overheating on the race track
 

I have an FD#S , the problem is that it get overheating only on the race track , I mean not that hot , but it get hotter . So I' was wondering what is the problem , meady I should buy another radiator or another front bumber I dunno.

My car is street ported and running at the standar 10psi boost.

I don't want to change the front bumper cause i love the standar look , but meaby I should cahnge it , cause my car have a lots of mod and meaby that the reason of the overheating problem.

Please let me know if you have had the same problem, and if you find the solution

bigger radiator? thats the first thing I would do.

There are two parts to cooling:

1. Oil
2. Water

For #1, it's a good idea to get an oil temp gauge so you can see what is happening there. You may need some upgrades in the oil cooling department depending on what your temps are on the track.

For #2:

a) Larger radiator (Fluidyne or PWR would be good choices)
b) Seal the sides of the radiator to make sure air doesn't go around the radiator instead of through it
c) Lower temp thermostat (or a drilled stock thermostat)
d) Run a higher percentage of water (or switch to Evans)
c) open up the nose for more air with something like the N-tech Shark Mod

Good luck.

Thanks very much for your help I really apreciate it.

Sorry for my ignorance but If I have a standar thermostar , how big I have to do the hole to it.

Listen to Mahjik, and Crispy has a list of mods for cooling on the track, may have to search for it.

But what do you mean by hot vs. normal driving.

Of course it gets hotter on the track than on the street. What do you mean "not that hot"? What temps are you seeing?

A litle uppeer than the midle of the gauge , just betwin the midle and the upper part of it. like 3/4 I'm still have the original water temp gauge , but I think that I should buy another one.

It the second time in my life that that happens to me in that car , the first time was with the other engine , steet racing in curved road on the mountains racing with a M3 E36 of a friend of mine. In that ocation was a litle bit diferent but everytime that that happens to me I get scare and I try to get the temperature down going slowly and don't pushing the car.

I notice that the temperature was hi cause I have presetting in the AEM EMS to get the car a lot of rich if the temperature get more than 110°C so I thing that the temperature get to that. I know that I dint brake the engine cause I'm still using it without loosing coolant , but I get so F... scare about it. meby I should to do the same configuration but when it get upper than 100°C, It really works.

You still have the stock guage? You are playing with fire. Even with EMS, it's a good idea to have a guage mounted for quick refrence.

Yes I know I should buy one , and I will.
I know there is a brand that make some digital gauges , I think that meaby that's the best option to be more accurate

Any gauge is only as accurate as the sender. A digital readout vs. a needle means nothing for accuracy. Same can be said of stepper motor driven gauges as well.

wich one do you recomend best?

I have used the VDO vision gauge with the matched sender. Autometers also seem to be popular. An electrical gauge (where wires connect the sensor to the actual gauge) is easier to install than a mechinical one.

Look around http://www.egauges.com/ for some decent offerings.

Good luck,

-bill

True, but the digital ones are a lot easier to read at a glance. When I had the autometer mechanical it was much slower to read because of the small numbers and hash marks. I have this dual oil/water temp gauge in my FC:

http://www.pegasusautoracing.com/pro...asp?RecId=4754

Another nice feature of this gauge is it has a peak hold function and an alert function. you can set a temperature level (one for each readout) and it will flash a warning light when you hit it.

I will say that I have had a couple of sender failures, which were annoying.

wich is the temperature that the coolant should be at race?

Like this ones:

http://www.egauges.com/vdo_grou.asp?Series=Cyber_Red

I disagree. I don't like digital gauges because you have to actually focus your eyes on them, then read the number and then wait while your brain decides if that number is ok or not. You look at the gauge again two minutes later and read another number and your brain has to decide if this new number is better or worse.

With a simple analog needle a quick glance from the corner of your eye is all it takes for viewing and it's simple to recall that as long as the needle is at x o'clock or less everything is fine, and your brain can much more quickly and easily tell if the trend of the reading on that gauge is rising, falling or steady without having to think about numbers. Unless the digital gauges have alarms to bring the driver's attention to out of spec parameters (for instance a Stack or Pi digital dash) I don't care for them.

I have to agree with DamonB here. The military (Air Force, IIRC) did some research into this and determined that properly set up analog (or simulated analog) displays were easier to get information from at a glance. Not as big a deal for just a single gauge or two, but real important in a fighter cockpit.

One thing you can do with analog gauges is to rotate them so that the needles point to 12-oclock for a "normal" operating point. That way it is fairly simple to glance at them and tell if something is off and needs more mental attention.

Perhaps more important than type of gauge is getting them up near your normal field of vision. My current set of gauges are mounted way too low in the console and I have to move my head way down just to see them (effectively taking my eyes off the road for a period of time). I need to remount them up a the level of the dash cluster.

-b

I would also agree that for track driving, get a gauge with Peak/Hold/Warning functions. FYI, I'll be using the Greddy Warning gauges.

It would help to give us a list of all your mods. (example, some front mount IC's can cause o'heating at the track).

The SPA gauge I linked to has programmable flashing lights for each of the two readouts. I agree with you on principle, but the analog gauge I had (autometer that the previous owner had installed) was a pain in the ass, because hash marks were small and a huge part of the gauge was useless range:

https://img152.imageshack.us/img152/6898/2606tk5.jpg

Street ported engine , single turbo convertion , big intercooler but in the original place , AEM EMS , and ussually in my country we race in a very hot days. I unly run 3 laps of the curse and the car was hot, In the street it never get that hot, meaby cause we race at nigth

Are you sure you still have your undertray on the car ? 3 laps seems a bit soon, but possible.

post some pics of your setup including the engine bay, view of the radiator from the front bumper and view of the radiator from the engine bay.

Go back and read Majik's post earlier in the thread - he covers the important bits. Making sure that all the air that comes in the front of the nose goes through the radiator and doesn't spill around it - that is critical.

The cooling on stock FDs is marginal at best. Once you start upping the HP, you start producing more heat, Not upgrading the radiator to a larger, better flowing unit is pretty much a recipe for disaster at high power levels. Are you running dual oil coolers? That's also very important to get the temps down.

Good luck,

-b

Heres a little trick I use at the track to keep temps down. SOunds silly but it's good for 15 degrees. Run your heater full blast through the defroster. Seriously, it helps. Since you should be running with the windows down, you wont even notice the heat in the car.