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BeCool Radiator install

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Old Jul 27, 2007 | 07:07 AM
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Default BeCool Radiator install

Sorry, i put this int the internal section by mistake, I'm putting a becool radiator in my 02 f-body and i was wonderng if anyone had as much trouble as me trying to get it in? i still dont have it in yet and the AC line is in the way and is making putting on the upper hose a bitch, the car has a 402 with all the stock accessories and its like the fan assembly is too close to the motor. stock fans too by the way.
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Old Jul 27, 2007 | 07:29 AM
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Originally Posted by RocketCutlass
Sorry, i put this int the internal section by mistake, I'm putting a becool radiator in my 02 f-body and i was wonderng if anyone had as much trouble as me trying to get it in? i still dont have it in yet and the AC line is in the way and is making putting on the upper hose a bitch, the car has a 402 with all the stock accessories and its like the fan assembly is too close to the motor. stock fans too by the way.
I have one and it is far from a bolt in.

We had to trim part of the lower frame support to get it to sit in the stock lower rubber mounts properly. You have to trim a little of the fan shroud to clear the WP pulley, worse if you have an Meziere Eletric pump. These mods did make it fit better than I have seen in other cars though. We also had to remove a little bit of upper rad hose to make the bend now that the rad face is closer to the block. I highly recommend changing your clamps on the rad hoses too. The stockers blew off my car, the first time pressurized. The oulet on the B Cool does not have as good a barb on it as the stock rad and when combined with the spring clamp it fails.

Hope that helps a little.
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Old Jul 28, 2007 | 03:15 PM
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I have the worst clearance by far since I run a Meziere EWP (street version), but I'm getting everything to fit. Tight, but it still fits. I had to do some serious grinding on the fan shroud to get everything to fit, but I think it might just work. I might pull the shroud out to do some more grinding, and if I do, I'll snap some pics of what I did. I basically made it sit lower on the radiator by grinding the side fins down to about half of what they were, and did some grinding where the passenger side fan comes close to the idler pulley on the water pump.

I have no more than about an eighth of an inch clearance, but that should be enough to get the job done since I have poly motor mounts. Time will tell, and I'll have to put it through its paces to make sure, but I'm pretty confident it'll end up working.
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Old Jul 28, 2007 | 04:27 PM
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Originally Posted by RocketCutlass
Sorry, i put this int the internal section by mistake, I'm putting a becool radiator in my 02 f-body and i was wonderng if anyone had as much trouble as me trying to get it in? i still dont have it in yet and the AC line is in the way and is making putting on the upper hose a bitch, the car has a 402 with all the stock accessories and its like the fan assembly is too close to the motor. stock fans too by the way.
I finally gave up trying to install mine even though was told by a sponsor that they fit with an ATI DISC Procharger.

I think the installers that say they fit install them while the motor is out or remove the AC pipes and hoses and also the water pump (I have a Meziere) and don't have the problems when trying to force the radiator down while holding the AC hoses and other stuff out of the way while the motor is in - same for the ATI fan and shroud.

After finally getting it in on the last attempt we discovered the pin to hold it in place is centered on the bottom of the radiator and it would not drop into hole (the pin should have been welded on the back half of the bottom of the radiator instead of the dead center). Rather than enlarging the hole at bottom of radiator mount we cut the pin off.

We had to bend the ATI panel that pulls the radiator forward and holds it in place. It would not stay without cutting holes in the mount - it would pop off.

Be careful too when hanging the ATI shroud. Bolts on the inside of the ATI shroud got into one tube on the brand new $500 BeCool - so we yanked it a 7th time to have the tube welded.

Temporarily I installed a bigger 97 manual version ($125 new) radiator but it still gets borderline hot with the AC on (runs 230-240).

I will install the BeCool again, but when the motor is pulled to install the 408. Then will have plenty of room to make sure everythings fits correctly with room to work and not destroy things during the install. And I'm going back to a regular water pump. The Meziere isn't helping at all with my overheating.

I recall there is something else different too - drain plug is moved to the opposite side on driver side instead of passenger side presenting more problems with a Charger installed?
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