308 Radiator replacement?

My 81 308 has a slight leak. I plan on replacing it with a better one. I will have the old one fixed and repainted then saved for orginal parts collection. I see Nick's Forza sells an aftermarket aluim. one for $825.00. Is there any other alternative to that one? I am willing to pay more for a proper fit.

THANKS!
Sam

 

You can have a custom one made for $300 ish. Most likely it would require a little modification to fit (most alum ones are a little wider than stock). If you are looking for a direct replacement with no mods that price sounds fair.
I got mine from www.alumrad.com in MI. Made some new supports and brakets and have never looked back.

 

Why would Nick's Forza be $500 more than eveyone elses? Are his that much better? His are $825.00. He said he will have more ready next week. If I can save $500 I will but, not if it comes down to being just a cheapy replacement.

 

I would stongly urge you to go to a rad shop and have your rad re-cored. DO NOT have it boiled out as this does not work. I had the rad on my 77 re-cored and in the hottest of weather the temp does not creep at all. I paid about $200 for the job. Be sure to get a very good rad shop with an experienced technician. 308 rads have to be accuratly re-cored or they will not fit.

If you have not removed your rad yet that is a treat. Expect to remove the hood, lower valence, and maybe the front grill and bumper; it is a highly overcomplicated affair.

 

YMMV, but I removed mine with the condensor and didn't have to remove the hood. Recore it. There is no need for an alum. rad. Sometimes they can add an extra pass if the tanks are large enough. 3 pass rad. are very nice. I had a 4 pass in another car that was great. 4 pass would be overkill in this situation though. I will say that the bottom rad. hose is a pain to get back on.

 

Any custom rad that you can have made (by a good shop) is by no means going to be a cheap replacement... no offense taken. The guys who did mine from Michigan did a great job.
I think the price difference is mostly due to the size. Most any new crossflow alum rad you will have made will be wider than the stock unit. Not a lot but enough to make you have to make a new bracket and possibly some other mods. I've never seen Nicks but my guess he would make it as a direct replacement... thus the extra cost to make it exactly the right size to drop in. I removed the a/c from my car so I didn't have to worry too much about the width.
I tried to have mine redone and after I got it back it still leaked! After all the trouble you go through to remove the hood, spare tire surround, a/c condesor, wrestle with the hoses and everyting else your going to only want to do it once. Good luck

 

Also most alum. rads use 2 one inch or larger passes. I personally don't like that as much as a 3 or 4 pass. I had a 2 pass alum. rad with 1 1/2 inch wide passes. Personally I wasn't that impressed. JMHO.

 

my rad is out, i took the bonnet off but left the spare tire well in place. i may go with new hayden fans and get rid of the old fans. here are some pics to help. the valence had some almost hidden fasters holding it in. i " think " there were 7 per side. 8mm maybe.

 

I would agree with the other posters; the stock system when freshened, will perform fine in hot weather. The people that have problems with overheating have a combination of issues with a plugged radiator, and/or slow/broken fans. I'm not sure why, but the 308/328/Mondial series seems to have an issue with the cores getting plugged up. My 328 had to have the radiator removed and "rodded out" which is basically having a long brush run up each of the tubes (after the bottom was removed). The other problem is the stock radiators are known to crack at the top and/or bottom seams.

 

Could I get someone to post additional pics of the Hayden fan/Valence installation? I'm trying to re-install my valence, and it is currently banging into the Hayden fan shrouds - I can't get the valence installed because the fans are in the way. The crease of the lower part of the valence is coming into contact with the bottom of the 12" Hayden fans (mounted too low?), and I can't get the valence on at this point. What did you guys mount the top part of the fans to, since if I raised the fans they would poke above the top part of the A/C condenser and have nothing to mount to????

 

?

 

Nicks Radiators are worth it because they flow twice the volume. These are not just an off the shelf core that someone has put a frame around. I have just ordered one and I know the folks who designed it for Nick. The nice thing about doing business with Nick is that he stands behind what he sells, I have been doing business with him for 5 years and he has always been there.

I have also ordered his new water pump as well.

Everything else is a Cheap Replacement....I know as I have seen the crap that people try to fit in...the key word is try.

Paul

 

Please let us know how the installation goes and post a photo as to how it looks. Thanks.

 

A radiator core is core is a core------
the only difference is the number of fins/inch and number of rows desired, and alumin. or brass.

I had a nice custom core fabricated for my car and reinstalled the original tanks on top and bottom.. all for 400.00 (5 rows/ 16 fins/inch)

also if your radiator flows fluid thru too fast--the fluid will not have time to cool suficiently.
the flow baffels are in the end tanks, by the way. the fluid basically flows thru the core 3 times in an "N" kinda pattern.

 

Guys, I happen to be intimately familiar with Nick’s radiator. I have one that is polished and ready to drop back into the car. In fact, I helped to develop the latest offering for the 4-liter project.

First, Paul Sloan is right on the mark. The Nick’s radiator is larger, 2.75 verse 3.10 inches wide. The core has fewer but much larger oval shaped coolant tubes. This makes it much more difficult for corrosion to impact the flow of coolant. By way of clarification, all cores are not created equal.

In point of fact, a new OEM core is not even close to that of the aluminum radiator. The aluminum radiator has about 50 percent more fin area, and about the same increase in coolant tube to coolant area. The net effect is that it flows a lot more coolant and is a much more efficient heat exchanger.

This radiator was specifically designed to both be larger and fit in the stock location. Trust me, it took several tries to get the thing right. We now got it right. Some other brands of aluminum radiators don’t fit. The lower tank perfectly fits into the lower metal bracket and rubber seat. The condenser attaches to the front side of the radiator like the stock unit. The two aluminum brackets secure the radiator to the frame.

Installation is no big deal. You simply loosen the fan brackets and pull on the AC lines to take up all of the slack. The AC fittings are about 1/4 of an inch further away from the hoses. Just give them a tug and you should have enough slack in the hose to attach the fittings. Adjust the fans so that you have a little clearance and tighten the mounting hoops to secure the fans. The hood fits just fine and the radiator is a solid fit.

Check out the photograph of this radiator in my car. I have personally checked it out for fit… several times. This radiator is designed to be a great companion for the high performance water pump. While the radiator is out, at least consider switching to Evans NPG + Coolant.

Sincerely,

Mark Lewis
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VERY nice....but I heard that there was no threaded hole for the Thermo Switch (for the fans) at the bottom of the Alum. Radiator from Nicks. So I had mine recored instead, and went with better 12" fans from Hayden. I'd like to see a pic or two from someone on a proper Hayden fan install that allows the valence to clear the bottom of the fans. Anyone out there have a pic to share? I'm stuck right now - my valence won't fit where my new fans are located.

 

The pictures of the radiator that I posted have threaded bungs for the temperature sensor and the air bleed valve. They are in the stock locations. I tested them to insure that the thread pitch was correct.

The lower outlet is angled the same as the stock radiator so all of the hoses line up. No modifications are necessary.

I have an ultra heavy-duty fan setup, but it is too expensive to market. The beauty of these fans is that they fit in the stock locations without modification. They have externally accessible brushes so they can be rebuilt if necessary. An individual stock fan can only move about 550 CFM. We had them tested. Most aftermarket fans can generate about twice that.

Good luck with your project.

Mark Lewis

 

My bad. It is a thermo switch for the fans not a temperature sensor. Here is a picture of the threaded bung.

Thanks,

Mark Lewis
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I have not looked into this very deeply, but I talked to a radiator shop here in town last fall about recoring my radiator, or if I should go with aluminum. He claimed aluminum was all hype, that size for size a brass radiator would cool better. I dont recall the whole conversation now, but it centered around the idea of the aluminum being thicker tubes and thicker fins for strength, which reduced the capacity of the coolant volume, as well as its overall ability to remove heat. He also claimed it was mostly used to reduce the overall weight of the radiator as whole, and with CAFE standards every pound lost helps fuel economy. He also said they dont hold up, that they can corrode up to four times faster.
The fact that people generally dont have any overheating troubles with the 308 would show that its a very well designed system if its maintained. Myself I will just recore what I have and keep it the way it was intended. If my radiator is original, its lasted 27 odd years without much trouble. Mostly what I have seen are that radiators corrode on the "outside", and they start leaking when the fins fall away and can no longer support the tube's from expanding and contracting and they crack open. Paint can really add to a radiators life. The inside just usually gets choked up with calcium, which keeping fresh coolant in will pretty much eleviate.

 

With all due respect, aluminum radiators are not just "hype". There are reasons they were first used in high performance cars (and now most all cars). The old radiator fitted to the 308 looks like two Fiat radiators stuck together. (Note the 328 radiator doesn't have the ac condensor in front of it and thus it gets more airflow than a 308 radiator. Its fans are also "pullers", not "pushers" as are the 308s.)
Aluminum Radiators like Nicks are super light weight and far more efficient than the OEM radiator. They typically weigh 60% LESS than OEM raditoar. For instance, a Ferrari 308 radiator weighs around 26-28 lbs. The aluminum radiator weighs only 12 pounds! In the world of weight reduction, that's a lot of weight to loose! I believe Nick's radiators feature double rows of 1" thick aluminum tubes with computer designed fins, making these radiators 40% more efficient than OEM radiator. TO equal the cooling of these aluminum radiators you would need five row copper radiator which would weigh well over 30 pounds! An added benefit is the aluminum is far stronger than copper/brass radiators and therefore much less likely to puncture or leak. Also, with 1" thick tubes these radiators won't clog like your oem radiator. Not only will your car run cooler, but your fans and alternator will work less because they'll be running les frequently. Also, the lighter weight means a better power to weight ratio. All this with greater reliability and for less than the cost of recoring your old, heavy and inefficient radiator. Obviously this is the way to go. Owning a Ferrari should be about doing what is best for the car, not what is cheapest, IMO. All Ferraris made today feature aluminum radiators, not those old brass/copper boat anchors!

 

"VERY nice....but I heard that there was no threaded hole for the Thermo Switch (for the fans) at the bottom of the Alum. Radiator from Nicks"

M. James,

Who would have told you that nonsense and why would you have belived them? It amazes be that someone out there would mislead you like that....don't get me wrong I believe you were told were you were told.

 

Sam, nick has them made somewhere else and shipped to you. I bought one from him and the guys at the local radiator shop said they could make the same radiator for around $250.00 . You can have it made local and cut out the shipping a middle man and save a bunch of money

 

i am in the process of repairing the stock radiator on the 308 ... to test the repair, what water pressure should i take the radiator to ?
many thanks, david

 

David,

The system runs at (0.9 bar) 13 / 14 psi and our radiator repair shop test them starting at 5 psi and rising to 20 psi.

 

There are several people that have taken different routes to solve the problem posed by an old radiator that needs to be replaced. The options are basically as follows:

1. Re-core the stock radiator. It will cost between $250 to $300 and you will end up with a radiator that it as good as the day the car was purchased. Price doesn’t include labor.

2. You can by a new OEM radiator. This is not an inexpensive option, but it is new and it fits.

3. You can order an aluminum radiator from an aftermarket radiator fabricator. My experience for the correct size radiator is that it will cost between $475 and $550. You can choose between a cross flow or a down flow design. The fabricator will adapt a domestic core for a Ferrari application. It will likely not fit the stock mounting brackets when it is first delivered. The lower tank has to be the exact dimensions of the stock brackets and be angled from front to rear. The brackets for the condenser needs to be added if you want AC. If you choose to a cross flow radiator design the lower outlet will need to be moved from the stock locations. The metal piping will then need to be modified to get the rubber hoses to fit. Don’t forget to weld in a bung for the fan switch. If the cross flow design is used, the bung will be need to be located on the side of the tank and the wiring may not extend far enough. Because domestic aluminum cores are wider you will need to be careful that the new radiator does not extend into the area of the stock fans. If it does then you can plan on fabricating your own fan setup. Many people on this web site have done just that.

4. Purchase an aluminum radiator from Nick that has been designed in consultation with industry experts to both fit and work better than the stock design. Cost has been reported on this thread to be about $800…frankly I don’t know the retail price.

Unsolicited Advice:

Since you are draining you cooling system anyway, consider spending an additional $250 for Evans Coolant. It last much longer, has a higher boiling point, and provides an extra margin of safety for a marginal system. I have no economic interest in recommending Evans Coolant.

In any event, replace your coolant. Many 308 cooling systems are under serviced!

Sincerely,

Mark Lewis