I am so frustrated with my oil cooling system at the moment, and am about to just take the car somewhere to have someone fix. Tonight I finally started the car after almost a year of it sitting in the garage. After letting it warm up and taking it for a drive around the block, oil is leaking again.

What I have:
Mocal thermostat
Mocal 19-row cooler on passenger side
Factory driver's side cooler
re-speed oil filter pedestal

Last fall I had oil leaking from around the mocal thermostat. I didn't have time (work & house stuff) to work on the car so unfortunately it say for almost a year. So last week I took off everything and noticed that on the oil thermostat one of the fittings had a slight dent it in. So I bought a new thermostat and re-installed everything.
Tonight after noticing the oil spot on the floor, I looked from underneath and it looks like oil is coming from almost every fitting on the thermostat.

I'm not sure what I can do next other than have someone else look at it. I'll upload some pictures from my phone in a bit.

 

What type of fittings are you using?

 

Summit

 

A/N or NPT

 

-10 an

 

Pretty typical for Summit fitting to leak, replace it with better brand.

 

Hose Brand is also a major factor. I have seen some of the cheap -AN hose where instead of rubber they use plastic and then the really cheap fittings that come with the little brass compression piece that goes inside of the fitting itself.

when it comes to brands stick with the tried and true...Earls, Russell, Areoquip, etc.

I've had some hit and misses with Jegs brand...but I wouldn't even consider using off brands when it come to fuel and oil systems, especially in my 7.

 

As stated, stick with brand name fittings. Also, make sure you use the proper tools to assemble to hoses. I can get any fittings you want just let me know what you need.

 

I'm not sure if I remember the brand of the hose I bought. It was the black-nylon braided style. I think all of my fittings were summit except for one of them was earl's because summit didn't have the bend degree that I needed. I bought summit because theirs were all black (I wanted all black fittings/hose).
I'll see if I can dig through some receipts and get more info.

It sounds like at a minimum I need to replace the fittings, and possibly the hose. This time around should I go with something easier like a push-on hose?

 

Luckily Summit saved all my order history on their website. Here's all the parts that I bought connect the hoses. Note that I already had -10AN adapters for my stock oil cooler and oil filter pedestal so they are not included in this list. I need to go through all of my parts and see what I actually ended up using for the fittings, because I bought more than I needed or some did not work where I thought they would.

1 EAR-184004ERL - Assembly Lubricant, for Hose Assembly, 8 oz., Each $6.95
5 SUM-220087B - Fitting, Hose End, 90 Degree, -10 AN Hose to Female -10 AN, Aluminum, Black Anodized, Each $84.75
3 SUM-220090B - Fitting, Hose End, Straight, -10 AN Hose to Female -10 AN, Aluminum, Black Anodized, Each $26.85
1 SUM-240015B - Hose, Braided Nylon, Black, -10 AN, 15 ft. Length, Each $99.95
1 SUM-900110 - AN Wrench, Aluminum, Anodized, -10 AN, Each $10.75
1 AER-FBM4464-10AN FITTING 180 DEG BLACK, Each $33.95
1 FRA-900670INDIVIDUAL TEST KIT, Each $13.95
1 EAR-AT815010ERLANO-TUFF S-SEAL, Each $36.95
1 SUM-220086B-10 45 DEGREE BLACK HOSE END, Each $16.95

 

Pictures of the mess. Not sure if there's any leakage at the oil coolers yet, but I don't see any drops/oil accumulating on the cooler ducts. I'll have to pull the bumper cover to be sure.



On this second one, you can see the nice layer of gunk starting to coat my steering rack.

 

I wouldn't use push lock there. The nylon braided hose is pretty easy to assembly if you have the right tools. I will get you pricing on all those fittings in a better brand.

 

...another thing you could try if you wanted to is this on the threads:

Thread Sealants : Permatex® High Performance Thread Sealant

Its common knowledge that -AN fitting don't require any sealant or teflon tape however I'm paranoid about leaks with all the vibrations and engine movement in the 7. So I use just a little bit of permatex on the threads of all my -AN fittings...just the thread, never on the contact face of the fittings.

 

Yeah, I guess that could rule out a leak caused by the fitting and then show if the leak is coming from the hose installed into the fitting. Is that sealant similar to loc-tite and makes removal of the fittings difficult in the future, or is it soft like teflon tape?

 

Also, I'm wondering if I even need the mocal oil thermostat? My driver's side cooler still has the factory thermostat in it. Removing the mocal thermostat could take out several points of failure and simplify my connectivity.

 

Can't really tell from the picture but is the allen head bolts on the thermostat facing the drivers side frame rail or toward the engine?

-Dan

 

allen head bolts facing drivers side frame.

 

It looks to me like either the fittings aren't tight enough, they're cheaply made and leaking as stated above or the thermostat has a defect in the casting and is weeping oil. If I had to guess I'd say it's not the thermostat itself but the lines.

-Dan

 

That permatex is like plaster. Its soft until it dries and then it hardens to plaster consistency...if any gets in the lines of say the fuel system then it will disintegrate and it won't clog the injectors like Teflon tape would. Not like locktite at all.

Sent from my DROID RAZR using RX7Club

 

From the first picture, it looks like oil is leaking out of the collar, that's where their fitting leaks the most, if you Google Summit fitting leaks you'll find a tons of topic about it. 7 years ago I had their fittings in my other car and they were leaking at the exact same spot right out of the box, guess they never bother to fix the issue even with lots of complain from their customer.

If you want black fittings, I would go with Fragola Series 2000 or Mr. Gasket, Fragola also have Nylon braided hose. I have heard good things about Fragola and their price is pretty reasonable, Mr. Gasket is what BAT carries, the site XLR8 recommended in his dual oil cooler list. I've read somewhere that Mr. Gasket is just rebadged Aeroquip with different color, not sure if that's true or not.