Oil Coolers, general heat for 200whp
 

Next summer I plan to start tracking the car again. At that point I am planning for @200whp. The car will be intercooled, so I will have a minimum of 4 heat exchangers - radiator, condenser, S/C oil cooler, and the intercooler.

I am planning on running the TDR intercooler, with their ducting (or a variant) so the heat exchanger stack will be ducted. I have 2/3 Cobra's radiator shroud and will be running two of the 1100CFM Spal fans with it. Probably a koyo 37mm radiator as well to replace the stock unit.

So, an oil cooler. Assuming I am keeping everything else cool, am I going to need one? The part of me that wants to over-engineer reliability says to just do it.

Let's assume I do need one. How much of one for 200hp? Assuming coolant temps are under control.

Real estate in my bumper area is becoming quite precious. I am not willing at this point to ventilate or otherwise carve openings into my front bumper, that will not pass the Ms Mobius test, nor my own "keep it stock looking" test. Adding a 5th heat exchanger into my stack will be tough.

Options I've come up with so far:
a) RX7 cooler. Seems popular and effective. Built-in thermostat. Doesn't necessarily need to be in direct airflow - correct?

b) Small cooler with a fan, such as : http://www.proracestore.com/index.ph...sourceid=GPPRS
5" with a shrouded spal fan. Small enough to mount out of the way. Fan should give it enough thermal capacity to take the edge off. Advantages - small, easier to locate, doesn't need to be directly in the high pressure airflow due to fan. Disadvantages - small, does it have enough capacity.

Actually, thinking about this one more, seems I could mount it where for track days I could remove a fog light and feed it from there. Fresh air + fan = win?

c) replace my current S/C oil cooler with a dual circuit cooler. Run S/C oil through the smaller side, and the engine oil through the larger, such as this one:
http://www.jegs.com/i/Derale/259/15230/10002/-1

I could mount a fanless one in the stack, or use the fanned version and mount that one horizontally, having it vent down through slots in the undertray. I don't like the exposure to damage having it down low like that though. LukeH's rotrex over at m.net has the S/C oil cooler down low, but that makes me nervous.

Thoughts/ideas/opinions? A/C is staying on the car. I want this to be a daily driver that is a moderately powered track weapon. Only thing I want to manage at the track is fuel, tires, and brake pads.

Let's start here - you aren't going to keep a 200whp car cool with a rear-shrouded 37mm Koyo, especially with A/C. You need a 55mm Koyo, or preferrably our 76mm twin-core unit. Our unit will definitely keep it cool - a Koyo may struggle in 100*F temps.

Enough to keep the oil temps down to ~250*F in 100*F weather. :makeout:

Look into mounting something between the intercooler and radiator. The oil cooler is much less picky about airflow and efficiency than the IC or radiator are - with the radiator you're removing a huge amount of heat, and with the IC you're trying to remove a significant portion of the heat that is produced. Without an oil cooler, you might see temps of ~300*F, which is definitely too hot, but you don't need to knock them down to the 150*F range. You just need a 15% drop, which is easy to achieve without too much thought put into airflow management. Just oversize the core a bit and stick it wherever is most convenient.

What's a good size core for this application? Curious as I'm going to be in this pickle myself next Spring.

/threadjack

Couple people have put one in front of the front wheels, check igorr's build thread (I think) and thesnowboarder before he put a rx7 cooler in.

I have roughly the same HP, a 55mm radiator and a 24 row oil cooler. No ac though, or additional S/C cooler, driving conservatively on all-season tires. It seemed to work fine for keeping temps at or below 250* in the two track days it's seen, one 60-70* day at PIR one 70-80* day at ORP. It gets fresh air though, along with my radiator being ducting and heat extracted.

Which track are you planning on racing at? PIR is cooler in general but tough on brakes and cooling. ORP is hot being in eastern OR but there's much less full throttle time.

PIR and ORP will be the two tracks I run at. It's doubtful I'll be able to do anything farther than ORP.

To clarify, the heat exchangers will be ducted and sealed to the mouth opening. There will be no spillage of air, it will all have to pass through the radiator. I agree the Trackspeed radiator or one of the other crossflow radiators would be an excellent solution but I'd like to stick with stock dimensions to avoid having to re-engineer the TDR intercooler installation. My two main reasons for going with that one (besides that the IC core is a good one) is for the mounting and ducting engineering that's already been done - brackets and ducting/sealing pieces are part of the install, and it's over-the-top for the intake plumbing, so I don't have to hack my undertray. I believe in the pressure differential benefits of the undertray, and the roads here are wet so much of the year I'd like to keep it as intact as possible.

If I change my radiator footprint I'll end up having to DIY my whole intercooler installation. Which is doable, but I'd like to avoid a cascade of changes due to unintended consequences. Unless the Trackspeed unit is compatible with the TDR intercooler? I thought I saw that it was not.

So even with airflow ducted and sealed, and with two hi-flow spal fans, the 37mm will not be enough?

Somebody correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think fans are going to do shit for you when you're at high speeds on track if your radiator is too small to get rid of excess heat fast enough.

The better solution would be to ditch the undertray and fab up your own, which is what a LOT of people here have done. Hacking your undertray for IC pipes doesn't mean it will suddenly become ineffective, you seal around the IC pipes. IMO what you're doing is ending up with a few bandaids when you could just rearrange some stuff and do it the right way. It would get rid of the "what ifs".

No, I don't think it will be.

I have no idea whether our radiator is compatible with the TDR intercooler kit. Our radiator extends down to the undertray a little closer, but other than that it retains stock height/width dimension. The depth dimension is obviously thicker, but that's true for all aftermarket radiators.

I'd rather have small notches cut for IC pipes in the sides of the undertray vs. the notches cut in the top of the radiator panel like the TDR setup has.

Make sure you post a build thread. This is basically what I'm going to be shooting for 200WHP S/C track car.

For the oil temps where is that measured typically? At the filter or in the sump?

Well those are the two choices. People seem to go with whichever is most convenient for them to hook up, from what I've seen. Mine is taken at the filter.

That is correct. Sorry.

I only run my low boost setting at the track for reliability reasons - 180 whp, and I have a ducted 37mm Koyo, no A/C condenser in the way like you have, and a Trucool 24-row oil cooler. I was OK with this setup in 85* heat, but at 100* ambient, I was unable to keep the car cool enough to enjoy a session. I am now saving up for TSE's radiator.

-Ryan

I can't remember the last time I was worried about coolant temps on the track - and that's at 330-350whp.

Here's 8 laps at Willow Springs in 95*+ temps.

(start at 1:45 if you don't want to see me do the world's most boring warm-up lap)

Awesome laps Andrew.

I'm going to be calling you to place an order for a TSE radiator in about a week and a half :)

What are you doing/turning on/adjusting at 2:40 in that video?
Also, what's the story behind the fun looking slide at 10:10? Looked like a late downshift, or just greasy tires?

-Ryan

We should change your name to Savingdrift!

Flipping pages on the Racepak at 2:40. Greasy tires at 10:10 - just overcooked the entry a bit and had to give the tires the rest of the lap to cool down.

Peak CLT was 219*F. Typical CLTs were 210-215*F for the session. 109*F IAT idling in the pits before the session, peak IATs of 136*F on the front stretch and back stretch. (front stretch is a full 5-6 pull to the rev limiter in 6th)

Ftfy

Doesn't Hustler use a stock sized radiator?

TSE's triple pass as far as I know, look a few pictures back on his build thread, no way thats stock. He's at least 2".



(That's what she said)

Anyone check out Mishimoto's triple pass radiator?

yea right. my stock radiator could barely keep up on stock power. hell it shat itself 1 week after my 1st track day.

I've heard that it is the CXRacing 55mm, but that is unconfirmed, and from the quality of the rest of his build that would surprise me. Either way, it is most certainly not stock.

A question on oil-coolers from someone who does not do trackdays and thus speaks from a position bereft of practical experience.

Presupposing that the main cooling system is up to par, would a water-oil exchanger not be a practical alternative to a front-mount air-oil exchanger in situations where space is a consideration and the car is also driven on the street?

I would imagine that even the stock 1.8-style sandwich plate might provide some meaningful benefit if the water supply were re-plumbed such that it draws in relatively cool water from the front of the head, rather than taking the hottest water in the system from the rear of the head.

Coming from no actual experience with such a system here, but hypothetically speaking, I wouldn't expect that to help much.
Granted, CLT while cruising could be 175*, but when you're really using the car, which is when you would actually need the oil cooled, you're probably looking at more like 200*-210* CLT, given a really good cooling system... An air to oil exchanger, on a worst-case-scenario day of like 110* is going to have a incredibly higher delta between the two temps than you can get with a water to oil exchanger... Plus, then you're raising your water temps because that's what is soaking up that heat - suppose a non-oil cooled setup would run 210* Coolant and 250* Oil, then you're basically looking at 230* across the board with a water to oil exchanger, and you don't really want to be that high in the CLT department..

-Ryan

I have considered this for years, actually. The coolant absorbing the heat will be much hotter, true, but the oil-to-water exchange itself will be much more efficient than the oil-to-air. And the oil will stay away from rocks and debris, and won't take frontal airflow real estate. And an oil thermostat won't be needed, since once the coolant thermostat opens up the oil should warm up almost immediately. It lags 55-60F behind coolant during a cold-start warmup anyway, another 90 seconds won't hurt anything. "Too much oil cooler" off-track for street cars in winter would be a non-issue.

The place to do it would be with the return hose on a coolant re-route with a laminova heat exchanger. The heat is then dumped directly into the radiator, which you then size/duct etc appropriately to dissipate the total heat load.
http://www.batinc.net/files/laminova.pdf

I have an M-tuned reroute in my workbench. Since I have a 2001, though, I'll need to replace the head gasket when I put it on for things to flow as expected (since the 2001 and up head gaskets have a slightly different hole pattern to force more coolant flow around the rear cylinders). Thanks to Joe for his part in the detective work tracking that down, since that probably saved me from doing myself in trying to do the right thing.


The extra effort of the head gasket coupled with not really needing it yet has led me to inaction. Also the laminova coolers are not inexpensive, discouraging the "get one just in case" type purchases.

A bracket of some type would need to be fashioned, mounting either to where the intake mani brace mounts (that we all take off) or to the shock tower possibly. The hoses would support it most likely but I wouldn't want it banging around under race conditions.

It may still become part of my winter project.

I just can't get behind the idea of dumping additional heat into a cooling system that is already being pretty heavily taxed - and that assumes you can get enough heat out of the oil in the first place, which I doubt.

I am a firm believer in big, air-cooled oil coolers.

<--- Had a big combined radiator/oil cooler. Was not nearly as effective at regulating coolant or oil temperature as a separate big radiator + separate big oil cooler. I had more problems with coolant heat than oil heat, and when I switched them (and no other parts) all of my heat problems went away. That was on a NA Honda, which most likely does not generate as much engine heat as a turbo Miata.

I think the root issue there is maximum heat capacity of the system, and that you can exceed that on track.

I didn't read the complete thread, but here's what I know:

Having worked at TDR in the past and having installed many intercooler kits, I can mostly tell you what works.

There are many TDR customers tracking their stacked heat exchanger setup reliably with a 37mm PWR/Koyo radiator setup in 100*+ heat. You'll see even better results if you seal the TDR plastic ducting.

An oil cooler is absolutely necessary! The solution that we had came up with, and I still use, is mounting the oil cooler off of the steering rack so that it is parallel to the ground. I made sure that it is above the steering rack and not the lowest point on the car. We then cut a duct out of the factory bellypan and used L-brackets to keep the shape of the duct in tact. One thing I learned, though, is don't use a Tru-cool style oil cooler. It was extremely inefficient compared to the Setrab, Earl's and Mocal coolers.

The problems that I can see with running the TSE radiator on the TDR intercooler setup is the fact that the TDR intercooler uses modified radiator brackets to lower and move the radiator back. When running stock fans on a 37mm radiator, sometimes it is necessary to trim the shroud to clear the sway bar. It's absolutely necessary to trim them running the RB sway bar brace.

With the TSE radiator being so thick, I don't know if it's possible to make it all fit with the sway bar and front core support limitations. Someone test it and report back. :)

Andrew knows his shit. The biggest factors boil down to how hard you drive, how much boost you run and ambient temps.

Here is the installation guides for the TDR intercoolers for reference: http://trackdogracing.com/inst/