Oil Cooler Locations

[jeffball610]

As I start my journey to getting #4G63510 on a full road course, I'm starting to think about prepping for more cooling. I have no space behind the grill to mount anything due to the 3" intercooler and the radiator. What locations are people running coolers in besides this?

 

I'd rather not put a giant cooler in front of the grill (RX 7 style). What about some space in front of a wheel like most modern cars use? Is there any place behind a front lip etc. (BRE  or others) that has accommodations for airflow to a cooler? I assume mounting it horizontally won't do much. For reference, my oil filter housing is on the Passenger (right) side of the engine bay.

[G-Duax]

This just came up on another forum, in reference to where many road race Porsche builders place the oil coolers, in front of the front wheels.

So a minor mishap, or a blown front tire often leads to a damaged oil cooler, and engine failure if the driver isn't right on top of his gauges.

Don't do that....

[datzenmike]

If the battery is relocated use the right side, otherwise plumb it on the left. Build a box behind the headlamps and remove the high beam for an air entrance.

 

 

This is an older Chev air conditioner condenser. It's 13" x 8" by 3.5" and will contain whatever the air con compressor produces. 200-300+ PSI???

[Crashtd420]

What about some creative ducting.... build a schroud around the oil cooler, duct the air to and from it....

Or You could use a fan .... then you don't have to worry about air flow to the location, but I would still duct the hot air out of the engine bay.....

[Stoffregen Motorsports]

You could do the old remove the headlight trick and place it in the corner behind the headlight bucket. It's as good a place as any. Oh wait, Mike already mentioned that.

 

You don't even need rushing air to help cooling. Just having a plate style cooler will help a ton.

 

One trick we used to do on our road race cars was to remove the hood seals and open up the rear of the hood by bending it slightly in the middle. This allows hot air to escape the engine bay.  I still do this on some vehicles that get built here, especially the V8 swaps.

 

There is a downside to that trick, two actually. One is aerodynamics, but your 510 will never go fast enough for that to be a problem, the other is a possibility that fog will form on the windshield, but that's only happened to me once or twice.

[G-Duax]

I've always found that an opening in front of the windshield forces air into the engine bay due to the high pressure caused by the windshield.

[jeffball610]

I've always found that an opening in front of the windshield forces air into the engine bay due to the high pressure caused by the windshield.

This is the "cowl induction" effect. Rushing air hits a low pressure zone at the base of the windshield and can reverse flow into the cowl area. This is why there are vents there for the air conditioning (vent) system in the 510 and muscle cars that the cowl induction hoods for MOAR PWR!!!

 

The headlight area is kind of off limits for me. That's where the intake is at for my turbo. I also don't care for the idea of removing the headlights. This is a 98% road driven car.

 

I've been looking at the area under the grill at the core support. I still have intercooler mounts there, and there doesn't seem to be any flow behind it, but there is space there. I would have to redo the lower valance, but it might work.

 

My other option I'm considering is ducting with a horizontal mounting. Cool air from in front and under the car would then send hot air into the engine bay. This might seem bad, but that's what a radiator does and that's what would happen if the cooler was in front of the radiator or intercooler.

 

I'm still open to other ideas. Turbo motors get hot, and mine actually comes stock with a cooler. Sadly it's a coolant cooled unit and it won't fit in its stock location with my mounting set up. I know I'm all over the place with what I'm doing and I've got a 1000 excuses for not doing one thing or another. My philosophy with this car has always been to try and keep things simple. Many times it takes a lot of work to make something as simple as possible. I'm just looking for the right/best solution.

[datzenmike]

I think the base of the windshield area is high pressure.

 

Relocate the battery to the trunk and use the right side. It's a high beam unit so not much used anyway. The outer headlamps have both low and high beams. or duct the air up to it from the air dam or below the valance.

[jeffball610]

I think the base of the windshield area is high pressure.

 

Relocate the battery to the trunk and use the right side. It's a high beam unit so not much used anyway. The outer headlamps have both low and high beams. or duct the air up to it from the air dam or below the valance.

I think you're right about pressure.

 

Again, I cannot mount a cooler behind the headlight, as that is where my intake is at on the right side. The left side is occupied by the coolant overflow and is on the opposite side as the oil filter housing. This would not be an easy place to run oil lines.

 

That being said, I'm starting to come around to this idea.

I don't have a front bumper, so it might look odd. I don't think I need one as big as the RX7 unit pictured (pretty sure that's what it is), so it may not look bad with a BRE or similar lip.

[Stoffregen Motorsports]

You don't need a giant cooler, like the one pictured.

 

I had a 510 once that had a cooler diagonally mounted in the passenger side of the engine bay. Just letting the heat radiate from the cooler will help, even without the high air flow.

 

You could always duct it to the fender well by cutting a hole in front of the strut area. Or use an angled scoop fed with frontal air to shoot air up into the area where the cooler is mounted. The ducting in the spook would work great for that.

[jeffball610]

You don't need a giant cooler, like the one pictured.

 

The one pictured is WAY too big, but I like the location and I'm not offended by the look too much. Doing some light digging on Summit Racing came up with a 4"H(2.9"H core with -8AN fittings)x11.5"Wx2" thick unit for only about $40. Even that is big, but the 4G63 can get hot on track.

 

I'm still considering the wheel well area. I can get fresh air to it, and build a "shield" from the tire if needed. I really just need to get under the car and look at things. I'm just curious as to what others are running or have thoughts on.

[datzenmike]

Inside the front fender ahead of the wheel, below the side marker and the front parking light. On my 710 there's an area  or pocket right there below the battery. You would just need to mount it and have louvers to keep crap off of it from the tires. I would imagine this is a pretty drafty place even without ducting. Another is just being outside the engine compartment with it's warmed rad air. The larger the temperature difference between  the cooler and the air the more heat it will exchange.

[jeffball610]

So I finally ordered some parts to do an air cooled oil cooler. However, I'm still lacking in mounting locations. I heavily considered the inner fender area, but I couldn't seem to find an aftermarket oil cooler with the proper dimensions. I'm sure there's an OEM solution, but then I'd have to source special fittings or deal with another issue. I'm still open to that option, but for now, this is what I've got.

 

I ordered 2 affordable coolers from Summit. I'll see if I can return one if I don't use it, or just try and sell it locally. One is a "7 row" and the other is a "10 row". Both are 2" thick with an 11" wide core. The 7 row is about 2" tall and the 10 row is about 3" tall. Both have built in -8AN fittings.

 

I don't have a lot of realestate anywhere. The 10 row is about the same height as the lower grill opening, though the fittings will need some creative routing so I don't have to make any major cuts. That being said, it would be sitting outside of the grill.

 

Another option is to mount it just below the radiator. There is enough room so that the core and most of the fittings are above the radiator core support. However, only about 4 rows get clean air. The rest of the coolers are block by the core support.

 

Some suggested that I mount the cooler parallel to the ground, and that could work, but the lines would need some creative routing. (I think every option will need that)

 

Technically I have room behind the radiator, but that would give it hot air from the radiator and probably would be worthless, if not worse that no cooler. I've looked at vertical mounting in the headlight area, mounting below the radiator core support, in front of the grill... I'm running out of options.

 

My best solution is the hardest solution, and that is to cut the top off of my intercooler (making it shorter) and mount it above that behind the grill. That's a lot of fabrication, but is probably the best option.

 

Before anyone says I need a bigger cooler or anything like that, I don't plan to ever make more than about 300hp with this car. If you can think of any other options or have seen any creative solutions, I'm all ears.

[datzenmike]

My plan is behind the rad. On the highway the rad air will be mostly diluted with outside air, it won't be 185F like the engine. If it's that hot in stop and go traffic then the fans will be on and blowing across it and you're not working the engine anyway. As Stoffregen said, anywhere will radiate heat.

[loungin112]

Get ratty with it...cut some louvers in the hood and mount it to the underside of the hood!  But really, I've been thinking of what to do as I want to go this route one day too.  I was thinking on the passenger fender with a mounting to match the contour of the fender...leaves the possibility of utilizing an electric fan that can switch on with a thermo switch.  A picture of your engine compartment could help think of ideas.