Hi all

I picked up an S2000 powered Tiger GTA a few months back and for road use it's been great. It's replacing my 919 fireblade Fury which was track only so it's really nice being able to use it on the road. (Fury up for sale soon )

Anyway, It's struggled in the heat in recent weeks with coolant hitting 105*c and Oil temp hitting 90*c when not moving. I'm hoping that a more powerful fan and fresh coolant (distilled water + wetter water) will sort that. The Radiator appears to be from an XR2i from what I can make out but it should be big enough.

Picture - Getting Hot

So coolant happy, my biggest concerns for taking this on track are oil temps and pressure.

Oil Temp is taken from the sump plug and only works when the car is stationary. As soon as I'm driving it drops off the scale. From what I've read the recommended way for accuracy is to take this temp from a sandwich plate on the filter.

I'm also concerned about oil starvation in long corners and like the safety net of the accusump on the Fury. This car is on it's third engine due to oil starvation over the years so I'm tempted to accusump it although the first engine was before the baffle and the second may have been oil level getting low. I took the sump off at the weekend and it still has the basic teigwa baffle plate in from engine 2 but I can't see this doing that much good. Certainly it's nowhere near as nicely engineered as the AB sump on the fireblade.

To fit an accusump I'd need a sandwich plate too.

The problem I have is that I can't fit a sandwich plate without pushing my filter into my steering column...
Picture - Too close for a sandwich

This gives me two options.
1 - Use a remote filter setup to gain the room.
2 - Remove the oil/coolant heat exchanger donut and replace with a sandwich plate.

Option 1 allows me to keep the 'donut' heat exchanger and mount the filter remotely. I could sandwich plate the accusump in or use a T piece and one way value. There are filter head mounts that allow for the temp sensor too. The downside of this setup is that the common remote filter heads in the uk seem standadise on a 3/4 UNF filter instead of the standard Honda M20. Canton do an M20 version but it's big £££. Should I worry about this?

Option 2 is removing the heat exchanger donut and replacing it with a sandwich plate. Merlin have a nice mocal one with temp sensor fitting. Now because I'm removing the heat exchanger I also need to install an oil cooler (not sure how big yet). I can then plumb in the accusump in with T and valve. I'd probably also fit an inline oil thermostat too that bypasses the cooler and help with oil warm up and avoid over cooling.

At the moment I'm thinking that an Oil cooler isn't a bad idea anyway for track use so Option 2 is probably best overall. But then I could add a cooler to option 1 at a later date. I'm going round in circles here and would appreciate other opinions as none of these options are cheap.

The engine is mainly stock but with the AEM Series 2 EMS tuned to 270bhp and vtec cutover lowered.The idea of oil starvation or overheating and going thin on this high revving engine is scary but maybe I'm over thinking it.

Thanks for any advice

Chris

[Edited on 19/7/17 by woodstock]

[Edited on 19/7/17 by woodstock]

First question would be, what do you expect the temps to be? 90 deg oil temp seems fine on the road, 105 deg water seems a little high but it depends what the engine has been doing and if the fan is pulling the temp down or not.

As this engine is from an S2000 which was designed as a longitudinal engine I don't see what you need an accusump unless you where maybe tracking the car on slicks. The previous failures are more likely to be low oil levels/wrong oil.

Hello,
i have restored-resbuilded a Westfield MegaS2000 in the past and i had same issue with water temperature.
on this car there was a big and hight quality radiator from radtec with approx 70mm section.
i have installed low temp thermostat (i remember 82°C) and solved the problem with some radiator bulkheads, in this way all air flow from nose cone is obbligated to pass trought radiator.
it's a simple mod but very useful, temperatur drop more then 10°C.

about oil temp.. 90°C is an optimal temperature.. probabily on trackday you will need a radiator, but you can try without and take a look on gauge.
if you use a good oil 120-125°C isn't a problem.

about lubrification i can't help you becouse there was a drysump system so i haven't experience with oil pan on this engine.

My experience, Jag V6 not Honda, modern engines seem to be designed to run about 100c As said above I fitted a
82c stat, max temps dropped by around 10c. I think I would keep the Oil/Water "cooler", I have removed mine and oil temps
never get above 80c, as low as 53c cruising. I think that is too low.

The mnr s2000 I built has been used on track all its life in the south of France and hasn't suffered any mechanical/engine issue at all.
Using a large pro alloy rad and standard sump pan.discs pads and oil/fliuds are all it's needed as far as I'm aware!

Coolant hitting 105 sounds a bit high - maybe OK if that's the peak when stationary on a hot day - but still high. Oil temp of 90 sounds fine. I would recommend flushing the coolant system with something like Thermocure - I used this on my car, it made a big difference to temperatures (but obviously that's only going to help if the problem is rust clogging up the system).

S2000 can be a pain to get all the air out of the system, just a thought.

Thanks for all the replies

@jeffw - "First question would be, what do you expect the temps to be? 90 deg oil temp seems fine on the road, 105 deg water seems a little high but it depends what the engine has been doing and if the fan is pulling the temp down or not."

- these were peaks observed when stuck in traffic for 5 mins after driving on open country roads. So the engine would have been warm but nowhere near as stressed as on a track day. When driving the oil temp drops off the chart due to the sensor placement so I've no idea what this actually is. The donut cooler should keep it under control on the road though. I'd hope for 85-95 coolant and 80-100 oil when on track but think it would be higher than that in the current state..

As this engine is from an S2000 which was designed as a longitudinal engine I don't see what you need an accusump unless you where maybe tracking the car on slicks. The previous failures are more likely to be low oil levels/wrong oil.

- I won't be going for slicks, just R888's or similar. The worry is in long corners like Coram at Snetterton where all the oil will be pushed left. I can't see the baffle stopping that for long enough but maybe I'm wrong. I know it will be pulling more G than my old S2000 on standard road rubber. The baffle looks like this so doesn't have any traps or panels to actually stop the lateral movement beyond keeping it under the panel.

Spoon Buffle

@HPDxxx - Good call on the thermostat. That makes a lot of sense and can't believe I didn't think of that. That's a nice easy win I think. It will help it run cooler but will also give more headroom when stuck in traffic.

I agree on the oil temps. Some people will say it can safely get much higher but I'd rather it didn't. The problem I have is that the oil temp sensor doesn't work until i stop and then there is a delay for it to settle. This leaves me blind as to the peak temp.

@40inches - Thanks. I like the donut cooler/exchanger and will keep it if I can as it helps heat the oil on startup. If I take it out and fit a rad i'll definitely go for an oil stat if the oil temp doesn't get high enough. I hear that 80*c + is ideal for oil as it helps burn off any water in the oil. 53 definitely sounds low and I've heard people say that you can end up looking like a blown head gasket if you don't get the oil hot enough, long enough.

@daniel mason - That's good to hear. It's a pretty solid engine so maybe i'm just paranoid. I think it's the history of it being on engine 3 that's made me cautious.

@rodgling - Thanks - that was stationary on a hot day but still had me worried and guage watching. I was trying to work out if it was better to stop the engine for a bit but ultimately decided that keeping the water pump running was more important.

@unijacko67 - I'll bear that in mind and give it all a check over at the weekend.

Thanks all - overall it seems i'm overthinking it. I'm going to order a replacement coolant stat and see if I can make some sort of shroud for the oil temp sensor. Then i'll keep an eye on things on a test trackday and build up.