general cooling discussion
 

As some of you have seen in my previous posts I'm building a mx5 powered 7 style kit car. Wanting to bounce a few ideas around...

Due to the frontal area of the car I'm going to have to run a tiny radiator. I'm struggling to get a nissan micra one in there. Now I'm not planning on spending much time in traffic but not sure if it will be enough...

I guess a beasty fan is a given

Was thinking if I made a large overflow tank to give the system a few more litres of capacity it might help things - I know it wont change the cooling capability but might give a bit more buffer time before it gets too hot on those occasions when you do get snarled up in traffic.

Intercooler wise I have nowhere at all to put a FMIC but I have a rather large available area on the floor level in front of the engine where I could mount an intercooler flat - would be hard to get the air to flow through rather then accross it. An air scoop would perhaps help but I don't have much ground clearance so it could only go 30mm or so below the chassis. Is this a bad idea?

I'd start with the radiator being a bad idea, is it a fairly thick aluminum piece? I wouldn't mess around with anything else. Find the biggest one you can fit and mount it in there. Is this a custom chassis? I didn't think they had that bad a time fitting radiators.

Radiator doesn't sound pleasant at all. Maybe some inventive ducting and some quality pieces will get you by, but I'd be on my toes the whole time and always keeping an eye on coolant temps.

Good ducting and a single good fan should solve your problems, even with a smaller radiator - I'm assuming you're not running an A/C in the 7.

Ducting with a hood and belly pan will get you success.

Yep no A/C. No roof or windshield either. The manufacturer of the chassis want their own radiator used along with their own engine mount, fuel tank, etc etc the list goes on so I'm trying to come up with my own creative solutions to such problems - Cheers for the input guys

Can you v mount? Sounds like you have a ton of space between the back of the rad and the engine already. Would let you run a slightly larger rad and put the intercooler in a good spot that also doesnt block rad flow.

I like the idea of v mount but while I have a big bit of space behind radiator it is intersected by cross members so would certainly be challenging. Heres a pic if I can make it work. I know it looks like there is plenty of room under the rad for a cooler but the opening in the nose cone is actually smaller then the rad (which is bloody small). Plenty of other problem to solve for now anyway!

And a pic of the whole project so far for those that are interested.

Ducting is your friend. If there is room for the IC, mount it there and then figure out how to get airflow there. It won't take much, you only need an opening 30% the size of the IC.

Only 30%? Well I'm sure I can find a way to make that work.