be cool radiator
be cool radiator
I am in need of a radiator and always wanted a be cool. Part number 35001 looks good for my w123. I have been pming a guy about this so i am sure he will chime in. It has no trans cooler so i will be fine with my manual trans. Looks like fab a braket and all should be good.
How come more people dont do this?
Why Be Cool.
To me they are far too expensive and nothing special. I would go with a Summit Racing brand myself. A radiator is a radiator.... As long as its fully welded and has the same tube specs, no need to spend the money for the "Be Cool" name...
Mine is not Be Cool, I went with a summit racing aluminum with trans cooler. A much better alternative to the factory plastic tank radiator. And installation is not too difficult.
I got mine thru the Summit Catelog as well and it was a "Be Cool" brand, $197 plus shipping. 3" thick 22x20. I don't think Summit actually makes a radiator; rather, they private label someone elses and I think it may be "Be Cool". The other choice is Griffin, but they are super expensive -- made in the Palmetto State....Very Happy with my "Be Cool". Unless I dropped the ball, it looked like the costs for any alumiumum radiator that was 3" and 22x20 is around $200 or more, so that was my line in the sand -- $200. No trans cooler built-in, however.
http://www.summitracing.com/parts/SUM-380324/
22 x 19.5 x 2.250 130$
MB tech i searched one of your other threads with your initial install. You put in the 381324 i think you said. Than the only difference between this one and yours is the internal trans cooler.
http://www.summitracing.com/parts/BCI-35001/
22 x 20 x 3 219$
Greazzer maybe you have the be cool 35001?
It seems the only real difference is cost and looks. I found the be cool on a different website for 190$ With money not being the topic for choice is there any reason one is better than the other?
I cant tell from the picture on summit, does the Be cool have the outlet in the filler neck to the expansion tank?
Do these come with a cap or do I need to buy that separately?
Thanks for your contributions all.
Here are some pictures of my radiator. One of the benefits of cleaning out the garage is making room to get to stuff. This will be going into the Phoenix Project soon. I am not sure if "Be Cool" makes a better radiator than some other maker. I liked it because it had the dual expansion tanks on both sides, and it was thick -- 3" and it fits really nice in the space. I took a picture of the aluminum pegs that go into the holes on the radiator mount at the bottom. Mine are off because the PO must have really smashed up the bottom of the car and it was bent pretty good. On a non smashed bottom, the holes are in straight line, so I will have to re-do this plate. I think I will make the pegs a lot shorter and thread them so that I can screw on a large aluminum washer like bolt I found at the scrapyard.
Those are are standard 617 hoses on it? I am still rocking the 616 (if I didn't say that yet). Could I get some 617 hoses with the be cool and call it a day? Of course the custom set up on MB tech's looks pretty sweet too.
MB Tech from Mississippi is the guy who motivated me to get the all aluminum radiator. I PM'd him a bunch and he was kind enough to respond and share his info with me. It was a great move. I will never use the OEM radiator again.
Those hoses are OEM. I will be getting rid of those hoses soon as I am getting an EWP. If you want them, I can sell them cheap. They are "new". I got them at Autohauz a few months before my first MB got totaled on 10/21.....PM if you want the hoses.
(02-12-2012, 04:38 PM)Greazzer MB Tech from Mississippi is the guy who motivated me to get the all aluminum radiator. I PM'd him a bunch and he was kind enough to respond and share his info with me. It was a great move. I will never use the OEM radiator again.
Those hoses are OEM. I will be getting rid of those hoses soon as I am getting an EWP. If you want them, I can sell them cheap. They are "new". I got them at Autohauz a few months before my first MB got totaled on 10/21.....PM if you want the hoses.
I don't know the cars well enough to know if the oe radiators suck. I do know oe replacement was a hell of a lot more money than one of these high performance radiators. I am sold.
Taking the hoses, pm sent
(02-12-2012, 04:38 PM)Greazzer MB Tech from Mississippi is the guy who motivated me to get the all aluminum radiator. I PM'd him a bunch and he was kind enough to respond and share his info with me. It was a great move. I will never use the OEM radiator again.
Those hoses are OEM. I will be getting rid of those hoses soon as I am getting an EWP. If you want them, I can sell them cheap. They are "new". I got them at Autohauz a few months before my first MB got totaled on 10/21.....PM if you want the hoses.
Electric Water Pump? Explain! haha
Fack, why you peeps keep leading me to all this neat stuff!?!? I guess an all aluminum radiator has found its way onto my wish list lol
Davies-Craig EWP -- with a thermostatic control. Very impressed with the Company. I even got a personal response from their President and 2nd in Charge with my questions. I am sold. They are located in Australia. That is why I needed a handful of custom aluminum plates mades. Good bye mechanical water pump and all the odds and ends that go with it, to inclue the belt. That is why I needed the mechanical steering box. It permits an easy, direct route for a Serp Belt AND a Supercharger. Pictures very soon. I am super behind on this project, et cet. Work has me swamped, but I promise to get the info and pictures out very soon.
Anybody want to give me a quick walk though on mounting on of those radiatiors?
After removing the factory radiator, I made 2 grommets/cushions out of hard plastic/hard rubber for the bottom
of the radiator. Then I fabricated an upper mount, as you can see its pretty simple looking (just some sheet metal and some mounting hardware). Then route your hoses.
This will be on my to do list as well, I think its a great idea to replace that old plastic POS.
Electric water pumps are just crazy though
Seriously though, good luck Greazzer!
Is the stock expansion tank used with these, or how does that work?
I used a universal chrome overflow tank, as long as they mount higher than the radiator cap its easy to bleed the system out. For the longest time I just had a piece of hose pointing at the ground and that worked ok too.
went to a couple welding shops this morning to see if i could source out the fab work. They were all scared to put heat onto an all aluminum radiator. In turn i got the fear. I order my be cool 35001 last night. Probably going to get some aluminum and smack it with a hammer to form a cradle, drill a hole in it and stick bolts throught that. Of course add some padding to it as well.
Ok ordered be cool but now it is out of stock
so i ordered the summit one and put it in over the weekend. Glad i didnt get the be cool. I have AC and boy is it tight in there. I will post a pic sometime. Zip ties are my best friend right now.
An all aluminum radiator would be nice, I'm still trying to figure out why they would use plastic??
Ok so installed the summit over the weekend http://www.summitracing.com/parts/SUM-380324/
The first thing I realized I had going special here was that I still have air conditioning! This took away only a tiny bit of room but had I bought the larger 3" be cool radiator it may have been to large to fit. I am just barely missing the power steering pump with my upper hose. Originally I was going to post a whole process of the install but I am not. And now know why others have not either. It is not that hard to do. I did not weld anything. Just spent about 8 dollars on brackets and stuff from the hardware store. Whatever you feel comfortable with. Also the hoses are just making puzzle pieces fit. I brought the old radiator hoses and the new radiator to the parts store, found hose that fit the new radiator with some suitable bends and put in exhaust pipe reducers to connect them. As of now they work but I will be cleaning up the look and have a muffler shop bend some stuff for me to be used in the coolant system.
One other thing. That oil cooler was a pain to get off the side of the radiator. After trying to unbolt it and feeling like an idiot I just cut it off.
For power I am a true apartment dweller. I don't have a cool garage with all sorts of nice stuff. I hooked a power inverter to my battery and plugged in a Dremel. Worked fine cutting the bolts and drilling the two holes for the top brackets to mount to the car.
I don't know If I am going to get this picture upload right....if there are no pictures here is a link to my picassa
https://plus.google.com/photos/118179900...YL97vOIpQE
CONGRATS!!!! I think you will like the difference between OEM vs. 3" all aluminum. I believe R&D, at the time it is being done, seems tough and daunting but on reflection a piece of cake. Looks good !
Glad to see it worked out for you, looks good.
Zip ties? Eeeeek! Home Depot has steel zip ties if it is absolutely necessary to use them in your case.
(02-24-2012, 12:12 AM)w123love Zip ties? Eeeeek! Home Depot has steel zip ties if it is absolutely necessary to use them in your case.
I know i know. Super temporary. Going to get some exhaust pipe bent and better positioned. Was just happy to have a car again.
(02-24-2012, 12:12 AM)w123love Zip ties? Eeeeek! Home Depot has steel zip ties if it is absolutely necessary to use them in your case.
I ended up installing one of these this weekend:
http://www.summitracing.com/parts/AFC-80103N/
really awesome, made in TN, all tig welded aluminum, a thing of beauty!
I'll post pics in my car's thread later, but it fits really well once the oil cooler is replaced/relocated... I opted to replace oil cooler with this:
http://www.summitracing.com/parts/EAR-41610ERL/
had to cobble together some hoses for now, but will likely do something like this for the long term:
http://www.summitracing.com/parts/SUM-390124/
edit: I did retain the fan shroud, but had to trim it quite a bit to keep it from getting in the way of the fan blades as it ended up shifted a bit to the drivers side due to the end tanks of this rad being on the sides of the rad vice top and bottom...thing runs really cool now...cool enough that I suspect it needs a new thermostat...it's been poretty cold here for the past few days, but I havent seen the temps get much above the line above the 40*C mark (50*C I'm guessing?!?!)