I'm going to relocate the radiator to the nose of Frankenfiat. Problem is that the thing is so compact there is no graceful place to put the coolant piping. Then it occurs to me that I was thinking of adding door bars to stiffen the chasis and provide impact protection. I could use the horizontal member to run coolant around the cockpit. My main concern is that I don't want the piping to weaken over time due to corrosion. One option would be to do the door bars in Stainless steel, but SS is a tad weaker than mild steel, and the scrutineers might not like that - particularly if we weld the stainless to the mild steel (hydrogen enbrittlement).
Any feedback from those in the know?
Could you just run the coolant hose through the tubing so the coolant doesn't contact the actual door bar material?
Those door bars are gonna get hot.
Rubber hose through the door bar?
i would think having door bars that are ~200 *F wouldnt be a lot of fun, and in the event of a wreck and any kind of crack in that pipe would be spraying boiling hot coolant everywhere.
i would look into beetle swap threads and see what they do when swapping to a water cooled engine
maybe something like this would work?
First two thoughts in my head also. That would be some hot piping running right next to you. Running an inner hose or pipe might work out better. Vanagons run 5-6 foot long plastic coolant pipes under them. Maybe use one of those through the inside. I could see a rubber hose eventually chafing and leaking inside the tubing.
When I went front mounted radiator on my Fiat 850 I used 1" EMT under the car tucked up as high as I could get it
I actually had problems getting the car up to temp. The two lines increased the system capacity over a gallon and a half. It took 30 minutes before the temps stabilized and the car would stop going back into warm up enrichment mode every time the thermostat opened. I wound up going with a 5/8" diameter braided stainless covered teflon line for both the pressure and return lines. That solved my problem. I don't have a crazy motor swap though. Just an 843cc Fiat motor running 21psi of boost. It generates LOTS of heat.
Don't run coolant thru the door bars, or anywhere else inside the car.
+1 for the EMT conduit idea. Did a similar thing with my V8 Fiero project a few years ago.
Ferrari 308 routes the coolant through aluminum tubes under the cabin. Still generates lots of heat.
My friend's Formula Ford Merlin runs the coolant through the frame, right next to the driver's arm.
Thanks guys. I think that I was getting a little bit too cute for my own good.
Ditchdigger: That's amazing that you could get enough water through a 5/8" hose. But given that I need to cool 250+ HP, the 1" will probably work fine for me! If it overcools, I could use something like the "circuit setters" that commercial plumbers use to lock in flow rates.
Hey ditchdigger: Are you still running the stock spring setup in the rear? I'd love to put coilovers on there, but it's real tricky to get the necessary overall length. Was thinking that there are some motorcycle monoshocks that are real short that might be adaptable.
I am using adjustable sleeves and 6" long 550lb springs. I machined some Delrin and Aluminum adapters to locate the sleeve and spring in the original springs place.
I feel like I need stiffer springs back there. It'll hit the bumpstops on hard launches. It is under 200lbs of wheel rate due to the motion ratio.
I am too low and could still wind it down another 3/4" if I wanted to. 6" springs are a good length for these cars. I will find some springs in the 650 range next time I get in there.
I am interested in how you manage to fix the handling ills of the frankenFiat. Throwing an extra 120lbs in the back and mounting it all so much further back than the stock layout is scary. If you could push the engine and transmission back towards the firewall enough to mount the rear panel correctly, it would probably make things much better
Love your spring solution. I'll be ordering some up post haste.Thanks.
Frankenfiat is a handling mess. I'm going to end up doing a full makeover on the front suspension and steering. But more pertinent to your question, moving the radiator and 10 gallon fuel tank to the nose will help weight distribution considerably while spreading out the moment of inertia. The plan is to basically redo most of the cockpit forward this winter. Then - probably around this time next year, I'll switch to a single turbo placed above the transaxle and place an intercooler in the same vicinity, That'll help as well. Oh yeah, I'm throwing some Bilsteins on the back to take the place of the current blown-out shocks. I've run one autocross in it, and even in its current state of funkiness it wasn't too far out of the hunt. I honestly think that when dialed in and sporting 13 inch slicks it'll be a FTD candidate.
edit: btw it's the turbos that push the back panel out several inches. If they weren't there the EJ20 would fit, or come damn close to fitting..
On a different note (is anyone still listening?) The ideal radiator size for the front would be about 10" x 24". The closest that I've seen to that as a stock size is the Scirroco units that come in 12 1/2 to 13" wide - protruding into where I want to put the fuel cell. Does anyone know of a multi-row radiator that might fit in my space? Or - and this idea might be silly, but considering the length of the coolant lines, could a large oil cooler be made to work?
Ford Fiesta (the old ones) rads are about the right size, not sure if they will cool enough though, assuming you meant 10" tall by 24" wide and not 10" wide and 24" tall. (You said 13" wide was too much, but VW are wider than they are tall?) You might be able to get a local shop to cut down a core whatever width and thickness you need and put Jeep Cherokee ends on it too.
Apparently all the old formula ford cars used to do this and they've all had issues with corrosion as the years moved on
Fiat X1/9 radiators were the go to front mount for rear engine cars but the supply of those has gone dry. I am running a modified aftermarket civic aluminum rad. I cut a few inches out of its width and repositioned the inlet/outlets and deleted the pressure cap and mounted it on its side.
Cutting and welding an alloy rad isn't that difficult. No different than modifying an intercooler.
http://www.eastwood.com/blog/eastwood-chatter/building-custom-aluminum-radiator/
Going from single pass to dual pass like that link is a bit extreme. For your average single pass you can just cut off whatever width you want, cap the ends and relocate the ports.
First I think I need a new profile picture
Second the scirocco was the only thing I found that looked like it would work well up front and I spent lots of time looking. I think summit had there radiators sorted nicely so you could select by width and height. I've seen a dune buggy setup that moved the turbo in more with a different totally custom exhaust.
I don't think the engine and trans are going forward anymore with out major work.
Right now the rear springs are 458 in lbs
Thanks Luke. The spring rate seems pretty good, but it'd be nice to be able to corner-balance it. I just bought a Fiesta radiator for a pittance (Thanks Oldopelguy) that fits perfectly. If it isn't up to the task cooling-wise there's somebody who sells a race-version for a couple hundred dollars more, but I figure that I'll try the cheap one first.
Luke, if you don't mind, I thought that I'd post my build experiences on your thread. You good with that?
