Update - Another Radiator
After my wife takes me to Summit I ended up bringing home another radiator. It's a griffin. I have heard both good and bad things about this radiator. I wanted to go grab one from the local auto parts store like suggested from a couple of members but a couple things steered me away from that approach. First, I don't like the looks of those radiators. Plastic tanks, etc. And while I'm only building a daily driver, it's morphed into a really nice daily driver
My second reason, and probably the most influential were my fans. On my original radiator purchase, it came with really nice dual fans built into a custom made aluminum shroud. I really wanted to try and re-use that setup and I didn't want to have to modify it too much to make it work. The OE radiators I didn't feel were going to make that easy on me. A third reason too is the location of hose connections both being on same passenger side. Didn't want them opposite of each other.
Something else I want to mention about my original radiator purchase. I'm pretty sure it was my fault that it started leaking. And if it wasn't my fault, I'm pretty sure I damaged it anyway. I failed to flush the LS I bought before hooking it up. And that engine sat for who knows how long. And it was FULL of rust and corrosion and what not. When I went to flush it after finding the fluid turning brown pretty quick it was already too late and it was clogging everywhere. I pulled it out and dumped it and tried to flush best I could. Then I re-installed and ran 2 different times, 2 different flush agents through it. I was only ever using distilled water, but I would add the flush agent to that and let it run for a while. I would take it around the block. Do this for a few days. Then I would drain everything again.
So after doing this twice, I finally got everything flushed. But there was still this milky white stuff stuck to all the internal fins that I could see through the filler port, that stuff wasn't coming out. But by this time, the radiator had seen so much crap go through it I just didn't feel right about getting a replacement. So I called the company back and asked them about all this. This is when the guy told me about the possibility of current in my water and electrolysis. And he didn't hesitate about all the stuff I talked to him about going through my radiator. He just said he wanted to take a look at it and simply replace it. Maybe he didn't care. I dunno. But it still bothers me I did all that. Well I never heard back from him after all this corona mess. Still no radiator returned. Not answering phone calls or emails. He may have went out of business.
This griffin was cheap enough and locally available with a good enough warranty I should be able to make it work. If it goes south, it's my own fault going this route and I will accept that, but I refuse to believe that all these radiators are junk. They have been around too long and have too many people using them. Time will tell.
Alright, enough. Here is what I did and all the pictures.
I needed to bent out a flange to mate to the new radiator. Minimal work to make my fan shroud work with new radiator. I ended up welding a couple flat plates on an old wrench and just went to town. I also used another pair of pliers later and scarred up the aluminum a bit but whatever, I can smooth that out another time. I'm just trying to get this thing done and on the road.
I didn't feel comfortable using self tapping screws in this new radiator as they would drive in too far IMO. So I carefully drilled short holes in the outer aluminum flange and used rivets to attach the fan shroud. Worked out pretty good.
Before:
After:
Next came mounting the radiator. And SCOTI(if he hasn't given up on me yet), I know man... is probably shaking his head at this point after reading all that above, but just wait, after reading what's coming next he will probably decide to reply to this post lol, it will be too much.
I ended up having to fab a lot more than expected. And using the OE radiator I probably wouldn't have to go through this. So I only can say.... But I didn't want plastic tanks on my radiator.....
In the instructions it has a warning, it tells you to support the middle of the radiator at core support mounts if you have only the 2 saddle mounts(which is exactly what our trucks use). So I had some really nice dense packing foam that worked out perfect for the job. I made the foam a 1/8" taller than saddles to make sure it would support properly. I have a feeling this step was missed by many out there and that is the reason the radiator failed on them.
And I had to spend a couple hours on the upper mounts, had to cut and re-shape them to lower them for proper fit. The radiator sat too tall for them. About 1/2" too tall. I only got one done so far. Still have the second one to do tonight. Yeah, I'm gonna have 4-5 hours in fab work for this radiator.
Before pic, sitting really high off the core support:
Mods:
