What did you do to your rig today?

[El Gringo]

I was thinking of one that can be opened or closed while driving, maybe something like this https://www.ebay.com.au/itm/New-1-2-to- ... voPWZUNMZg
That way the 2nd rad could be left isolated to aid in warm up and brought into line later when required?
I must admit I hadn't thought of the heater outlet, seems that it might be a good idea as mine has a reduced from 2" down to 3/4" off the side of the block.

Thanx,

[Wilbor]

Not a bad idea , I am handling warm up temp by using Davies Craig digital thematic fan switchs. I have two of them, one for the radiator fan and EWP and one for the two 16” fans. I have them set to come on at 5 degrees apart at about the same time as the first thermostat opens. When they activate one fan comes on and 10 seconds later the second one comes on.

[Greynomad]

Working on our brick-based rig ....
Planted 10 trees in front yard. Eight Pittosporums (the pedant in me reckons the plural should be ‘Pittospora’ ) and two different ones. (Hey, I’m just the Gardener’s Labourer. SWMBO says “Put it there.”, and ‘there’ is where I dig the hole...)

[Busman]

Bernie,
It don't really matter where you take it off from, our second radiator is taken from the return line from the main radiator and put back into the thermostat housing on the left hand head, seems has caused no problems.
What I am doing is some shroud work to make sure the second rad gets mainly outside air as now it is sucking some of the hot engine bay air as well.
I have used motorised ball valves to isolate the trailer radiator, as well we have 3 ways to heat water for shower etc and one of those is using a heat exchange, I have used one to isolate that as well.
Just be careful as some of them can handle 100 deg C water, but only in a 40 deg C operating environment !!!
I also use DC controllers, so I can actually have 4 levels of cooling, depending on requirements.
I also have the ability, via dashboard switches, to run any or all of them off the solar/lithium pack installed, once they are full, or the 270 amp alternator.
I also have led's on the dash to tell me which banks are getting power, just a bit of warning if a fuse blows for any reason.
Happy with how it all works.
I guess that you are finding that just your original radiator with thermatics is not enough as they are not pulling the same cfm through it as the engine fan. Think I told you this a couple of years ago ?
Cheers
William

PS This from an American forum, guy has a Detroit powered bus, the last sentence is the interesting one.

The bus will start to get hot when tackling a large hill, 2 miles or more. It'll also get hot when pushing it a little bit on very hot day and no grade. If I run with the back doors open it helps a lot.

[jon_d]

tackling a large hill, 2 miles or more

Australian hills are bumps in the US. .... Probably a 1000m (3000ft) climb or more of the Rockies.

[El Gringo]

Thanx William,
Yep we have had the conversation re an extra radiator, always knew I would have to do it in the end...
I have fully ducted mine, no chance of recycled air to my rad, and did the back door exhaust as well.
Even though it's obvious that the thermo's aren't moving the same amount of air as the original, it's hard to imagine much more air being moved.
With the 4 thermo's running the blast of air out the rear door is amazing.

Still a little way from getting to do this job, but seeing as it came up in discussion I thought I would ask how you both went about it.
Some good ideas, thanx. Appreciate the tip re operating temp for the motorised valves as well.
I will probably upgrade to the electronic controllers too when I do the whole job.

Also, do you still have any contacts for the coolant your using, would like to get some of that sometime too.

Cheers,

[dapope]

tackling a large hill, 2 miles or more

Australian hills are bumps in the US. .... Probably a 1000m (3000ft) climb or more of the Rockies.

Not wrong there! We did a couple in excess of 10000 ft... 3000m plus

[Dot]

Were those "bumps" in the states double/triple lanes??

[dapope]

Were those "bumps" in the states double/triple lanes??

Some were, a couple we did though were standard two lane, with plenty of pullover spots. The autos get a workout using the hold facility

[Toolman]

Back to overheating, the first and often most over looked problem is the radiator cap. 1 psi lost can make +5 degrees difference to coolant temp.

The first thing I do is to put a new cap on