Moonder

Radiator only will not solve your heat problem!

Remount the intercooler get a new air dam with relocation brackets and make a side panels.

Take a look at page 25-26 hope this help you

http://www.aacorvette.com/pdf/aa_c5_instructions.pdf

directnosfogger

This is interesting, what are you IAT's? you aren't actually feeding air through your intercooler to the condenser and radiator which makes me wonder how you get any air to the intercooler. I have some extra sheet metal so I will fab up those side metal pieces.

directnosfogger

Some further progress tonight. If anyone is interested in doing the same thing it's pretty cheap. Take the standard license plate holder from GM.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/1997-2004-Corvette-C5-Factory-Black-Front-License-Plate-Frame-Holder-10288541-/331163398209?hash=item4d1ae07041&vxp=mtr
The part numbers changed from the standard tutorial on the license plate mod. Now it's 85385T29 on McMaster-Carr.
Corrosion-Resistant 304 Stainless Steel Woven Wire Cloth, 5 x 5 Mesh, .047" Wire Diameter

Lloyd Christmas

That's kind of my question too. Can I get away with doing one or the other? I just want to be able to run my a/c in normal traffic.

PEETYZ

Will the A&A pieces work with the Procharger cradle and laid back radiator?

I plan on doing the front plate and i need to get an air dam plus top cover to get more air through the radiator ( I still have the larger twin intercoolers)

Luckily car runs about 198-220 depending on heat as is but it could do better.

neutron82

some people say the stock fans are as good or better than the spal fans, I disagree... I have a full size dewitts and spal fans and normally my car would be mid to high 190's while at a light with the ac on and get down to high 180's to low/mid 190's while cruising in the hot *** tx summers... recently my driver side fan started cutting off when it was switching to high speed and I noticed my coolant temps get up to about 220, that's how I knew something was going on... point is that with only one fan going on high speed it still only got to 220, if I had stock fans and only one was running I'm certain it would have been much hotter than what it was... the climate in your area may also play a factor, if you live in an area where it never really gets that hot then the stock fans may do fine

Lloyd Christmas

It was about 88 degrees here at noon. I was at 198 going t o work on the interstate with no traffic and the A/C off. Any light traffic and it goes up over 200. Any more than that and it sits between 212-220 for the most part, no a/c. Ambient temp goes up 10, so does my coolant. So 95 degrees ambient is unpleasant for me and the car.

neutron82

what are your fan on/off temps set at?... do you have an iron or aluminum block?... iron is going to run hotter obviously so I don't think there's much you could do about that

bill mcdonald

Yes.
I have the A&A kit, and my car is lowered a lot. The intercooler air damn was hitting when I drove the car. I actually broke a corner off it.

I removed the air damn form the intercooler, removed the front cover over the A&A intercooler/radiator shroud. Built a 1/4 inch piece of metal to keep the side shroud pieces in place (which you should build). Removed my licence plate cover. Made a copy out of fiberglass. This one has a hole in it. Built a shroud from the license plate to the intercooler out of sheet aluminum, backed with fiberglass to make it rigid.

Intercooler now gets all air from the license plate cover, and the radiator gets the air from the bottom of the car or what passes through the intercooler

Your air damn is not right.
Your intercooler would probably be best moved all the way forward, to mounted right off the back of the bumper bar. This will allow a large gap for air to get over the ac/radiator.

Under the hood

The tan stuff is the bare fiberglass for the duct in front of the intercooler. I made the shroud bend around to meet the length of the intercooler, and the opening is only the size of the license plate cover.

what it looks like through the copy license plate filler.


I am going to be tearing it apart and modding it again here real soon.
Intercooler mounting needs to be redone, and some more mods.

i did this when I was driving in 95-105 degrees and watching temps like a hawk. I have the stock radiator and it never went over 195. Oil on the other hand was hitting 226 on the freeway, then backing down to 220. I suppose ok enough.

directnosfogger

You guys were definitely spot on. I initially thought that air needed to travel through the intercooler, but now that I have the mesh open on the license plate and redid the air dam; water temp highest it has gone is 214 in 95 degree heat.

To explain what I did.. I inverted the stock air dam to act as a scoop and drilled it into the cradle. I think I am going to pull the crappy plastic and maybe use plexi or stronger plastic. I immediately noticed a 10 degree drop just from redoin the air dam.

cmiller8006

I have done something similar. It was 92 here today and coolant temps were 199-201. I am looking to do my own air scoop here soon.

directnosfogger

Now that is cool man, I really like that idea. I don't have foglights and everything behind the grills are completely empty. I'd love to funnel that air right into the middle compartment once I get sheet metal setup on the side of the cradle. If I could get away from the underbody air dams I'd be ecstatic. Your fiberglass panel gives me some ideas.

directnosfogger

Giving everyone an update on my cooling adventures. Replaced the radiator with the cut down Dewitts with engine oil cooler. I didn't run the oil lines yet, that's a project for another day.

What is everyone else's take on this. I'm now seeing water temps right in line with where I want to be. I am seeing between 192 and 208 driving all conditions. The weird part is that I don't see my engine oil cooling very quickly. After driving the car hard I witnessed my water at 192 and engine oil near 230.. Am I just being paranoid or could this be some kind of an air bubble? I followed the burping procedure from GM closely once I added the 50/50 mixture back in.

neutron82

230 is fine for oil temp especially after hard runs... some people see that temp or close to it just driving normally

Forcedvert

Thought I would update my cooling problem on this thread in case anybody is still dealing with the heat like me (it hit 91* today).
I finally got my Dewitt's cut down and spal fans in, I'm also using the trans cooler in radiator as a oil cooler and a separate b&m trans cooler mounted under driver headlight. Before with ac off in 90*+ air temps got to 240+ water, hotter oil temps and trans temps in the 265*+ if driven hard. Now with ac on, water never goes over 215* in traffic, oil just a bit higher, but trans only hits 184* driving hard. So even if temps are a bit higher next summer I should be ok!

Never did change my tstat.
Thanks to everyone who gave advice on this thread any many others I looked at for this issue! Sorry OP didn't mean to hijack your thread.

MVP'S ZO6

Glad you got it all sorted out!

a/c man

awesome sounds like you got it

directnosfogger

I am going to have someone custom fabricate me an air dam scoop next year once I take my car out of storage. I got tired of futzing with the air dam so I removed it entirely. Highest temps I saw was water going to 214 cruising. If all goes well maybe I'll create a jig and have my buddy produce a couple. Glad you got it sorted out.