Thread: Puma Radiator Options

Originally Posted by redrovertdi

This may be relevent or not to some being as 110 300tdi with full front intercooler[allards] and larger radiator[allisport] and auto transmission cooler inbetween, i run twin thermo VT coomodore fans with a thermo switch and a manual over ride switch on my dash, my biggest cooling problem was my KBX grill- i eventually cut all the cross bars out of it so it is now a frame with mesh, i also run spot lights a warn winch with out the solinoid box above blocking air, when climbing a big hill with a heavy work trailer i flick on the fans and it keeps me under 100c, i have 2 temp guages[vdo] one in the original and one in the head. The commodore fans pull much more air than the rubbishy pwr aftermarket fans ive tried[built for Australian conditions and approx $50 at a wreckers].

I am sure that this would work well at slow speeds but would the fans make a huge difference at 100k/h??

Originally Posted by chook73

I am sure that this would work well at slow speeds but would the fans make a huge difference at 100k/h??

Towing a heavy trailer today the fans come on at 100kph on the bruce highway[i have a light above my over ride switch that comes on with the fans automatically or when i manually turn them on-so i know if/when they are working], the fans are set to come on at approx 92deg cel, they then pull the temp needle[sender near thermostat] back down to 80dc[82 degree thermostat] before cutting out so i would say they do work at highway speeds when towing, however they rarely come on when im not towing a trailer at 100-120ks,

Originally Posted by redrovertdi

Towing a heavy trailer today the fans come on at 100kph on the bruce highway[i have a light above my over ride switch that comes on with the fans automatically or when i manually turn them on-so i know if/when they are working], the fans are set to come on at approx 92deg cel, they then pull the temp needle[sender near thermostat] back down to 80dc[82 degree thermostat] before cutting out so i would say they do work at highway speeds when towing, however they rarely come on when im not towing a trailer at 100-120ks,

Impressive, I would love to see a photo of them if its not too much problem....

This is a vt commodore fan set up that cost $50 at a wreckers, i had to trim the fan shroud to fit but it drops in the genuine land rover shroud clips on the bottom of the radiator frame, also note that i have the 65mm wider allisport radiator behind the full front allard intercooler, some people say that you can fit twin ea falcon fans but it just wouldnt fit in my car, these fans have been in this 110 for over 2 years with out any problems and they replaced a vs commodore single fan that i had behind the standard radiator intercooler

Originally Posted by redrovertdi

This is a vt commodore fan set up that cost $50 at a wreckers, i had to trim the fan shroud to fit but it drops in the genuine land rover shroud clips on the bottom of the radiator frame, also note that i have the 65mm wider allisport radiator behind the full front allard intercooler, some people say that you can fit twin ea falcon fans but it just wouldnt fit in my car, these fans have been in this 110 for over 2 years with out any problems and they replaced a vs commodore single fan that i had behind the standard radiator intercooler

Thanks for this, sorry I missed it I must have been busy. Shouldn't be too hard to do that on a Puma I wonder how much difference it would make over the stock Puma fan

Hi Iain, before we left on our trip, I pored in a bottle of "Redline Water Wetter". for $25 I did not expect it to make a difference, but I think it has. On our last trip I would have to slow down to 80-90kph if we had a headwind as the temperature on the Scangauge would creep up to 115 deg then the engine would shut down. So far on this trip we have not had that happened at all, and the highest temp that I can remember seeing on the Scangauge was 108 deg and that was in the desert out near Coober Pedy when we were driving at 80kph into a 40-50kph headwind, climbing a bit of a rise. The air intake temp showing 53 degrees.

I also rigged the scan gauge to show fuel consumption, and into strong headwind on the last part of the Anne Beadell after the Dog Fence, we decided we just wanted to get to Coober Pedy, and we had enough fuel so I put my foot down, and even running 15 PSI/25 PSi in the tyres, and into headwind, fuel consumption went up to 19-20lt per 100km (we ran like this for the last 60km), engine temperature was around 103 degrees and air intake around 35 degrees. Normal is around 12-15lt. That means we are pouring in 25% more fuel, and still not having a problem,

Might be worth a try for the money.

Cool runnings,
Iain

I had a thought the other day. The viscous fan hub on the PUMA is the same as the TD5. But It's located about 12 inches further back from the radiator. I reckon this causes the viscous fan to perhaps experience different temperatures to the TD5, which might mean it's not locking up at the right radiator temp, perhaps a few degrees too hot, which makes the rest of the system marginal. So I looked into what can be done to adjust the viscous fan hub to make it lock up at a slightly lower temp, and I found this

Paul’s esoteric meanderings » Blog Archive » Tuning and Understanding your Toyota Viscous Fan Clutch

Yes it's for a Toyota, but these viscous couplings are all pretty similar. I wonder if by following this guide it's possible to have the viscous coupling lock up a little lower, and that might reduce the engine max temp considerably.

Production tolerances in the viscous coupling might explain why one PUMA overheats and another does not, and why some are sensitive to driving lights reducing ram airflow.

Anyway something to experiment with. The silicon oil they mention is avail on ebay, used for shock absorbers for RC cars, for not much more than $20.

Originally Posted by Iain_B

Hi Iain, before we left on our trip, I pored in a bottle of "Redline Water Wetter". for $25 I did not expect it to make a difference, but I think it has. On our last trip I would have to slow down to 80-90kph if we had a headwind as the temperature on the Scangauge would creep up to 115 deg then the engine would shut down. So far on this trip we have not had that happened at all, and the highest temp that I can remember seeing on the Scangauge was 108 deg and that was in the desert out near Coober Pedy when we were driving at 80kph into a 40-50kph headwind, climbing a bit of a rise. The air intake temp showing 53 degrees.

I also rigged the scan gauge to show fuel consumption, and into strong headwind on the last part of the Anne Beadell after the Dog Fence, we decided we just wanted to get to Coober Pedy, and we had enough fuel so I put my foot down, and even running 15 PSI/25 PSi in the tyres, and into headwind, fuel consumption went up to 19-20lt per 100km (we ran like this for the last 60km), engine temperature was around 103 degrees and air intake around 35 degrees. Normal is around 12-15lt. That means we are pouring in 25% more fuel, and still not having a problem,

Might be worth a try for the money.

Cool runnings,
Iain

Thanks for this iain. Just wondering where you pick this up from, I tried repco and super cheap this morning.

Also I assume that it's ok with the standard coolant?