A friend is buying a '80 limited with 60K miles. It has a small radiator leak. I have a spare radiator from an '87. Will this work in the '80? This car also has the oil cooler up front like the gen 2 cars. Any info would be great. Thanks

 

I doubt it, I know that the 84 - 85 12A ones are different, maybe with a little fabrication, but hes better off just getting a radiator shop to rot it out, and then weld it. I had one done one and these guys are good, straightened all the fins and painted it, it looked brand new

 

That is probably the best think to do anyway. Thanks

 

Ok looked at my mazda book

They go like this:

79-82
83-85
86-88
89-91/92

 

i may have an extra radiator from a 79. if interested, email me
felix@atg1.com

 

My friend decided to take it to a radiator shop. He figures he will end up with something that he knows the condition of. Thanks for the input everyone.

 

It has the oil cooler in front of the radiator?

 

the 80's have the oil cooler below the radiator

 

79-82 did

83-85 had that crappy one under the filter , unless it was a -SE. 84-85 -Se's had it in the same place as the 79-82's

 

Yeah I know, I have an '80 too... the comment that it was in front like an FC kinda shocked me a little

IN fact pretty soon I'll be digging my radiator/oil cooler/electric fan setup out of the ol' 80, and the '85 will be getting a.... heart transplant? no... sweat gland transplant? Whatever you call it, I'm gonna be fixing Mazda's attempt to make things better

 

Yeah I put a T2 oil cooler on my 83. had to put it in front of the radiator as it was larger than the 1st gen one.

and thanks to my buddys recent purchase, I know now why everyone wants a Rx-4 oil cooler, those things are absolutely huge!

 

Really? I thought SE's ahd the same radiator as the 12A's of the same year and mounted the oil cooler in front of the radiator.

 

Yes, the -SE's had the oil cooler mounted in front of the radiator.
'79-82 did not have it in front, it was directly underneath the radiator.

And FCs had the oil cooler in front of the radiator, buried waaay deep up in there where you can barely get at it even after you take all the front sheetmetal off...

I'm told all '84-85 cars have the provisions for the front-mount oil cooler like the -SE has. It would be interesting if I could just go to a junkyard, find an -SE, and grab the whole oil cooler assembly and just bolt it right in to the GSL.

 

I DID!

actually I got my buddies old T2 oil cooler, and went to the junkyard and swiped a couple of NA FC oil cooler lines, Then swiped the oil filter towers from a 80 and another NA FC. I do not remember which tower I used but it was the taller of the two to make the filter more accesable. Oh yeah get a pre 83 or a FC heater hose. the hard metal line that runs from the fire wall to the lower radiator hose.

the only trickey part was were the heater hose and oil cooler hose went into the block by the spark plugs. It was a T for both hoses, a few seconds after aplying the ol hacksaw it was A stright pipe and a good hose clamp keeps things together.

Get new o rings for your oil filter tower.

get new heater hoses.

get new crush washers for the oil cooler lines.

if you want the pre 83 setup get the radiator & fan shroud. but I just attached mine to the bar in front of the radiator using the old T2 mounts and some bolts.

PM me with any qeustions if your serious.

 

Thats basically what I did, but I have an FC oil cooler mounted upside down, with Mazdatrix stainless lines.

 

I dig those SS lines

But did this on the cheap.

Maybe I will upgrade when I street port my motor and get it in?

 

Mine happened to be on my old FC that I was parting out.

 

Thats how I got the T2 cooler. It was on my buddies wreck that was in my driveway.

 

Well anyways I'm going to be grabbing the whole radiator/cooler/electric fan/heater pipe assembly out of my '80, along with the oil filter tower. I just thought it'd be neat if there was a more elegant way, like Mazda SHOULD have done (Or does a 2nd-gen cooler fit directly in place of the -SE cooler with no special brackets or modification?)

BTW I had a different way of eliminated the tee when I put together the '84 engine that sits in the '80... I put a 2" section of hose on the fitting that faces the rear of the car, applied a ton of Form-A-Gasket (the brown nasty-smelling junk) onto a pipe plug, stuffed the plug in the hose and secured it with a clamp. Never leaked! The stock '80 heater hose fit right on to the other fitting despite it sticking a few inches further out from the engine.

 

get the heater rubber hoses and the short hose and the metal line coming in from the lower section of the radiator.

 

Well DUH.

What I want to know is if the 2nd-gen cooler will bolt up to the SE mounting points, and do '84-85 12A cars have the mounting points for the SE oil cooler? (OK so that's a two-parter)

 

I don't believe the coolers mount the same way.