Air Intake And Hood Vents.

Its starting to get a little warmer here in North Cackalacky (getting up close to 60) and last summer i had numerous probs with loosing antifreeze and overheating. Well I'm wanting to get rustys intake kit with the big 6x9 filter and some labaron hood vents. Think this will hold me out through the hot summer days?

It will help. I live through 110 degrees here and I never have a problem. I would do a back flush on the radiator first off, that'll help alot. I did that with mine and it helped. Then my radiator cracked like 2 weeks later and I just replaced it altogether. Also are u sure your electric fan Is kicking on. I found mine wasn't and that getting fixed kept it alot cooler

Well my radiator is the only cooling item that i havent replaced. and if i end up having to replace my radiator, can i swap in a radiator with a cap already on it and eliminate the coolant bottle?

I cant see how the intake kit is going to help you out, especially when sucking in hot air directly. Check your fan and thermostat with that.

well my buddy has a GC and got rustys intake kit and lowered his operating temp from 220-230 to about 190-200 in 90 degree weather, which is what im after.

Yea, my jeep overheats like a bad hooker on a hot day. It likes to stay at 220-230 in the summer. Only quick thing i can think of to do is the vents also.

Cherokeekid88 said:

well my buddy has a GC and got rustys intake kit and lowered his operating temp from 220-230 to about 190-200 in 90 degree weather, which is what im after.

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Maybe his original filter was in bad shape or something, thats weird for his temperature to go down by that much just because of a short ram intake. Coincidence maybe?

I to thought it was normal to run at 210 in the summer until I purchased a new rad and bingo down to between 170 and 195-even when its 40c and crawling up a hill, The rad was a little bigger than the stock one though. You can run without a hood and its still gonna run warm if your rad is getting plugged/restricted

So i should take my money and invest in a 3 core radiator? sounds like it would be a much better purchase than an intake kit. whats a really good one i can get?

If you are overheating then I would surmise that your aux fan is not working and 9 time out of 10 that is becuase either the fan burnt out or the relay stopped working....fix that and your problems should go away.

no both of my fans work. that was the first problem and still it overheats.

If you have an 88, and the radiator is original, it needs to be replaced. Don't bother trying to switch over to the open system(radiator cap type radiator) unless you've been blowing up pressure bottles. I put a 3 row GDI radiator and converted to the open system on my 90, and I put a two row nice brass radiator from Performance radiator on the 88 and kept the closed system. The two row works better. How's your water pump? Any leaking at the weep hole? Have you changed the cap on the pressure bottle? Done a reverse flush? How's the clutch on the fan?

Even here in CO, a lot of people put vents in their hoods. It really helps if you are doing a lot of crawling.

Fred

Cherokeekid88 said:

So i should take my money and invest in a 3 core radiator? sounds like it would be a much better purchase than an intake kit. whats a really good one i can get?

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I wouldn't recommend the 3-core's. I've run them from GDI. The first did ok on a stock motor until a broken motor mount allowed the fan to get intimately close to the radiator. The second one didn't do as well with my stroker. I had it checked out as there was a problem with GDI's being plugged with solder from the factory. The rodding didn't find much occlusion. The rad shop recommended a Modine 2 core. I haven't regretted the change.

The GDI has three 1/4" tubes (cores), The Modine has two 5/8" tubes. While you do give up a bit of surface area per tube volume, the Modine's 1 1/2" of cooling tube is far better than the 3/4" of the GDI's tubes.

The Modine isn't that much more expensive. I would do a rad change before an intake kit or vents.

If you are set on the 3-core, drop me a line. I have a rodded GDI 3-core that could be for sale.

Bones :skull1:

Go for the three core- you will not regret it, I have plenty room between the rad and fan. It was only $225 cnd. I actually have to put cardboard in front of it in the winter time, never touched 210f

I was running around 222 degrees cold or hot outside. It didnt matter. When I put the Lebarn hood vents in it dropped the temp dowm to 210 and it never goes above that. If your loosing antifreeze and overheating I would consider a good radiator and the vents.

Having run a 3 row GDI for 5 years (completely plugged, with regular coolant changes) and then replacing it with a Modine 2 row, I would highly recommend the Modine.

Speaking of hood vents, I've heard the ones off of a 260Z are one of the better choices.

What type hood vents are you all using, and what are the pros and cons? (cost, ease of installation, effectiveness, etc)

I don't know how original this idea is, but it's what i came up with for the extreme differences in our weather temps.
What i did was open the hood and cut the corner end at the windshield on the hood seal. I bent the metal down and tucked the rubber underneath it for use in the winter. The heat comes out of the angled corner and you never smell a thing. In the winter bend it back up and put the rubber back in place for a complete seal.
takes 5 minutes to make, and 2 minutes to change from summer to winter.
Hope the photos help...
http://good-times.webshots.com/album/557898940lpadlK
-B

Definitely the Modine, it allows for future electric fan conversion as well as a great rad.

Ive been through about 2 coolant bottles. I want to get an Aluminum coolant bottle and some of those high temp hoses along with the Modine 2 core Radiator. Just wondering how much would a 2 core modine for an 88 run me?? is it a direct swap? My water pump is brand new and my clutch fan is fine, everything has been replaced but the radiator.

Overheating!
My '96 overheated consistently when driven hard or slow in very hot weather (>95 degrees). The fans worked (tested mechanical fan via factory manual test, verified 219 degree set point for auxiliary fan), waterpump worked, thermostat worked, radiator did not seem to be occluded, no obvious source of the problem. It has been solved (99.5%, anyway) with the following fixes, in order from most important to least:

Very helpful
180 degree thermostat vs. 195 stock
Manual switch for aux. fan
Proping up the back of the hood 1" to allow hot air out
Getting into low range immediately when headed off road to keep the fan speed up, even if low range is not needed by the terrain

Slightly helpful
High flow water pump from ? (cant recall, but the "good" one)
Running 42% glycol (the minimum allowed--sometime try straight water or water with only a radiator cleaning agent for 60 minutes, it is stunningly better at heat transfer than water/glycol--too bad I can't run straight water all the time!)
High flow thermostat

Questionable at best
GDI three core radiator (luckily, my old one sprung a leak just when I decided to change it out, so I don't feel bad about this being a nonproductive change)
High flow thermostat housing

FYI, I was not impressed with the GDI radiator--there have to be better units than this out there. But it has worked OK for the last 18 months.

Some say that running a low temp thermostat is not good for losts of things on the xj, maybe they are right, but I had no choice. I have taken to partially covering the radiator when on road or in cool weather in an effort to run closer to 195. Then just uncover when going off road or it gets hot.

Rick