The curious case of the Atom 4 Cooling

[robfitz]

Where would you fit a second radiator - are you looking at side pods like a 3.5R?

[Monza]

Good question, don't know if enought place for horizontal one as on the older Atoms. Of course side pods are a solution but the cost will be much much higher.

[reg]

Of course but you'll not be able to do 2 consecutive laps because of water coolant temp ....

Definitely would be in conjunction with any cooling mods.

[Yorkshire]

Where would you fit a second radiator - are you looking at side pods like a 3.5R?

I have already enquired with the factory re sidepods.
The rear plates for the metal work are obviously pre drilled for Atom 3.5 wishbone centres (as they mount on the end of the wishbone bolts) which is easy to overcome by having a new rear plate laser cut with the correct bolt centre.

However there is another problem with the side pods i am trying to overcome. On the 3.5 Atom the rear chassis had lugs for the wishbones and the bush was in the actual wishbone. So when sidepod metal work slotted on and clamped up the wishbone was still free to move in its normal range of movement.

The Atom 4 has larger mounts (not lugs) with the captive bush actually in the chassis. The wishbone just has lugs which fit on the outside of this bush and are held by the bolt. So if i just fitted the plate and torqued it in place there is a danger the rear wishbones wont move which isn't good for quick lap times!

I'm still thinking of a work round for this as i would like pods on mine to get an additional cooling rad passenger side and more intake cooling drivers side.

Phil , Chris and Paul have done some good work with there cooling mods with more to come and having witnessed there results at Cadwell i'm going to give them a try on my car. Although i believe i may need even more with my tuning mods.

Just to update from my earlier posts i did run my car at Blyton last weekend with the only cooling mod being the "Race Ready Coolant" whilst i can't say it made no difference its hard to say as the day was nearly 30 degrees in the afternoon and i could only run in my map 2 which is about 390bhp. Even this resulted in engine temps of 106 degrees. I did run without my front wing to try that which resulted in cooler results (but i want a front wing) and had same problem with once i caught a slower car and didn't clear straight away cooling system raised temp and then was impossible to cool it back down without stopping.

Hope this helps and with a little more testing i'm hoping a solution will be found for track day use

Cheers Stuart