engine cooling
 

I am thinking about putting a turbo on my '95 miata...I am concerned about cooling.

I am considering a FM kit...Is there a kit that is best for cooling?

I should have mentioned that I only use the car on the track

Also many people at the track told me that if I go with the turbo, I will have nothing but problems? has this been the general concensus?

Does the 949 racing coolant re-route help the issue?

You don't have to write a new post...you can just edit the original post.

Good luck with the onslaught.

WOW. 5 posts by YOU. I am gonna tell you this...
My car has a T25 non journal bearing turbo and dyno'd at a mere 210whp at 12psi. I never have any kind of issue with it running hot. The factory temp gauge has always shown the same reading as it has when the car was stock.
So I answered your question by transferring my experience, now as soon as hustler reads this, get ready to get bent over and railed. You should prepare to read a response like, "shoot yourself in the head with a staple gun and then use the search feature, and then when you're done searching, eat my shit and my dog's shits."

Won't help increased oil temps too much but you can always just run no thermostat in the summer/when you track it...

:facepalm:Holy shit, don't ever do that w/ a Miata. Great way to overheat the back of the motor and blow a head gasket.

Need more details.

6-12 psi is probably fine in Alaska.

6 PSI in TX or the Southwest in the summer with AC doing 20 minute track sessions is a different monster.

Post an introduction thread in the Meat N' Greet and put your location in your profile.

Chris

I've run a gutted thermostat in several track only cars including spec and turbo miatas and it seems to work well.

Well, I can tell you that this will cause the exact opposite effect as the coolant re-route as you are dropping the flow resistance in the front of the motor and therefore reducing flow to the rear.

Your theory may be solid, in practice for me it has always given a signifigant overall drop in water temps. I've yet to lose a head gasket or had a problem with the number 4 cylinder. Your results may vary.

All I can say is that in my early Miata days, I was having problems w/ my thermostat on a long ass drive. I pulled my thermostat, and blew my head gasket a month later. Maybe the head gasket was on its way out though, always assumed that the missing 'stat did it.

Gutted thermostat :ne: missing thermostat.

A gutted thermostat maintains some of the flow restriction necessary for proper cooling.

I'm not saying to remove it entirely, just cut the ears of the sprung section out and put it back it so that it's effectively always open.




Removing it completely may not be a good idea because the system likely requires some amount of restriction.

Thanks for all the replies. I run my car on track days...not full out racing. I live in south Florida, so the ambient temps can get well into the 90's.

I saw a post from someone in TX with sim. weather. I really enjoy the car and the handling....I just would like some more power because It sucks to catch up in the corners to just have the car in front of you pull away in the next straight.

I heard the turbos work awesome in the street but not during 1/2 hour sessions at the track.

Is there a magic number for boost that helps control eng. temp. I think I would be happy with about 160 whp. My car only weights 1,973 lbs

You can make that much naturally aspirated and still be fairly streetable. PM a guy named EMILIO here and ask him about his naturally aspirated setup on the OGK car.

Any 1.8 block and hi-comp pistons.
'99-'00 head with a little work, oversized valves, and hi-rpm valvetrain.
Aftermarket cams and adj cam-gears.
Header+exhaust+CAI.
Any full funtion piggy or standalone.
Obviously no AC/PS/EGR, plus hi-octane and a shit-ton of timing... that oughta do it.

you're a tard.


You need an oil cooler too.

I dont know what is more of an epic fail, this^, or the OP...

I'm sorry, but do you even know what a turbo is or how it works? Power is power. A turbo isn't going to function any different in 1/2 hour on the track, or 1/2 hour on the street - it will be the same. It makes power, regardless of where you drive your car. Whether you can handle that power on a track comes down to your driving competence and how the rest of your car is set up.

Please do some reading.

and kill yourself because you're a virgin, and always will be. Trucker glory holes don't count.

52mm Radiator = most of your S.FL cooling issues solved.
Mishimoto Performance Radiator - 89-97 Mazda Miata, Manual - Turbochargers.com

http://www.turbochargers.com/store/i...RAD-MIA-90.jpg

My car was overheating in Tampa in the summer at the autocrosses. It would also overheat when parked in a sweltering parking lot with the A/C on for more than 20 minutes. I know that doubling the radiator capacity has solved my problem, and I like my Mishimoto's looks as well. Good luck.

^+1 on Mishimoto, a bunch of my drifter friends run them with no problems (and they beat their cars to hell).

the old "coolradiator.com" and "radiator barn" radiators seem to be the best around this side of Ron Davis and CRR money, but they're out of business. I was at the track at 90* in Texas with roughly 300whp and only needed the fans after a few laps in, with shitty ducting they kept blowing out on the bottom so I really had no ducting. Below 90* and I never needed the fans on. I also need to improve my ducting.

If I had to do it again I'd buy a sprint car radiator and fab up mounts...or just go with a Ron Davis..

With CSF out of business (coolradiator/radiator barn), the only rad I'd recommend for a turbo car would be a 55mm Koyo, or something custom and larger.

I'm sorry, but do you even know what a 1/2 hour on track is like? While a turbo may make the same power a 1/2 on track as it does while doing a 1/2 hour on the street, the engine will not. Please tell me where you live, so that I can drive a 1/2 hour on the street like I do on track. I have never driven for a 1/2 hour, where 90% of that 1/2 hour I am at full throttle, dropping down to second, then going full throttle through 5th gear on the street!

Thank you!!!! MX5RACER......There is no comparison between driving on the track and driving on the street. There have been many replies from people who are not posers and actually use there cars on the track or just know the difference.

I appreciate all the other good advice about the larger radiators and the thermostat mods. I will do some more searching within the forum for sim. topics.

Ok so this is what I was originally quoting:

I heard the turbos work awesome in the street but not during 1/2 hour sessions at the track.

- I stand by my statement. A turbo functions EXACTLY the same if its driven on the street or on a track. You are driving the car harder on the track, and you might have overheating issues if not set up properly, but the TURBO DOES NOT FUNCTION ANY DIFFERENT IF IT IS BEING USED ON THE TRACK OR A STREET. It's not like it suddenly makes less power because it's on a closed track then a highway... unless your heatsoaking your intercooler and your engine management is taking timing out... but the turbo is still spinning, oil coming in, oil going out... As I read the original post, I figured the OP was very confused about turbo's in general, and I know several people (including some on this forum), who use a turbo miata on a track for a half hour.

Well thank you for addressing the fact that you semi-blasted the OP without really knowing what they were asking. I understand that it gets frustrating dealing with newbs who just post, instead of searching, but these forums are a way for the community to come together and help each other. :2cents:

I see that you only have 10-posts here, so I'm going to help you out for the good of the community. If you're going to chastise any member here, I'm going to need you to run it by me through a PM first. I don't really want to get into the consequences of not adhering to this policy, or the hospital bills involved, just please do yourself a favor and respect everyone here by asking my permission before you post anything like this. I'd go into this further but I'm in Tehran right now to eliminate a few "issues" and keep the United States as the greatest, safest nation in the world.

k
thx
bye

I ment no disrespect to anyone. I will refrain from such posts in the future. Again, I ment no disrespect to anyone. And yes I am a :noob: to this Forum, so thanks for lookin' out.

Its confirmed, Hustler now has Jedi mind trick capabilities, beware!

It certainly does... The Florida, Cali and Arizona Folks love it, since they are in some of the hottest areas of the US.

Odd Question here since we're on the topic of hot days and cooling.

I heard people go as far to say a reroute(m-tuned or other) on a stock rad in good condition with proper mix should be more then enough to cool pretty much anything under regular circumstance, unless you are tracking under 110 degrees desert sun, then pretty much anything will overheat eventually.

Truth?

I don't think a coolant reroute really cools more than the stock setup, maybe a little (I guess it depends where you're taking the temperature), it really just ensures better cooling across the motor. The problem is that when the stock setup gets hot it basically leaves the hot water sitting in the back cylinders with little water flow.

I'm currently running a custom reroute, effectively the same as the kits offered, on a stock radiator, in south Florida, and I haven't had any problems overheating at all under regular cirumstances. There have been a few times I've been ready to put the car into a wall to put myself out of my misery from the ridiculous heat, meanwhile my temp gauge reads a consistently cool 187.

So in answer to your question, I would say that is true; under regular circumstances a stock radiator w/ a reroute is sufficient. Also, even if you do have an upgraded radiator, it's still a good idea to do a reroute to ensure those back cylinders aren't boiling.

So here's a slight spin on this... I've basically got a stock auto rad, and after adding the TDR, I've been finding that the car will run hot with the AC on, in 30+ degree C days... (90+?) after about 20mins or so....

So the question is... what's the better choice... rad or re-route? I've been trying to figure this out the last couple of days... and reading everything again, just well gets more confusing. <G>

Most people do the rad, then do the re-route if necessary. I'm just curious if I should be doing the re-route, then the rad if necessary.

Oh and if anybody is running with the TDR, which rad are you runnin'?

Dave,

bigger radiator for sure, you can always do the re-route later.

I'd do the reroute first... This is what I plan on doing first myself anyway.

Here is my logic.

You are not necesseraly "overheating", it only says where the sensor is, at the back of the block where there is little coolant flow, it's getting hotter. By doing the reroute you are pulling all the heat away from the motor and sending it to the rad. I beleive a bigger rad will only accentuate the temperature difference between the front and the back of the motor since that coolant at the back of the motor still wont be circulating more with a bigger rad.

That's what I think, I could be wrong, I could be right... i'll still do the reroute first. and take it from there. For sure that Reroute+Bigger rad is the end all solution to everything tho.

On that subject, i've been wondering if anyone ever hooked up 2 temp gauge (to the front and to the back) on a stock cooled motor too see what the difference was?

BTDT. Back in 2001 or so I had a thermocouple son the back of the head heater outlet and the front (t-stat) outlet. At idle the difference was huge, something like 8-10*C. At high RPM it diminished, to something like 2*C. I think the reroute will actually help low speed stop and go overheating more than track performance. However at the track every little bit helps.

In fact the first thing I noticed after my reroute was that my temps in stop and go traffic went down.

Big rad from Mishimoto solved my overheating problems, but I'm not adding two or three times as much fuel energy to my situation yet - I'm not boosting yet. But mine was constantly overheating on autocross days in the summer down here before the rad change. Big difference.

Edit: Got the Mishi from our forum sponsor Turbochargers.com