Message to COKEADDICT

Hi Roachie
I am intrigued, I own a GU 2002TD and as you can see from the photo it is heavily laden all the time weighing in at 3.75 tonnes and we use it to tour with and also offroad and the temperature gauge never moves off 40% up the dial and that included doing the Kimberley's with airconditioning on and it has reasonable large driving lights in front of the radiator. We had vehicles in our 4WD club with overheating problems and they flushed the radiators to no avail. After removing the radiators and cleaning the mud, insects and leaves mainly from the bottom 30% of the radiator the problem went away. May be worth the check, blowing or washing out with the radiator still in the vehicle did not help as this area is fairly hard to get at.
Raywanderin' in retirement. victor 2010

Yes I am surprised too, as my 98 ST GU TD Patrol @190,000ks still runs in all conditions just under half way on the temp gauge in 44C with air on and towing an off road camper trailer.
The only exception was on a recent trip over East at Lamington NP ,Jenolan Caves and Kosiosco NP where it ran above the half way mark due to the bloody steep hills/mountains, high revs-low gear, hot weather and the trailer with a heavy load. I'm thinking the tempory shade cloth I tied on the radiator grill to stop insects gumming up the radiator was not a good idea as it restricted the air flow. The radiator never boiled and once on the top of the hill and on the down hill the temp gauge always dropped back to normal very quickly.
I'm curious as to the life expectancy of these new aluminum radiator cores.
Any one out there know??

Hi Roachie,
Thanks for the note mate. Well I am not farmiliar with the GU setup but the same plastic plate you refer to is metal on GQ's, Well Just an update if you read about my attempts to find the heating problems in GQ's....I am oNLy refering to my GQ ok as i cant speak for other cars as everyone does different things.
But i have found some very interesting things indeed. I have NOT installed the oil cooler yet, I am very involved in finding a cure for overheating first before just ADDING things on. Starting off with dasics rather than spending dollars.

I must point out that my GQ has a 4 core radiator fitted.

First thing i did was pull out radiator and give it a good pressure clean, Also cleaned condenser while i was there, Pressure flushed cooling system and got some coolant. I replaced bottom hose with one with an internal spring as it felt a bit too soft for my liking. With all the basics done, We noticed a definate drop in general driving around temperatures ( thats heading down to Bulli).

I have run many proper tests as far as temperature goes while fully loaded and on roads of all kind of terrain, But most tests have been done on hot days. I "borrowed" a Temperature unit which had hoses and stuff running outside the body , taped to it to stop flapping...anyway i think you know what i mean. Well this thing was amazing.

SO here is what i have done so far, mind you...I am not in the "modifying " stage as i want to see any differences in temp while removing things off the car.

I found that :
by removing the Nissan Nudge bar with the 2 IPF's, temp dropped by 3 degrees (doing the same hill repeatedly) I am refering to bulli pass as its quite a test for the old girl.
The NISSAN badge sitting in the middle of the grill also restricted air flow, not much, but im trying to get this thing as cool as i can.
My next step was to remove the grill totally off the front of the car, by doing this, temp went up 2%, I thought it would drop but i now know that the actual ribs between the grill housing really work air flow towards the center of radiator. Very similar to that of a planes wing, but on a much smaller scale.

That ended the day, headed home and had more ideas already planned, I have since made up a cowl that bolts down to the car panel at front of radiator, this cover comes out moulded to the demensions of the ctr grill frame where the ribs are. It acts like a funnel, once the air hits the grill ribs, it cannot escape, so it has to pass through the radiator, We went back down to Bulli to give it 3 runs, the difference was amazing, Different day yes, but still a hot one. Anyway temp dropped by 6 degrees. Now from the Bulli climbs ive done before even thinking of these changes to the last day there, my gauge has dropped from just over 3/4 to just on 1/2.

My next try will involve adding angled fins to this cover i made up, Hoping it will swirl the air kinda like a donaldson pre filter setup. I beileve (yet to prove) that if i can get the air to swirl while under pressure it should pump more air through.

For those of you that dont understand what im trying to say here...its just like filling a bottle up with water, tuning it upside down and watching the water spill out, the air comming back in to the bottle causes the outgoing water to slow down. BUT if u were to make that water inside the bottle swirl as it comes out, you will find that it comes out much quicker and thus allowing more volume to pass in a shorter time.

Now guys, please dont dig into me on this ok, i am no scientist, its just trial and error stuff i am playing with, but so far, I have dropped the temp on my GQ to the point that i am no longer affraid of overheating. This is all taking a long time to get through and the cost of fuel etc is fairly high plus ware and tear on both me and car. But if I can do this without buying a 1200 dollar radiator and stuff, then why not if it can help others out there, I dont mind at all.

Just remember...this is MY car im refering to, I cant speak for others or what reaction they would have from this, but i drive MY car and thats all that matters to me.
I will let you know how stage 2 goes when i get round to doing it.
Regards AngeloI love it when you talk DIRTY !

Roachie,
If you dont mind, I would be very interested in the artical. Especially the bonnet scoop, as this was one more thing i was going to try down the track, but i was considering placing it on the passengers side of bonnet at rear, just above the turbo exhaust manifold with an extended piece inside the bonnet running the air around the turbo head. But again..its only on paper at the moment.

I love it when you talk DIRTY !

Hi Mark, Thanks for you support. AS i said, I am no scientist, it was just an idea but your input was great. As i have already made the swirly bits, I will try them out soon and see if there is any difference climbing Buli pass. Worst thing is either no change OR worse. But now that you mentioned the fact that the Donaldson centrifcally tosses the dirt out to be collected by the bowl, It made me think of something else. ...Ill get back to you shortly...lolI love it when you talk DIRTY !

Geez guys ... I'm impressed.

All this science from a bunch of blokes I figured were smarter than a 2 bob watch ... what can I say??

Just thought I'd add my two pennies worth.

Don't get me wrong here ... only constructive input.

1. Hot water rises, or more correctly is forced up by the more dense colder water.
Accordingly the top radiator hose is usually the first to show signs of deterioration due to age/heat.

2. With regard to the swirling bit. So called laminar flow through a tube/pipe is the most efficient, where the pipe is flowing full of smooth water. The only restriction is friction against the wall of the pipe which is usually derived from a formula by a bloke by the name of Manning. Hence Manning's formula is used to establish the rate of flow through a pipe. Believe me he was ONE CLEVER DICK !!!!
Anyway ........ turbulence restricts flow.

More later ... depending on responses .............. ;-D

Cheers
Fidei defensor

Rosco

Ross,
I will let you in on a huge Italian secret old mate, What you read was correct as far as MANY Italian "studs" are concerned. Just look at Silvester Stallone.."the Italian Stallion" as he is known, Fact is they should have nicked named him "Jelly Bean", Especially after what some women have said about his enormous ego.

Thank god i was born here !!!!!I love it when you talk DIRTY !

Roachie.

The future looks bright is this thread is any gauge of ozi ingenuity.

A thought on your air flow problem. It is posible to increase the airflow to much. Too higher velocity will reduce the cooling effect of the radiator.
As previously mentioned, laminar flow is the way to go.
MTBW.
PS. I notice no number 8 fencing wire has been used yet :-)

All the best and keep us all posted.This 4WD stuff is addictive,
time consuming & expensive.

My only comment re: the swirling air discussion is that you have to consider the difference between a system where air/water is passing through an aperture (ie the radiator) and a situation where the air/water is exiting a container through an apeture (ie water out of a bottle). In the latter case you have to have water out and air in regardless, the swirl makes this work better becasue it creates a tunnel for the air. The better anology for your rad would be a hose, where the water enters one end and exits the other and nothing comes the other way, in which case a swirl doesn't help. Just food for though.

Re: the bonnet scoops, and interesting GQ is here discussed here: http://www.ebroadcast.com.au/ecars/News/1998/981111.Patrol.html this thing is getting 185kW out of a TD42 and notes:

"The addition of bonnet grills was necessary so as to reduce under bonnet temperatures. The temperatures where reaching such levels that the vent air for the cabin was being preheated to very high temperatures and also resulted in extensive heating of the fire wall. After fitting the grills the under bonnet temperatures have fallen drastically and has also assisted in increasing air flow through the engine bay and cooling system."

He has an image of the vents he used. Has them on both side of the bonnet and are an actual vent rather than a scoop.

Again, just food for thought.

Personally I haventt got to concerned about the heat issue. I hit about 2/3 at most on climbs but never more and it never overheats - just gets hotter under load. I just had my cooling system flushed at the last service and it was apparently full of crap so it will be interesting to see how it goes on the next big hill. I also plan on pulling out the rad and giving it a good clean as this seems likely to help, especially after the mud I sprayed over the thing a few weeks back!

Cheers.

Noting that 99% of GQs with overheating issues have Turbos, and many of them have the Denco system, which I think is the main problem.

the location of the Turbo, the angles of the pipes coming out of it, etc....

The things rarely overheat prior to the snail going on....