan moves is coming though the rad
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There's about a 3mm gap the full length down both sides inbetween the radiator and radiator fan shroud. Should I fill that with foam?

They may not have done this properly when you had the radiator done

Also check they used a new radiator cap with the correct pressure
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Well I did the radiator myself so I'd say very likely that something wasn't done properly.
 
Red XS said:
There's about a 3mm gap the full length down both sides inbetween the radiator and radiator fan shroud. Should I fill that with foam?
.
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Yep. Air will be getting sucked in through the gap bypassing the radiator. Wont make a huge difference but will help. Get some adhesive foam from Clark Rubber.
 
You guys know that if you just didn't thrash the engine when it's hot you probably wouldn't have issues. Going out know 40+ degree days isn't just damaging the vehicle but our bodies too. Italian not always 40+ w hen we go out.
 
Actually Con was Greek, not Italian.
 
Red XS said:
There's about a 3mm gap the full length down both sides inbetween the radiator and radiator fan shroud. Should I fill that with foam?
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yep. The offcuts bin at Clark rubber is your friend. I did this on mine and it made a significant difference. Doesn't have to be adhesive: you can jam it in the gap.

taza said:
You guys know that if you just didn't thrash the engine when it's hot you probably wouldn't have issues. Going out know 40+ degree days isn't just damaging the vehicle but our bodies too. Italian not always 40+ w hen we go out.
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Taza you post some interesting examples of autocorrect. I'm guessing that you have an interesting relationship with Siri.
 
taza said:
I was out at the pines with Hydrowill the other week and was really giving it hell with the ac on while it was hot and the two gauge didn't even move.
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Do not put all your faith in the OEM Temp gauge, by the time you see it rising it can sometimes be too late for your engine.

The temp gauge in my 03 Forester had never moved beyond the horizontal in it's lifetime until it was about 8 yrs old, I was towing a trailer with a golf cart at 100 km/h on a rather warm (not stinking hot) day on the Sunshine Coast, when some instinct told me to look at the Temp gauge and it was just below the red zone. I slowed right down and popped the hood then crawled along for a few kms as I watched the temp gauge slowly begin to fall.
Took the forester to my normal Workshop and they found that 50% of the radiator was clogged with **** and that was despite having the car serviced as per the schedule and on time.

I ended up buying an UltraGauge to monitor my temp more closely, I also found my Forester had 40 sensors that could also be monitored by this gauge. :monkeydance:
 
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