I just bought 2 Cold Case radiators. One Mopar, one for 1965 GTO

[biomedtechguy]

One vacation a year, my wife and I, and that is the week of Cruisin the Coast.
The 421 TriPower in her 65 GTO has quite a few performance enhancements including a roller cam, H-beam rods, custom forged aluminum pistons, etc.
So I find antifreeze under the hood in the area of the radiator, but I don't see any source. Ordered the Cold Case radiator overnight delivery. GREAT price and they deducted the cost of regular ground shipping to calculate overnight shipping cost (forum members get free ground shipping). I decided to change the radiator cap and that stopped the leak. So I didn't need overnight shipping after all, and although the leak on the factory radiator was actually the cap, I am very glad I got the Cold Case radiator because we are adding Vintage Air.
As for the Roadrunner, the 26" factory radiator has seen better days, and I am adding Vintage Air as well, so I'm happy to have a new Cold Case radiator too. It arrived only 2 days after the one I paid overnight shipping for.
Thank you Cold Case for the tech support and for free ground shipping and the generous discount!
I'm excited to install both of them and I will be sure to post results.

 

[Kern Dog]

Holy cow, man...WHEN do you sleep ??

 

[coronet68mx]

Holy cow, man...WHEN do you sleep ??

Several members here have insomnia.

 

[727]

"Cocaine is a hell of a drug"

 

[biomedtechguy]

Holy cow, man...WHEN do you sleep ??

"Cocaine is a hell of a drug"

I'm happily drug free.
Beat up knees and lower back suck too.
Especially after a week of Cruisin the Coast stop and go traffic, on and off and on a 2900# pressure plate. Pain gives me the occasional wake up call.
Sometimes it's "my reading" time in the bathroom. Wife had trouble sleeping last night too, so that transfers to me.

 

[biomedtechguy]

I finally opened the boxes and eyeballed the 2 Cold Case radiators today...

They are a couple of fine looking radiators, and if they work as good as they look, I'm all set!

 

[Billccm]

I like cold case and many of my friends have had great luck with their products. I made the mistake of buying ECP speedcooling, but learned my lesson. Good choice.

 

[davek]

@biomedtechguy so how did the coldcase radiator work out?

 

[biomedtechguy]

View attachment 992284
@biomedtechguy so how did the coldcase radiator work out?

I was going to work on the GTO today but my wife asked me to cut the grass and we have a big yard.
Long story written here and there is I'm having an overheating problem with the GTO but I'm "sure" it's the goofy design of the Pontiac water pump/divider plate combo. Since the Wraptor came with a very nice (BEST design) water pump, that meant a new divider plate went in, and the installer got bad advice on how much of a gap was acceptable between the water pump impeller vanes and the divider plate. I had told him about the gap being critical, but at the time I didn't know what it should be, and he says Butler told him between 1/16 and 1/8th of an inch would be ok when it should be 1/10th of an inch. LOTS of posts on the PY Pontiac forum about that and different water pump impeller designs and materials. The pump provided by CVF Wraptor is outstanding, and I definitely don't think the Cold Case radiator or dual 12" fans and shroud assembly are to blame, BUT I am going to try the factory HP clutch fan before I have to take EVERYTHING off to fix the gap I've described.
The Cold Case radiator for my Roadrunner should be going in in the next 2-3 weeks.

 

[davek]

did you install it yet? what radiator did you get model number mop754?

 

[biomedtechguy]

Sorry, I forgot about this thread. The running hot problem with the GTO was definitely the dual 12" 1,400 cfm Cold Case fans and shroud assembly. They are going to give me a full refund. The factory original clutch fan without the shroud kept temps around 186-189 and with the AC on, when it used to shoot up to 235° it only got in the 190s. I want it to run cooler at idle with the car stationary, AC on, so by tomorrow I expect to finish installing the new 16" two speed single fan and shroud assembly. The new setup is rated at 2,500 CFM, a full 1,100 more than the 2x 12" setup.
I'll post results tomorrow. I'm expecting good things, because I have the same kind of setup for my Roadrunner, 17" 2,600 cfm, and if it works in the GTO, it should work great for my Roadrunner.

 

[biomedtechguy]

did you install it yet? what radiator did you get model number mop754?

Yes, it is installed. MOP 754
Fits perfectly, but I did replace the factory upper hose with a Gates #20355 upper hose. STRONGLY recommend doing this as these pictures show the factory upper hose for the 26" radiator is about 3½" off from where the connection is on the Cold Case MOP 754 shown w/the #20355 in the second picture.
Factory original upper hose:

Gates #20355

 

[biomedtechguy]

I can't report on the radiator and fan combo in the Roadrunner yet, because it's still in the shop, with a few more things to do, and then I'm going to start a new thread to consolidate ALL of the massive number of systems and upgrades and strengthening things I've done. It's coming down to the wire, again, as Cruisin the Coast is October 4th thru the 11th. The Vintage Air AC system should be about finished, and that leaves the Dakota Digital RTX-68D-CHG-X Retro gauge system, PAC-2800BT electronic fan control module, 2 BIM-13-2 wideband O2 display modules so my Innovate Motorsports DLG-1 dual wideband O2 sensor system can use the TFT display on the gauge panel to display the A/F ratio or Lambda readings from the O2 system instead of having the dual readout gauge pod sitting on my otherwise clean dash. These gauges are a brand new item, and I had the DD VHX series ready to be installed, but I saw the RTX series, read the technical features that it had over the VHX, and between that and how AWESOME it looks, I HAD to have it. If I have to cut corners for time's sake, I'll wait to hook up the 2 O2 modules, but I hope that I'll have it all done in time.
Back on the Cold Case radiators and fans...Cold Case makes excellent radiators, by design, materials, and construction process, and their tech support has been great. I wouldn't try their dual 12" fans setup though, and I'm disappointed that they would sell a product that fits their radiators so perfectly yet fail to cool in an absolutely unacceptable way.
The manufacturer of the 17" 2,600 CFM 2 speed fan and shroud assembly I have on the 440 6bbl and the 16" 2,500 CFM 2 speed setup that I'll put to the test tomorrow on the 421 Tripower in the 65 GTO are HIGHLY rated (4.9 out of 5 stars, over 70 reviews) is Cooling Components model CCI-1780
Only 2⅝" deep!!
https://www.affordablestreetrods.com/cci-1780-cooling-fan.html

 

[davek]

thanks for the heads up on the upper hose. I wish I could do half of what your doing on the car. looks nice I hope it works out.

 

[davek]

what shroud is that on the radiator?

 

[biomedtechguy]

what shroud is that on the radiator?

Those pix were lifted from a forum member, so I don't know.
I bought 2 Cold Case radiators, like the thread says. 1 for the 65 GTO and 1 for the 70 Roadrunner, to replace my 26" radiator. I got a dual 12" fan and aluminum shroud assembly from Cold Case for the GTO, and it made the car run hot, like up to 235° hot, that really pisses me off, just because it was rebuilt about 4 years ago and running hot can cause problems. Fortunately no damage. I ran the mechanical fan, no shroud, in the GTO just to see what the temperature would be and it was in the 185-190 range, no higher than 202 at idle stationary with the AC on.
SO I decided to get the 16" Cooling Components cci-1790 two speed fan and shroud assembly for the GTO and I had just drilled the LAST HOLE to mount the shroud and I knicked a water passage.

I'm going to get it fixed tomorrow, and now since the radiator is out, I'll just go ahead and set it up with 4 L brackets and mount the fan and shroud assembly to the radiator, and install them all as an assembly in the GTO.
Because the Wraptor left 3" of space the dual 12" fan setup wouldn't work anyway, so I had already ordered the 17" Cooling Components 2 speed fan and shroud assembly for the Roadrunner BEFORE I knew the dual 12" setup didn't really work well. Unfortunately I still haven't tried the 16" fan in the GTO to see how it cools, but I certainly hope it does a great job, or I'll be looking for my 3rd fan for the GTO and my 2nd one for the Roadrunner.
I honestly think they are going to work great.
The shroud for the Roadrunner looks like this:

 

[biomedtechguy]

Well, my local radiator shop doesn't fix radiators anymore.
I had already got some 50/50 solder and flux paste and a torch.
It took quite a bit of heat to get the water passage up to temp, but I think the repair is good. It's definitely stuck to the area of the repair, so I'm going to move forward with attaching the fan and shroud assembly and the rest of that so I can test it out on the GTO.

 

[davek]

Im so sorry you nicked the tube,hope it holds. With all that you bought from CC I would of asked Chris if he would fix it. Hope the fans work out.

 

[biomedtechguy]

Im so sorry you nicked the tube,hope it holds. With all that you bought from CC I would of asked Chris if he would fix it. Hope the fans work out.

Thanks. I am less than 2 weeks away from Cruisin the Coast. That is the one time a year my wife and I take time off and disengage from our demanding schedules. I am pretty confident my repair will hold permanently. I'm running short on time, and while my mechanic is very thorough in working on my Roadrunner, with all that's been done, I may have some fine tuning to do and certainly have a lot of new stuff to learn and get used to. My Dakota Digital gauges are due in tomorrow, and once he gets them installed, I have to program them. My car is pretty filthy too, so I'm going to have to clean it up.
Believe me, right now I need everything done NOW, and October 4th is going to seem like it's this weekend, not the following one.
Tomorrow I should know if the GTO cooling system is squared away. I expect it to be!

 

[davek]

I would love to see a pic of your wifes GTO