Steve, Try and figure this out!!
My car which is a 36 ford is overheating
To date I have , Changed the termostat twice
Tried a 160&180 ,Put on a waterpump ,Drained the water and tried to burb the radiator,Fluid in radiator is not dirty! Put electric fan closer to the radiator,Also tried it putting a box fan in front of the radiator.
What happens is the gauge keeps on going up as high as 250, never drops below even with the box fan in front of the car.I called VDO and I found that I wasn't supposed to use tape on threads to seal, drained rad. again and cleaned it off still the same problem.
I did change the grille and used a 40 LaSalle this could be it but i nixed that when i used the box fan.
I"m stumped got any ideas.
The hood is louvered on top.
To date I have done 3 things
Thermostat, waterpump,new electric fan, and grille
WHAT"S UP "WHEELS"
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I'am interested in the Early 40s style
look !

Wheels, try putting a solid hood on it and see if it still gets warm. A few years back before my uncle passed away I noticed when he put the solid stock hood on his 39 Chevy 2 door sedan w/327/350 setup the temp dropped 10-15 degrees, as soon as the louvered hood went back on it jumped back up 10-15 degrees if not more. The hood may be a good part of your troubles. What radiator do you got in it? Everyone around here myself included runs Griffin. You can get a Griffin Radiator a good bit cheaper through Southern Street Rods.

Slammin
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Hold your ears folks...ITS SHOWTIME!!!

Slammin, I started out with a louvered hood with a panel under it so no water could get . the other day i took the panel off No Difference.
WHEELS
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I'am interested in the Early 40s style
look !

Where are you reading the temperature?~~Head or the intake manifold??What kind fo radiator do you use,ie..How many cores and how big is it overall??
How big is the fan or fans and what is the cfm rating??Do you run a fan shroud??.....Ray
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Grump

I found Steve Jack's article on this very helpful. My car kept boiling over so I went to an 18psi cap. The water stats in the radiator now. Set the timing correctly. This alone lowered the temp 30 degrees. I took the side curtains off,didn't change the engine temperature, but it was a lot cooler inside the car.
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Mike J

Grump, I"m using a Walker that came in the car when i got it. The Sender is in the manifold!!The radiator is 3 inches wide.I"m not able to put a manual fan on the car!I talked to the walker guy at York and he said with an electric fan as a pusher. he said you can't use a fan shroud it will not work!!!
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I'am interested in the Early 40s style
look !

Do you have room for the electric fan behind the rad? That's where a shroud is helpful. Also, is the timing set correctly? Steve's article is really helpful, check it out if you can, it's on the article tab at the top of this page.

Bob

Mr. I have just enough room to change a belt if i have to on the road! Timing was set by a friend! He set it at 10 degrees and 36 full advance! "WHEELS"
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I'am interested in the Early 40s style
look !

Hey Wheels I was reading your letter 6/15 , Noticed that you never said that you rod puked water or not, although you did say your gauge read 250 at times! Just trying too figure out if it is electrical or water temp?
Wheels have you had this motor in your car for a while, or is it new? And if it is new, are you sure it has the correct head gaskets on the motor?
If the head gaskets are correct, is the sender the correct one? Some senders have different resistance. (I made that mistake once, I had a pile of them in the tool box, I grabbed the wrong one!)
Divco13 (Bob)

Divvie, It doesn"t puke but it is hot! New water pump!Motor is 327 and has been in for 15 years.
Sender came with the new gauges I bought last year!I think i might have found it today but haven't tried anything yet! I think the electric fan in front of the radiator and the smaller 40 LaSalle grille might be the problem! I put a box fan in front of the grille and i can't feel the air coming through it only at the bottom where the fan is not blocking it !Theres only 2 fixes either i have to use a smaller radiator or I have to move firewall back and move the engine back to get a manual fan and shroud on it! let you know when i try either out!

Thanks for all the help! "WHEELS"
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I'am interested in the Early 40s style
look !

Hi,

I've played this game with my blower motor in my 50 chevy and found the following:

1. Temp was reduced some by installing a 180 degree High flow thermostat.

2. Temp was further reduced by installing a flow cooler water pump. Care should be taken when going to higher flow pumps because you can get a pump that flows too much water and the water won't be in the radiator long enough to transfer heat!

3. A trick I used on my water pump was to tap the by-pass hole on the water pump and installing a threaded plug. I then redrilled the hole to 1/8" instead of the 1/4" hole. This causes more water to circulate through the cooling system to transfer heat.

4. Due to a lack of room I too was stuck with an electric fan as my only option. I only had room for a pusher fan "in front of radiator" so I went with a Scott's Manufacturing Swirl fan. This fan was custom made with as large as possible motor and swirl blade fan. I think it's in the 2400 cfm range.

5. I also noted air escaping around my radiator "above and below so I made sure to have the lower gravel pan installed and made up a tighter seal for the top cover so air really passed through the radiator. I think this might have been part of the problem with the louvered hood example noted in earlier posts.

6. I also reduced the temps more by adding a product called wetter water or water wetter. It's basically an anit foam agent which works by eliminating foam which reduces the water contact on the radiator cores to transfer heat. It actually did reduce the temp about 8 degrees.

7. Those flex hoses restrict flow and create air pockets which reduce the water heat transfer. Try to only use smooth hoses.

8. Try running your vac advance off of manifold vac to see if it helps reduce the temperature.
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Joe Garcia
http://50chevy.freeservers.com/

Sorry it took me so long to respond Wheels1950, but have been missing in action. Sounds like a few of the other guys here have given you some good advice and asked pertinent questions.

First, the changing of thermostats will not change any temperature your engine is running beyond the rating. In other words, if your engine was running at 200 and you had a 200 thermostat, then it is obvious that if you put in a 160 the temp would go down to 160 if the rest of the system was correctly designed. If you engine continues to operate at over the rating then it won't make any difference.

One of the missing elements here is does this overheat at idle, cruising, highway or all three. This tells me loads about what is going on. If highway driving is okay...then it's a simple problem of getting air to flow over the radiator whilest at low speeds and idle. If it is hot at highway speeds, in my experience 95% of all the cases, you are too lean unless you have a blocked radiator or airflow in front.

Are you running vacuum advance at all? The static timing of 10 and 36 (36 is a tad too much by the way....I would limit it to 32 depending on specs..but it's not what is hurting you) is okay for starters. Full time vacuum advance is a great help to running cool at low and idle speeds. If you do not have a vacuum advance, I would bump the static to 14 and limit the top end to 32,or go and get a vacuum advance kit/distributor.

You say you have a new water pump, but in todays street rods, esp the narrow-nosed cars, a high flow and pressure one is what you need to carry BTUs away. I noticed that one of the posts (no offense meant here....just restating the facts of themodynamics) restated the myth that it's possible to get to much water too fast thru the radiator and that is detrimental to cooling when in fact that's what you want. The more, the faster the better, the more BTUs are removed. Your cooling system is a closed system so the longer it stays in the radiator the longer it stays in the heat source as well. The water stays in the engine long enough to get to the point where it is so inefficient at carrying BTUs away that hot spots begin and the first domino in a long chain has been pushed over. Moral to the story.....use high flow pumps on your engines, along with themostats designed for such and high pressure caps. This will do wonders for your flow in your engine. I do agree with the posters comments about water wetter. It is a surfactant that reduces air entrapment and decreased the likelyhood of hotspots. If hotspots never occcur....then the coolant will stay in the system. Also, reduce your anti-freeze content to 25%. Anti-freeze actually inhibits the ability of water to carry heat, but provides for other things. Pure water is the best carrier of heat, but you have to design your system to never see the vapor corrected boiling point.

What pulleys are you running? Are the crank pulley and water pump pulley a one to one ratio or are they underdrive where the crank pulley is smaller than the water pump pulley. This was a very common thing to have happen with many an engine/car builder to put "underdrive" pulleys on when in fact on the street you absolutely need "overdrive" pulley systems. Check that out...it could be adding to the fray of the cooling issues here.

Are you sure the temp gauge is correct. I have seen these be off substantially and I test ALL of mine before putting them in. By using an external 12 volt source I boil water on the stove and hook the sensor up and emerse it in the boiling water hooked up to the meter. I do enough of these to have my own test fixture......but boiling water will show a 212 degree starting point on the meter. I find 1 of 5 meters to be off! So...that may be an issue as well.

In-so-far as the fan issue goes, I don't know how much room you have for an electric fan pusher. Go with either a Derale or Spal pusher the largest that you can get into the space. I really don't think the grill is the issue unless you are having problems at highway speeds. Pushers only degradate the airflow about 10% as opposed to the pulling mode.

Last but not least......an aluminum radiator would be my last ploy here. Most of the applicable designs of al vs cu have a 30% increase in cooling capacity....

Steve Jack
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Steve Jack
SOUTHEASTERN GOODGUYS REP

Steve, now I'm a bit confused about one of your comments concerning the water flow thru a radiator. In this case, you stated that the more flow the better.(hi flow pump and thermostat). In the flat head days, if the thermostat was removed from both sides, the engine would overheat.Ostensibly from the water flowing thru the radiator fast enough that the heat could not be dissapated fast enough. Hence, many companies selling restricters of various sizes (different hole sized washers lol). Was this an old wives tale or are we talking about apples and oranges?
Fred P

cooling triumphs over all
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Fred P.

FredP.....This is where the myth probably started for most. I have heard this a million times esp the circle track community and racing in general. It's about understanding what is going on even though the outcome may seem pertinent to the situation and that is, a cooler engine.

First, the radiator is a heat transfering beast that always outstrips the engines ability to move/remove pure BTUs ( this can go both ways by the way). I mean alot. Depending on radiator design and materials, it just sucks BTUs away because of the relatively massive surface areas and/or design, which in turn is tremendously cooler (depending on ambient temperatures) than that of the engines internal surface area. The result is devastating to heat assuming that you have adequate heat transfer capabilities to pull the BTUs away from the radiator (CfMs through the radiator).

A radiator is a closed loop system which means that the water in a large heat sink has the ability to cool faster than the water is being produced in an engine. The result is that the more flow through the large heatsink, the better and eventually the larger BTU mover will always win out and reduce the coolant temperatures to a temperature that is lower than the engines output (significantly so) and higher than the air temperature that is actually removing the BTUs from the radiator. Water has this property to absorb BTUs/unit faster as the temperature goes away from it's corrected vapor point. What this means is that as water/coolant closes in on it's corrected vapor point, it progressively slows at this heat absorbtion process. So, in essence, it is in the best interest of your engine to have the coolant inlet temps to be as low on average that you can achieve and as fast as possible...volume is the real deal here. Since the hotter the coolant the slower the absorbtion, and in a closed system the water that would be held in a radiator would also be held conversely in an engine, and the result is that the engine would not have as many BTUs removed the next cycle and eventually out of control to the extent of hot spots and coolant push out! Usually, when one talks of removing the themostat and adding restrictors, it's because of the next item that it works.

In the case of the flatheads I know exactly what is going on. Actually, the rate of flow had little to do with the cooling in this case because of the severe loss of carrying the heat to the radiator. The water from the engine to the radiator is coming thru the hoses without the themostat installed in a laminar flow attitude. What I mean is that the water is not in turbulance and the outside of the water stream is removing BTUs but the inside is not turning over and therefor carrying very little BTUS. This makes the system very inefficient. Only the outside is utilized. You can experience this yourself when jumping in a lake or the ocean and having the uppermost layer of water that is warm and the deeper part cool at you feet or as you descind or maybe that hot spot in the bath water running the hot water into the tub even though the other parts of the tub are okay! This is what goes on here....the water just flows laminarly (not mixed thoroughly)and only a small percentage of the capacity is used. If you put a thermostat back in or in this case restrictors, it creates a damming/venturi effect which introduces churn and turbulance to the stream and makes the entire coolant capacity utilized. If you think of every molecule of water as a heat bucket it kinda helps. The buckets on the outside in laminar flow get filled with heat, with the inside nearly empty or at least just picking up what it is getting from the next molecule. It's just as important in a engine block or a radiator to have non-laminar flow and lots of turbulance for the maximum heat carrying capacity of the coolant. I have even welded in weld fins in some of the internal water jackets of 400 small blocks to help the water turn over in the block. It helps. Regardless of the introduced turbulance the high performance pumps keep the pressure and volume up for a great job!

I hope this will shed some light onto the subject that is near and dear to my heart. There is more information about this very subject on www.stewartcomponents.com and I forget which section, but click on tech for a start.

Steve Jack

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Steve Jack
SOUTHEASTERN GOODGUYS REP