After procrastinating for years but finally deciding that, with the summer months coming up, it would be a good insurance to go ahead and get an upgraded radiator, I knuckled down and forked out the cash for a PWR radiator from RX7store (after checking with Jason to see if it was in stock, the radiator arrived a week later). I figured I'd install it after I linearized my temp gauge, so I could compare differences driving under the same conditions. At first I was leery of tearing into my dash, but linearizing the temp gauge was easier than I expected (quick tip: in order to avoid melting the clear plastic gauge cover when soldering the jumper wire onto the gauge circuit board, just pre-coat the jumper wire ends with solder, then heat up the wire close to board with the soldering iron; carefully push the jumper wire into the holes, and just as you feel it sink into solder in the board, let off the soldering iron. That way you won't have the soldering iron close to the clear plastic and possibly melt it).
I figured I'd install the PWR radiator in a couple of weeks. But yesterday my coolant buzzer went off. After all these recent threads about o-rings, I was thinking "great-- now it's my turn..." But there were no previous warning signs, like no sweet-smeling steam clouds on startup, or bubbles in the filler neck. Then as I was examining underneath the car today, I saw just a little spot of coolant by the front of the bellypan. Closer examination of the stock radiator revealed slowly increasing leakage by one of the POS stock plastic end tanks. Damn. Good thing I bought that PWR unit. Guess I'll have to tear into the car this weekend...
FWIW, I've been very careful about keeping temps under control since I've owned the car, and I've never thrashed on the radiator. And yet it decided to suddenly fail. Just a note to those with the stock radiator-- watch that thing carefully. And get an upgraded radiator. Money well spent, and not just for the added cooling capacity.

 

And people say why upgrade the stock radiator if there is nothing wrong with it.

I had the same thing happened to me, except I smelled it before the buzzer went off.

 

Yup, the stocker is a piece of poop. Mazda wants a chunk of change for it too......

 

It amazes me how many people still use the factory unit. It amazes me even more that they mod the car with various upgrades before ever even considering the radiator. THe only thing that amazes me more is that they bitch about it when the stock one lets go and so does their o ring.

 

That's funny because I just posted this on another thread. Talk about your fortuitous post!!


quote:
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Originally posted by Snook
I disagree with upgrading the radiator and y pipe
those mods are pretty much useless unless your y pipe is leaking or you end tanks broke on your radiator. You don't get that much power from the y pipe and the stock radiator works fine unless you have a front mount.

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I disagree on both of these:

The stock radiator works fine for most uses........until it breaks. A good quality aftermarket radiator will be more reliable.

They efini y-pipe added about 10 hp to the FD when Mazda put in in the car in 96(??). After installing a downpipe on my car, it was boosting to 12 psi. Next, I installed the Efini pipe, and opened up the stock airbox. The car was boosting to 15 1/2 with no change in boost control. That's 3 1/2 psi of additional boost from those 2 mods. I can't say how much each provided, but I have to assume that the y-pipe had to be at least one psi.

 

honestly our cars are 10 years old...probably replace the radiator anyways..REGARDLESS... the stock is not a POS and is more then enough cooling ability for 90% of you out there...now the stock AST is a POS in comparsion.

 

I still have both the stock radiator and AST. I realize many people out there have had these bust, leak coolant, fry their engine. I know I'm probably on borrowed time cause if it happens to several people, I don't consider it a fluke. Yeah, they work but like everything else, it can and will break. Not necessarily a reflection on the part..unless it breaks often to a lot of people. =)

 

Radiator and Power FC are the next two mods on my list!

 

Yep, you never think it will happen to you until it does. I started up the car one day and while driving down the road a few minutes later I noticed something fishy: stock temp gauge is about nine o'clock, but the PFC is reading 35C. Hmm... pull over, pop the hood and there's coolant leaking from the stock AST.

Funny thing was that this guy in a moving van rides by and says "Broke down on ya already?" I assumed he thought it was some fancy new sports car. Gotta love the 7.

 

The exact same thing happened to me la couple of years back....Coolant light keep on going off, had to keep topping off the coolant, however, there was no hard starting and no smoke on start-up(well - no more than normal!).

After numerous times crawling under the car and looking for leaks I finally found a tiny leak in one of the OEM radiator end tanks that was getting bigger by the day (it took me a week to finally find it because I guess it was initially only coming out when the car was running and the system was under pressure).

Got the Fluidyne, converted to zero pressure Evans system and no problems since....!

It goes without saying fellas . replace the POS OEM unit ASAP! I think given the age of our cars now that it should probably be considered one of the first "reliability mods", along with the DP.

GEB.

 

Any radiator with plastice end tanks in an engine bay as hot as ours is a POS regardless of cooling ability.

Stock AST = Plastic = POS AST
Stock Radiator End Tanks = Plastic = POS Radiator

 

I'm not tracking......so what exactly are you trying to say ?

---Rich
Alum AST and Rad