The13Bats

Of course like I said more hp equals more heat and the need for more cooling and if limit of how big a company makes a copper radiator ends under the amount of cooling a person needs then they have to move on to that larger unit in aluminum...to be honest I never checked into high performance copper units for high out put engines by that point people also want to save weight.

MotorHead

I didn't think of any weight saving. I wanted to protect my investment the best way I could and went with a BeCool rad and two 13 inch Spal fans. It was very expensive but I didn't want to see my investment overheating in a traffic jam, with no place to pull over.

The13Bats

Do you have pictures of the 13's mounted?

What made you choose the becool brand?

MotorHead

At the time BeCool was considered by many to be the best rad out there. Under normal condition I only use 1 fan.

The13Bats

I had heard that about becool a long time,

Your set up looks super nice,

I went with these 12" duals


They pull close to 4K

I wanted to get all my radiator in the air flow path what I then did was wire up 3 relays to run both fans on low then both on high because they share a shroud if I ran one and the other off it would pull from least resistance hence the off fans hole and not through the radiator,

I figure if I am paying until it hurts for a super top end radiator why waste any of it....

76C3forme

Been thinking of trying one of the 4 Fiero electric fans I still have in the garage on the '76 and get rid of the clutch fan. I used to pick those things up every time I saw one at the U-Pull-It yard. ($10-$15 each!). Must of had just under 12 of those things "In Stock".....just in case...

The worked pretty well on some older cars "back in the day". May try that on the '76.

Thanks The13Batts, for getting my mind going on another possible project

The13Bats

The fiero fan v6 fit the c2 radiator almost perfect, but that car was no power brakes or steering, 4 speed and no ac, 327 likely the 300 hp model,

before my strut rod broke and made my 69 into a frame off project I was testing fans on a used unknown condition copper radiator,

With a two speed Taurus fan the 383 would also creep day or night even with fan on high, ironically the 454 with more hp actually ran way cooler,
I have no doubt that behind a good radiator the Taurus fan would cool either engine just fine, then the next step was the Lincoln Mark VIII in non biased testing it will move more air than almost any aftermarket fan,

The biggest issue with running stock fans is the shrouds and their fitting,
the fiero shroud is almost a perfect square with out weird things here and there.

If you have a stock or near stock engine a good condition radiator I believe the v6 fiero fan might cool it, but with ac on and stuck in 100 degree weather...hum.

also you should consider a higher amp alt if you go to electric fans.

76C3forme

Good info. I did 3 V8 Fiero's back in the 90's (Still have one sitting at my dads garage) with a combination of the V8 Archie Kit and my last one which was kind of a "Hybrid" with "most of" a V8 Archie Kit and the remainder (Engine Adapter) from a street dreams kit. I liked the stock hi-torque starter option from the 280Z vs the Chevy / Mini Starters that the V8 Archie Kit used (and had numerous issues with).

On the early / 1st or 2nd one I did, I used the Archie Water Pump which essentially was a stock chevy pump where the belt drive stuck out into the wheel well. As odd as that sounds, it worked pretty well.

Later on, after the CSI / CSR / more modern electric water pumps came down in price (and up in G.P.M. !), I went with those and they worked well also. Each of the 3 builds all used the stock Fiero V6 fan and they all did well. (Even with the stock V6 radiator or an older Nova V8 radiator in the first car - 3 core I think it was).

It funny. Talking about aluminum radiators in this thread.....The car I still have at my dads now actually has one of the 1st Champion Aluminum Radiators I bought in it designed for the V8 Fiero Swap with a stock V6 Fiero Fan and CSR electric Water pump and cools very well.

Funny you mention the Taurus fan. I've seen and heard of guys also using those fans. One thing I love about technology : The "electrical / electronics" have come so far, that there are a lot of good aftermarket options (and factory stock options) especially for electric fans etc. And... you can usually pic them up pretty cheap to experiment with at the junkyards.

I agree with you 100%. The stock / older alternators will not usually keep up. Luckily the higher amp alternator rebuild kits are still fairly cheap and not that hard to do.

MotorHead

Mine was custom made and they told me they never put a shroud on the high performance stuff. They put the same rad as mine in a big block supercharged engine. It was the best setup they make and more money would not have changed anything.

They know their stuff they also made the custom supports so the fans were 1/8 in. off the rad. They said through engineering and some trial and error that was the way to get maximum cooling. You can clearly see the fans don't touch the radiator.

The13Bats

76C3forme4,

Being into kit cars as long as vettes I was always into what Archie was doing, I really liked the jack kube gt40 rebody until I saw that constipated turtle in person... my first fiero was a dd and made way for the 66 corvette and now I picked up this 87 gt I needed like two extra holes in the head, but it's extra sweet and clean and if I keep it will likely go super charged v6, like you say tech changes with times and I see pros of the sc v6 over an 8 but that all likely will never happen when the 69 is up and running again I will likely sell the poor fiero, but I love those little cars.

In most cases stock electric fans are over kill for what they are one so yeah, people have them cooling so pretty wild stuff.
Champion radiators, more on that below.


motorhead:
I agree that high cost/more money doesn't in and of itself mean anything, why do you think so many people are cooling big hp engines with cheap old Champion radiators?

From as long as I recall thinking about aftermarket "becool" was the name,

As far as never using shrouds on their high performance stuff that sounds like a contradiction since they sell drag shrouds and no one can argue that in most cases drag cars are high performance,

I tried to call them curious they reasoning behind this and they are closed for the holiday.

It's well known that shrouds are an important part of a cooling system, so I will call them again next week, my guess at the moment is they are going to tell me like many other top names do, "it's not needed" and the fact the products are out there keeping cars like yours cool proves that statement.

However,
Your dual 13's actually do have shrouds, built around the fans and that 1/8 they spaced it was very important for proper air flow,
Most all top names in fans and radiators do space the fan off the radiator, that is common.

What I personally do not like and had many top names agree with me on the phone/emails is any space of the radiator not in the fan stream is wasted, well, that "wasted" I used isn't really correct, that would imply it's not cooling at all and that is not the case I should say "not being used to full efficiency" which it isn't but these custom top end radiators with nice big fans do not need that little extra to still cool the vehicle.

However again,
I am far too COD to pay what I did for a custom built Dewitts radiator and not use as much of that radiator I can needed or not, in fact I wasn't told that there was a bb or sb unit ( I thought at that level it was one size ) and I got the sb but my car is bb and I lost a little more radiator there, and my COD lets that eat at me,

Tom Dewitt I am sure gets a little kick out of how **** I am on this knowing the radiator he sent me would likely cool any car ever to touch the street, and a few track cars. ( it's custom made for me )
Anyway in that I simply could not use the dual 11 spals a hell of a lot of radiator is out of the shroud, I did all the math, the research had to find one that fit the radiator and car and that did move a lot of air, the one I got covers over 90%

would 11 spals cooled it? you bet!
( But I wanted my full bang for the buck )

The key here is these aluminum radiators are larger in almost every case than the stock copper ( many times worn out ) unit they replace so of course they will cool and cool better that didn't mean that they cool better than same size copper it doesn't even mean that our high end high dollar name brands will cool any better than a comparable budget Champion....but we all do it the way we are comfortable with.

76C3forme

You said it!. If I were to do another Fiero Swap, it would have to be the 3800SC. Right now, I think it's the best swap going. (It's a shame that swap wasn't being done when I started my last swap (Which is in a 308 replica).....

But that's a whole different thread (most likely for Pennocks or Mad Mechanics forums) . - I should pop over there and see how everyone is doing!)

The13Bats

Pennocks...lol people who think the rules and mods here are tough, Pennocks, a forum that has a rating system for members to rate each other, enough bad rating gets you banned.
I get some belittling arrogant power junkie going off on me high jacking my thread to soap box cry about getting a neg rating ( he deserved ) and blaming me for it because he was being a condescending jerk in "my" thread it must have come from me, well, I laughed until I hurt when I got to call his asinine self out that I wasn't a member long enough to have rating status and it wasn't me,
Rather than take the high road and admit his epic dbag fail and apologize, he spews how his ot high jack jerky rant is how that forum works and it made my thread better, so I need to just get used to that...lol not!

I will not bother going back there.

oops talk about epic high jack....

Wrecked82

WOW. This tread got a lot more intense than I intended. Just saying in the OP that I experienced an improvement over the 4 core copper radiator I previously had. I was totally satisfied with it and it lasted 10 year. Got old and sprung a leak. Shop (high quality) replaced it with a GENERIC aluminum. Not a name brand - pay me more, version. Very pleased. Houston temps over 90* already and still holds the spec temp in traffic. So, tell me again why I should buy something else other that a standard aluminum radiator.

The13Bats

I cant even tell 90% of the people here why they need more than a good copper replacement unless the flip flop in metal prices has made aluminum cheaper and then champion look out...their sales will skyrocket.

I don't know about "intense" but when ever any cooling/radiator thread is posted here it will get passionate with some people,
you have to keep in mind in the last few years people here have been buying the cheap import champion aluminum radiators at a faction of the name brands and getting the same cooling results so you can imagine when a cat spent close to or over 1000 to do what guys are doing for a few hundred...well...