[dfairchild19]

I was just looking at the radiator situation last night and what to do with it. I have a 94 donor truck and contemplated using the radiator and intercooler out of it. It would just not look as clean as a direct replacement as it is about 40+ inches long and thats at the bottom where it indents in for the intercooler ducts coming through the core support and I would also have to modify the core support bracing. I would like to use the intercooler from the 94 but it is going to be really close height wise. It is 16 inches tall and I have about 18 inches between the hood latch and the frame rails but this is with the 2 inch body lift threw in that was with the truck(I think I am set on running a 1 inch body lift, although I do not want to, to help with clearances like you mentioned) so I will end up with 17 inches between the hood latch and the frame rails. If it will work out i think my best bet is to run an aluminum replacement radiator and the 94 intercooler.

I threw the core support and radiator in the truck last night to get a feel where the drive train needs to end up, front to back anyway. It looks like where I have it currently front to back is about right as my fan clutch is about 2-2.5 inches from the radiator and the rear of the head is about 1-1.5 inches from the recess in the cab. I can't do much about side to side as I am using the 2nd gen Dodge mounts and it gives me about 3/16 of an inch between the mount and the boxed frame on each side. Now I think that I am just stuck on the top to bottom location. Last night was one of those nights where I just stood around and stared at everything and I felt stuck or maybe overwhelmed trying to get everything to work in such a tight space.

How did your bracket for the a/c work for you? I will go this route as well if I can figure out what to do with the water inlet as it seems to run into the frame and the belt routing. Since I am boxing the entire frame I might just take out a recess in the rail and box it all up so that it looks clean and smooth. Then comes that extra idler pulley. Any advice or work around for not having to custom make some bushings and brackets for it? I've already made many custom brackets and plan to make many more but I'm not sure this is one I want to tango with.

Did you use the mounting point on the side of the 205 to help support it? If its in your thread I must have missed it after reading it the past 10 times!!

Thanks for the help! You're saving me a lot of money and stress with your thread and your help.

I might try to make my own build thread if I can find the time to give all of the info of my work to this point.