Thread: 300Tdi radiator, rod original one or new aluminium/plastic one

That wider radiator is the one i have

ok, I was a little confused (what a suprise) I thought the allisport was 70mm THICK and FULL width. It seems that their "bigger/bigest" radiator is only 70mm wider than stock, not sure of thickness. It has to be used in conjunction with their/or other brand front mount intercooler. On their ebay site, it clearly states that the front mount intercooler can NOT be used on vehicles fitted with A/C.

Now I know anything is possible with a little fab work, but I cant push anything forward due to my winch.....

Originally Posted by uninformed

ok, I was a little confused (what a suprise) I thought the allisport was 70mm THICK and FULL width. It seems that their "bigger/bigest" radiator is only 70mm wider than stock, not sure of thickness. It has to be used in conjunction with their/or other brand front mount intercooler. On their ebay site, it clearly states that the front mount intercooler can NOT be used on vehicles fitted with A/C.

Now I know anything is possible with a little fab work, but I cant push anything forward due to my winch.....

I thought that at first too, but have a look at where the inlet/outlets are.

Recore specs and $ with a HD Redback core.

3 rows, but 5/8"-16mm wide tubes which are much wider than standard ones. It's claimed the core is equivalent thickness to a standard 5/6 row.
I think the tubes are dimpled to create turbulence and increase heat transfer.
Better rad cooling should also improve oil cooling with the standard oil cooler.

Tubes 8mm apart.

Pitch 11FPI (standard pitch is 13FPI. IMO lower pitch = less crap getting caught, and possibly better air flow/cooling.
Better airflow, more cooling goes against theory as we are reducing surface area but when engineering the Perentie it was found that radiators with lower pitch finning cooled better, higher pitch radiators lead to overheating. According to the engineers they thought air was packing up in front with more fins, IMO it was an engine bay air pressure issue, but I digress....)

Divider plate bleed reduced to 1/8".

all up cost, $500.

Sheesh, I thought I wasn't going to spend any money on a good for nothing Tdi except bare bones maintenance. I'd rather tip money into a ball tearing 4BD1T or TD5, but I'm telling myself to look at it as insurance.

What purpose does the hole in the divider plate serve ?, and why so big ?

I've seen mention of a 'tropical mod' in several posts but can't find documentation which may explain what it's all about.

I bought this (hole in divider plate) up with my local radiator man when I took my D1 300 Tdi radiator down for rodding/testing. His view was that it was a 'bloody stupid idea' and he could see no good reason for it, in fact he reckons that all it does is make the cooling system less efficient.
He also noted that this was a quirk of Land Rover and not common of cross flow type radiators.

He also said that to reduce the hole size the tank with the divider plate had to come off and due to the method of its construction and the heat required to separate them it would result in damage to the core header plate, ie. a recore would be required, so really not a good idea unless I wanted to trash my good core.

Any thoughts

Deano

Dean, the hole is to stop an air lock, but as you said, no one else seems to bother and the size is ridiculous.

The supposed 'tropical' mod is to just block it and that's all I'd do, although as I mentioned above my rad bloke wants to still use a 1/8" hole as a bleed.

I've used split cross flow rads before on race cars and we only had an external bleed at the top of the tank as the rads were below engine head height, we never had a bleed in the divider (that I'm aware of)

Originally Posted by rick130

all up cost, $500.

Sheesh, I thought I wasn't going to spend any money on a good for nothing Tdi except bare bones maintenance. I'd rather tip money into a ball tearing 4BD1T or TD5, but I'm telling myself to look at it as insurance.

Haha, I'm certainly not spending any money on a good for nothing Tdi, but my Disco is a pig these days, not a DD. I ended up ordering a new plastic/aluminium one last night ex UK, I can't see anyone rodding out my current one for any less dollars. I'll keep the old one in the shed if/when I need to revisit that option.

Tank removal, rodding, pressure testing and re-painting cost me $120 (incl. GST), which I reckon isn't too bad.

Deano