Am toying with the idea of some form of oil cooler. I like the idea of the oil/water exchanger for my application as I have restricted internal air flow. Laminova seems ideal, but pricey!

What are the general opinions on oil/water vs oil air coolers??

Is an oil/water type fitted in the coolant pipe that flows from the engine to the rad, or in the coolant pipe that returns from the rad back to the engine.. or does it matter??

any opinions greatly appreciated!

The laminove will add heat to the water so where you position it is probably quite critical.
In the bottom hose will mean that hot water is going through the Laminova but as the oil is normally hotter than the water there should be enough temp difference to effect some cooling.
In the top hose and the water will be cooler so the oil will be cooled more but you are adding heat to the water going back to the engine.

What ever you do you will be expecting your water radiator to cope with more heat.

You can put an oil cooler behind as well as infront of a water radiator to good effect

erm....might be a typo, but i think you're a bit confused there snapper.

top hose is usually feed TO the radiator, with the hottest water.

bottom hose is FROM the radiator with coolest water.

i imagine unless your water cooling system is running at its limits, you could run the laminova in the bottom hose happily enough. the thermal energy in the oil shouldn't be massive enough to affect the temperature of the water by a great amount but the greater temperature differential will cool the oil better.

all depends how desperate your need to cool the oil is.
tom

Hi we have been having them made and using them for 20 years now. They are far better than the OIL/AIR type particularly if you are tight on space for a traditional type one with air flow problems.

As said plum the exchanger up in the cold return FROM the rad. The biggest benefit is that the water warms far quicker than the oil. So you use the warmth of the water to warm the oil up. And when it's all up to a working temperature you are then using the water to cool the oil. A good setup should keep the oil temp to about 20 Deg above water temp.

Couple of pics i found. this is the Laminover one.


Or theres the type that engine manufacturers use as STD fitment IE Ford and most bike engines.



And this is the one we have made for us.


The small version of our oil/water heat exchanger. Suitable for 200bhp. Larger sizes for larger bhp applications. Available with either straight or 90 deg ends. 1/2" BSP oil fittings. [/img]

Of course the other great advantage is that you don't have to try and put it in to the air flow or block the flow to the rad. This is of particular benefit on rally cars where air flow is generally full of debris that blocks the traditional type coolers of worse still damages them causing oil leaks.

Cheers Matt

Gents,

Thanks for the replies.

Regds,

Indykid you are correct..

quote:

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On the pinto the water pump sucks from the bottom of the rad and the heater and pushes that water into the engine. Before the stat opens this water should go through the block and head and then out of the centre of the manifold to the heater.

Just reverse the location of the Laminova in my reply of my reply

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Hi I'm a big advocate for the oil/water cooler. On my car the nose cone houses the radiator, intercooler and a cooler for the Rotrex gear oil. So it was getting very crowded in there!

So I fitted a Ford oil/water cooler as pictured above (my installation is below) but my engine is a Toyota

I've plumbed the cooler in to the heater circuit so the oil is heated quite quickly on startup. The cooling works very well and stays just above the thermostat opening temp in all situations, including on track. Obviously in traffic the temp rises until the rad fan kicks in to cool it down again. My car puts out 270BHP at peak RPM so that's a fair amount of energy to remove.



Ford oil water cooler 2