A couple 3.4 swap issues to work out

[thefatkid]

Yea, stock, umm yea.



I run a TRD thermostat foo!





Running supercharged I see a huge power drop from timing being back out at temperatures above 190ish.

[Quick Draw]

Doug, I have a stock 3.0L radiator and a 180 degree thermostat. Factory is also 180, but these motors just seem to like to hit 190 I guess. That's what Lauren's truck generally hovers at too.

It's a little warmer today, and I'm still seeing some temperature increase on the last hill to my house. I have a mark on my gauge that is roughly 212 degrees. Previously it pretty much sat on that at the top of the hill. This time, it didn't hit that mark and it seemed to recover much faster. Within about 60 seconds after I quit climbing, it was pretty close to normal again. So the trans cooler seemed to help some. But it's not the root of the problem. I'm getting closer and closer to that almost inevitable shiny new radiator...

Originally Posted by thefatkid

Just FYI, I'm getting a 4 row/core radiator build here in the next couple of weeks. I'm on a quest to get my 170° operating temperatures. I'm almost there in normal driving, towing and wheeling are not so close. I run 205-210° while towing on flats, my speed is set by holding that temperature. My transmission temps have been staying around 130° so it is not my issue, I have a very large cooler though.

As in, your getting a radiator custom built? Where are you getting that, and about how much are you spending?

I was looking through some replacement 3.0L radiators last night. You can get a 2 core aluminum radiator fairly cheap. For about another $100, you can get a 3 core... And I didn't see anything bigger than that.

Is an aluminum tank/core radiator really an improvement on the factory one? It seems like I have seen some conflicting information on this.

[wakkjobb]

Kyle man, come on down to the Springs; we'll get an F250 radiator to fit in Doris (with trans cooler). Rainbows and Unicorns Fab Werkx, LLC is now open!

[thefatkid]

I was looking at those all aluminum units online. While they are a 3 core, they are 2" shorter due to being for 2wd trucks. I was not sure I wanted to spend another $100 on one that might work.

I'm going to be spending $400 on a high efficiency copper unit from Spikes Radiator. I need to find a stock core radiator at the moment as mine is not a good core with the plastic tanks and all. They need the tanks and brackets.

The aluminum units can be more efficient if built correctly. The aluminum is stronger and can be built thinner to help with heat transfer.

I'm just going the old school way. Sheer mass quantity of coolant. The think the radiator will double in capacity over what I have now. I currently have a super single core aluminum radiator, a "factory replacement".

[wakkjobb]

+1 for bigger/more coolant... there's no replacement for displacement! Cutting the core support to eliminte cooling issues is A-OK in my book... so is cutting open the hood.

[Goldfinger]

Originally Posted by wakkjobb

+1 for bigger/more coolant... there's no replacement for displacement! Cutting the core support to eliminte cooling issues is A-OK in my book... so is cutting open the hood.

Are you talking about cutting the hood and having the radiator stick out of the top?

[wakkjobb]

Nah; cooling holes. I knew a guy who had pusher fans under his hood to help cool off his Dodge Ram; seemed to work. My manager has a hole in his *cough* XJ's *cough* hood but they all needed that from the factory.

I have some expanded steel mesh that would look pretty slick on ol' Doris...

[Goldfinger]

Originally Posted by wakkjobb

Nah; cooling holes. I knew a guy who had pusher fans under his hood to help cool off his Dodge Ram; seemed to work. My manager has a hole in his *cough* XJ's *cough* hood but they all needed that from the factory.

I have some expanded steel mesh that would look pretty slick on ol' Doris...

Scared me for a minute. I thought you'd gone plasma crazy!

[liveoffroad]

Originally Posted by Quick Draw

So...how do I do a cold air intake on Doris? After looking into it, I think the best way is to take it outside of the engine bay all together.

i'm in the same boat with my 7M, let me know what you decide to do...

[Quick Draw]

Fixed the high idle in reverse problem! It took a long time to figure out because the problem was so intermittent. And I was thinking along the lines of an electronic problem. It was very simple. The opening in the hood would occasionally grab the throttle cable housing. This is fine until the engine twists in the opposite direction but the throttle cable doesn't go with it. I finally confirmed it by popping the hood when it started to idle up. That fixed it every time. So it's time to do some more trimming...

I thought I had ruled out the throttle cable in my original post. I don't remember how I came to that conclusion, but I was wrong.

As for the rest of it, it still runs hot, I still don't have a cold air intake, and the CEL still comes on. But I will get to those eventually.

[Goldfinger]

Never say you where wrong. Always say "I missremembered".

[Avsfreak1234]

just ratrod spacer the back of the hood up half an inch. then you wont have to cut anything else.

[wakkjobb]

Kyle, bring that fat old broad down to the shop and let's get some work done already!

[Quick Draw]

Lol Wakkjob, don't you have a truck of your own you should be building?

[wakkjobb]

Not really... it's just the frame, cab and that's about all. Not much of a truck per se.

[wakkjobb]

But once more stuff comes together, you can bet your sweet Doris I'll be bugging you for 3.4 info. You and Doug both.

[Goldfinger]

Originally Posted by wakkjobb

But once more stuff comes together, you can bet your sweet Doris I'll be bugging you for 3.4 info. You and Doug both.

When do you think you'll start putting that thing together?

[wakkjobb]

Who knows... next week or next year; whenever I can.

[Etravoda]

Kyle, not sure if you've fixed the overheating or not...

I've watched my temps a couple times and they usually hover around 195* Coolant and 120* IAT while driving. I wouldn't be worried about the IAT causing your overheating, thats not the primary issue and is so negligible in the grand scheme.

I know we've talked about this before but is yours a factory 3.0 or a replacement 3.0 radiator?

[Quick Draw]

I don't know if mine is factory or not. Yeah, I have pretty much decided that the IATs probably aren't the primary factor, but they certainly don't help. I noticed that my coolant was low recently and it frequently has air bubbles. So now I'm looking for a leak. I am praying that it's not slowly burning the coolant or something. But I have never had smoke out the exhaust, so that's not too likely.

I'll try a new radiator when I get some money for one. Those seeds in there can't be helping anything.

Mine will stay at 190 almost all of the time, until I drive up the canyon to my house. And really it only gets to 210-220 then. So it's not really overheating...it's just out of my ideal range.

As for my IATs, I once recorded temperatures over 190 degrees! Last time I was on Wheeler Lake, I set up my laptop to record data for about an hour. I set it to generate a graph of coolant temps and IAT temps. They trends of the 2 graphs were definitely similar. At the time the IAT was 190, the coolant was like 228. After seeing this, I pulled off my hood, and rotated the intake out of the hot air. The truck stayed much cooler and seemed like it had much more power. So regardless of the IATs, and their relationship to coolant temps, I want to get the hot air and my intake out of the engine bay.

[Etravoda]

See if the top of the radiator is plastic or metal, with the former being better. I think we talked about this but Ben (liveoffroad) is having the same heat issues and has a 3.0 replacement radiator. Maybe he can chime in but I think they are only 1 row instead of 2 and they are around 1/2" thinner. (We measured the thickness of his and mine).

I'm sure the high IATs are sort of just the "straw on the camels back."

I wouldn't be comfortable with 210-220 either, I'll keep watching mine when I'm doing more "strenuous" driving and see how high I can get it.