Radiators
The cars > Developments and changes
Cooling Pack, Radiators
Keeping the engine at suitable and "comfortable" temperatures has increasingly been a bit of a concern especially as we have fitted a bigger and more powerful engine. We have been running a standard Land Rover TDI radiator from the first build of the car, Initially a 200 TDI With the ports on opposite sides and later the 300 TDI with the ports (top & bottom) on the same side. The change to the latter arrangement came as the result of some advice that this has a better cooling effect, and it did help. When the most recent engine change was carried out we fitted an electric water pump and again this does help control the basic temps.
Unfortunately under extreme conditions, hot weather and long hard climbs the alarms have been going off and while so far the engine temps have been "controlled" to the upper level of acceptable it has become a concern that continually running the engine at these temps will not do the expensive investment any favours.
The solution;
A bespoke radiator from Allisport.
We dropped in to their facilities in Herefordshire, on the way to the Kielder BXCC event and spoke to the team. The car was measured up and a new bespoke radiator loosely based on their XL300TDI format has been built.
For various reasons, not least I enjoy the challenge, I ordered the radiator without the fan cowling although it does have the threaded mounting points for this.
So I needed to construct a suitable fan cowling that both fits the radiator and supports and fits the electric fan assembly.
The results (after multiple attempt are below. the fan Diameter is very close to the height of the radiator so making this cowling fit snugly around the rad and still able to support the fan was a bit of a challenge.
I ended up making the cowling in two layers of Aluminium sheet.
- To provide a good tight fit around the radiator to maximise the effect of the fan when running
- To provide a robust and rigid support structure, to minimise any unwanted movement etc. of the fan assembly.
The fan cowling at the top is the original from the standard LR 300TDI radiator the one on the bottom is the new one made up to work with the Allisport radiator, it shows the size difference between the two radiators quite clearly