A/C condenser to Tranny cooler

I'm sure this has been gone over before so I must have not typed the correct search words in...anyway.

Does the a/c condenser have enough flow through it to not starve the tranny? I guess I could hook it up and find out. Who is running theirs like this? My little aux cooler doesn't seem to do much while crawling, the temp still goes 230ish. I'm venting the hood at the same time so maybe that will help also. I was thinking the condenser would be a nice heat exchanger if it flows enough. This is a trail only rig, no DD.

Thanks.

Do you have a trans temp gauge or are you reading that off the main temp? A good trans cooler will more than do it's job so I'd just get a better one. Can't remember what I bought but it was under $50 and the trans rarely gets over 200. Also I disconnected it from the radiator so the cooler is doing 100% of the work. It's not a bad thing for the trans fluid to get up around 230 either.

There is another change over that you could do, It will drop the temp some, try switching over to AMSOIL. I know that it sound a little wired but it will make your trans run cooler. Here is the web page
www.amsoil.com/products/atf.html
Take a look theres info on the page. If you are intrested I know a dealer.

Ok, yes, I have a tranny temp guage and yes I have an external cooler rated at 16k gvw(or close to it) and yes, I am running synthetic fluid. Maybe I should have expounded alittle more. I am also have p/s overheating issues(I added a small p/s cooler that didn't seem to do much good either). So I was thinking of using my current aux tranny cooler as a extra p/s cooler and using the a/c condensor as my new tranny cooler. I will probably bypass the cooler in the rad also. So...will the a/c condensor have adequate flow to feed the tranny?

Thanks.

why not use the a/c condenser as a ps cooler

that'd be a big ps cooler

I've heard of it done


Umm, also synthetics and the aw4 dont last together very long... I've only heard/seen 2 things kill the aw4 the wrong type of atf, or synthetics

Earlier this summer I cleaned out my trail-rig's AC condenser and hooked it back up as a tranny cooler. I took the fluid out of the radiator, and mounted a remote filter. No real reports on it's usefulness, only driven 10 miles since... The AC cond is pretty big though... and where it sits in front of the rad? I doubt it'll be any problem at all.

OTOH July 4th I replaced my DD 88's cooling sys. and installed a 'big' 24k GVW tranny cooler and remote filter... Now that cooler weather has set in, I am not sure that was the wisest thing to do... not clear if the trans is getting warm enough.... OTOH keeping hot oil out of the radiator hasn't hurt engine cooling.

Hindsight would be a cooler with a thermostat... and getting the remote filter housing that either comes with a temp gage ($80 Permacool) or at least one that has a port for a sender :dunno: The generic Summit ($30 Permacool) filter kit I got for the trail rig had a port and brass plug... the next two I got didn't.

rust bucket xj said:

Umm, also synthetics and the aw4 dont last together very long... I've only heard/seen 2 things kill the aw4 the wrong type of atf, or synthetics

Click to expand...

I've been running it for almost 2 years w/out any problems. I've put all kinds of atf in aw4's over the years from atf+2,+3, Mercon, and syn's. I've only seen 2 fail. One was a freak thing, one was a cooler hose that blew off and the guy ran it until it quit. Hopefully you're wrong and I'm right or else I'll be :repair:

Woody, I've also noticed a difference in the colder weather with the trans temps but haven't noticed a difference in performance of the trans. I have heard that you can run the trans too cool and was thinking of putting a bypass in but I don't drive it on the street any more.