Quote:
Originally Posted by 70TWO NOVA
What went wrong with yours?
|
Neither would cool my engine when on the road course. 10 minutes in and I would be at 230+ deg. They did well on the street.
The first started to leak after a year, they warrantied it, but said I have a blown head gasket and they will not warranty it again. The replacement did no better cooling the engine.
I replace the t stat with a stewart, replaced water pump with a high flow, added coolant tubes front to rear on the engine,also tapped into the outlets of the water pump and ran hoses to the center siamese cylinders just under the block deck, added a big setrab oil cooler. All this based on their solid claim the rad. was good to 700 HP, and my car had 275 wheel HP. So, it couldn't be the radiator.
Prior to installing the new replacement champion radiator I block tested the engine, it tested good. And this car did not have coolant loss issues. I said screw it, pulled the heads, sent them out to machine shop and reinstalled. I also changed the car over to Evans coolant. I installed an AF meter, fuel pressure gauge and autometer temp gauge to compliment my factory gauge.
The temp issue remained.
Cut apart the 3 month old champion and found at the very least 1/3 of the tubes were restricted (pinched) and the un pinched tubes are less than .030.
Champion radiator is a 3 row 5/8 tube.
I still have the cut up radiator if you want to take a look.
I bought a griffin and all the cooling issues disappeared. It is a 2 row 1.5" tube, and the tubes look to be about .080. It also has 9 or so more usable rows than the champion. Even in 100 deg temps on the road course and the current engine making 435 RWHP I do not see temps over 220 deg. We ran Vegas just before optima this spring. I was on track for over 40 minutes straight. Never saw 215 deg. But my brakes were not happy
So all this proves that I am an idiot for believing in Champion's B.S., I called them multiple times, they were adamant it was not the radiator.
After I cut apart the radiator I sent them pictures of what I found. They never responded.