Atom cooling

[KrisC2]

Hi all,

After a trouble free 3000 mile trip in the Atom around the south of France my only comment would be the car struggles to keep oil/water temps down in 35 degree heat and demanding conditions. As such over winter I will be looking to add a oil cooler and maybe upgrade the rad. Not sure the best way to go at the moment hence this post. I was looking at the sandwich plates for a oil cooler but not sure of the do's and don'ts at the mo.

Any info/ideas especially if someone has already been down this road would be much appreciated.

Chris 

[AtomMadStew]

A hot country (larger capacity) radiator which i believe the factory do and an oil cooler seems a good option.

Stew

[8407jeff]

I agree with Stew.  The best bet would be to purchase the hot country radiator.  If you have proper cooling, your oil temperature should be fine on public roads.

[John Scherrer]

From the Ariel web site :-

[KrisC2]

Wonder how much the full rad conversion kit is? I also still fancy the oil cooler as temps easily saw between 100-120.

[import_trung]

I agree. The water temps do climb higher than usual when ambient temps are mid 30s.

Ians turbo'd atom was struggling to keep cool last year on track.
3 laps and it'd be over 104c.

So he got me to make him an additional rad.

The cardboard rad fit well, but didn't do to well with holding water.


So made the next one out of ally


Its about 300mmx300mmx75mm core size.
Twin pass, it has 4 bleed screws and 2 drains.

[911tom]

Good work

Any feedback on its effectiveness? Can only make a positive improvement and the stock rad is tiny.

[import_trung]

No feedback yet from the track
Although normal road use has seen the temp gauge read lower after fitting it.

The stock rad isnt too bad. About the size of a honda civic half rad, although it is twin pass,triple core and copious amounts of uninterrupted  airflow in and out

Does atom make their rads out of ally now?, as the one on ians atom2 is copper.

[Monza]

I can confirm that the second horizontal radiator with a fan solves all the problems of really hot days on track even 35+ °c exterior temp. Oil cooler can help but the first problem is for water/ coolant heat.

[Alex Brandon-Smith]

[quote="import_trung"]
No feedback yet from the track
Although normal road use has seen the temp gauge read lower after fitting it.

The stock rad isnt too bad. About the size of a honda civic half rad, although it is twin pass,triple core and copious amounts of uninterrupted  airflow in and out

Does atom make their rads out of ally now?, as the one on ians atom2 is copper.
[/quote]

Is this designed to be a horizontal rad then? Or to replace the vertical rad so a halfway house so to speak?

[KrisC2]

[quote="import_trung"]
So he got me to make him an additional rad.
Its about 300mmx300mmx75mm core size.
Twin pass, it has 4 bleed screws and 2 drains.
[/quote]

Really like that alloy rad, I assume its upside down i.e. the air scoops sit at the bottom? You need to start knocking kits out and I could be your first customer 

Thanks for feed back all, now leaning toward EO rad and shelving the oil cooler ?

[import_trung]

it's an additional horizontal rad, much like ariel's hot country rad.
the scoops sit at the top, as the area behind the vertical rad is a high pressure zone, and under the car is usually a low pressure zone. so at speed, the scoops are there to help direct the airflow.

funny story.
i stumbled across ariel's supplier for their radiators whilst looking for a radiator company to make my one.

they wouldn't make me one as they are/were still contracted to ariel. He mentioned he designed and built the rads for the v8 atom. When i asked him about which way the airflow traveled through the 2nd rad, he said he didn't know.

[Toilet Duck]

I know this is an old thread, but how do these extra horizontal radiators mount to the Atom? I see they have horizontal "flaps" that I assume must be something to do with the mounting, but there aren't any holes or fixing points in them? Any owners with one fitted mind sharing a pic of the horizontal radiator fitted please?

P.S. import_trung, that is a quality bit of fabrication! Looks twice as thick as the pic of the Factory option!

[Toilet Duck]

One other question that hopefully someone may be able to answer, does the fan mounted on the horizontal/hot weather radiator suck or blow? I see that on the pic of the factory hot weather radiator there are mounting lugs on the top of the rad so the fan must obviously either blow air through the rad and out underneath to the road, or pull air up through the rad from the road. Curious as to which would be more efficient in this application.

Cheers

[autobackup]

TD

May I suggest that you call the Ariel factory and speak to either Tom Siebert or Steve Rooke for full clarification.

During my discussions with them prior to my rebuild starting re the best way of cooling my Atom in Cyprus - both were absolutely adamant that fitting the V8 radiator, larger pipes and oversize fan was their preferential/recommended solution rather than the older design 'hot weather' radiator option which was developed prior to the incarnation of the Atom V8.

Reading between the lines I somehow got the impression that Ariel haven't actually sold very many of their older-design dual 'hot weather' radiators - also it would be fair to point out that the Atom V8 has far a greater cooling requirement than has the standard Atom (even in hot countries!) and all I can say that so far that retrofitting the V8 kit has been keeping my Atom markedly cooler than previously as, in general (bar the odd UK heatwave), the average diurnal OAT is far higher in Cyprus than the UK!

However, as I stated in another thread, it must be remembered that my upgraded Atom 3.5R also has a charge cooler and large external oil cooler fitted - but what actual contribution these two additional bits of kit add to the overall cooling is difficult to ascertain but I am sure that they MUST contribute something?