I made my first car show this year where I can get judged and what happens? I had to get taken away on a roll back.

The bottom line of my oil cooler has a leak somewhere and EXPLODED everywhere. People followed a trail of oil from the entrance to my car and before I got out they told me I'm leaking A TON of oil.

So, I get out of my car and notice the WHOLE side of my freshly washed car was caked in oil overspray from the the car. I prop my hood and its drenched in oil along with just about everything else in there.

The weird thing is, my gauges showed no error! I was running at the normal water temp, oil temp and oil pressure. I would think there would be a reading somewhere that I would notice something was wrong! No smoke out the back, no bad readings on the gauges, nothing.

I'll upload some of the pictures tonight. I think my dad got a bunch of them.

I would have one first place, but I was disqualified because I couldn't drive to where the pictures were being taken.

My car seemed to run fine the whole way, so now I begin the tear down of the cooling system. Fun fun.

Can a beehive cooler be put on an 81 engine or should I stick with the oil cooler? I'll be doing a lot of research or will be posting a thread shortly.

Thanks,
Chris

 

Sucks to hear man, atleast you didn't lose the motor!

Better to just stick with the oil cooler.

If you went beehive, you would need to plug the oil cooler ports on the engine, and T-off the
coolant line that comes from the firewall to the engine block. Beehive cars have the T built into
the engine coolant hard line, whereas oil cooler cars had a straight pipe.

 

I tried a beehive on my '81. It can be done easily. You'll need two Tees (plastic works). One at the firewall and one at the coolant tube on the rear plate of the engine. You will also need a short bolt to fit in the banjo bolt location at the bottom of the rear plate. You can probably get one from a forum member who swapped to an air oil cooler. Or buy one from Mazdatrix (they are cheap). I don't have the part number at the moment.

 

Sorry to hear about that Chris.

Stick with the oil cooler over the bee hive....It sounds like you were just unlucky mate.

 

that's exciting!

usually its a hose and not the cooler, and B there is enough oil in there to, well i went half a lap after the drain plug came out, and it wasn't empty when i stopped, engine was 100% fine, car was a MESS though

 

I took off the cooler yesterday and WOW, the thing was kind of hacked together. The bottom bung was welded before, and whoever ground it down to make it "flat" where the crush washer should seal did a terrible job. Was completely un-even and just awful.

The top bung had a crack along it, and when the hose was attached, the PO used a screw clamp to keep it from leaking!

On top of it all, the radiator was repaired probably two times or more. It had JB weld over a hole and it was welded up along the bottom too.

Theres the problem with buying someone elses project.

 

Go to salvage yard. Replace Oil cooler. Very easy. Do not go bee hive, the front mnount oil cooler is a huge improvement over the beehive. But they did tend to leak at the fittings in time. It was actually a common prob with FC's too.

 

Gutted. Hope you get it sorted chris.

 

I put the radiator and oil cooler from a parts car I have into it over the past week. I also eliminated the red wire loom and replaced it with harness tape and some black wire loom to clean the engine bay up a bit.

Tomorrow I'll throw oil and a filter on her and see if it's all good. I have another show on Saturday I want to make it out to!

Ill post pics of the before/after later this weekend. I'll also post what called me the disqualification. I think I'm going to hang that cooler in a shop so I can have a chuckle when Im getting frustrated. haha

 

The way I had to leave the show;



Heres a before and after of the wiring. I took off the red wire loom and replaced it with harness tape and for the large wiring harness I used black wire loom to give it a clean look. I think it looks pretty good.





So far so good with no leaks from the cooler or radiator! I'll drive it around tomorrow morning before the show just to make sure it's not leaking under load and high RPMs.

 

Looking sweet... time to take a polisher to that there alternator, though.

 

Welcome to the club Lots of us had to be towed back from our first meet. My clutch decided to shred itself the first time I took mine out to a meet. Of course my cats were glowing orange, I couldn't idle below 2,500, and you needed a gas can to start it... but I didn't care I went to the meet anyway!

That was ages ago. My car has come very far since then, lol.

Jon

 

I just went ahead and bought a trailer with my car. The selling said add $1000 and take the trailer--so I did and it has been $1000 well spent.

 

I wish I could have found a deal like that! I would have purchased a trailer, too!

The one we rented from u-haul JUST fit the car on. And I mean JUST! Maybe 1/2" extra space max on the sides and the front lip cleared the wheel stops about the same. Ill have to dig for those shots. We were all surprised.

 

Well, it wasn't that simple. That summer, I was working in IL, the car was in MI, I had to bring the car and the trailer home to PA. Renting a truck was kind of expensive, so I looked around on ebay and found a 1997 Mercury Mountaineer with a V8 (Ford 5.0) and 4X4. I drove for 2 hours to check it out and it was pretty decent. I ended up getting it for $1,600 knowing that I could get home and sell it for what I paid for it.

The Mercury has been so good that I kept it. It has more than paid for it self by being a mode of transportation in the winter, road trips, hauling car parts, towing my RX-7 to races or the shop, helping my girlfriend move--twice etc.

In an extra stroke of "luck", I hit a patch of ice last winter. The Mercury spun out and the rear quarter panel hit the guard rail. Insurance paid me $2400 for the damage. I changed out the rear tail light and did the alignment at a cost of $175.