Radiator Question - not typical

[FuzzFace2]

Not much moving on my project unless backwards is movement?

The radiator has been sitting with vinegar in it till yesterday. The vinegar came out green from the brass? and cloudy from what I was trying to remove. Did some flushing with the garden hose and I see I do have flow thru the tubes I did not before but there could be another reason why this is so.

Being the radiator still has the white crust I set it up for another round of fresh vinegar as it cant hurt to let it sit longer.

Now the why the reason for no flow:

Being I have the system drained and not knowing if the motor had a Tstat, low temp on gauge, I was going to change it out. When I pulled it apart it had no gasket only sealer that I could see and it looked like the Tstat was not opening as it was covered in rust.

The block side gasket area cleaned up nice, the Tstat housing not so nice. In cleaning I saw what I thought was a crack. Hit it with a wire brush and it still looked like a crack.

Yep put a little pressure on the bolt ear and it fell off in my hand. I checked 4 stores and none had 1 so will need to order it.

At that point being hot & sweaty I called it a day, yep backwards movement!

Dave -----

[85lebaront2]

The problem is this once common practice may now cost more than a new unit.

Ain't that the truth. I had no idea until recently. I was checking around with radiator shops to get mine cleaned up and painted, etc. My rad was the original 1984 unit, and the local shops wanted $400 to rehab it. (I think a brand new one was around $200).

One guy told me that the only people paying to have them redone anymore are the classic car guys that want the 100% period correct radiator.

In any case, the replacement turned out to be a decent unit, or at least it appeared to be. It's all metal, same as my original. Only difference was that it had actual ports (plugged) for trans cooler lines, and my original did not.

Just be glad you can actually find a new one. My project car uses a special copper/brass radiator that is essentially made of unobtainium. For a while you could get one that was made in Thailand, but they were junk. The problem is the intercooler for the turbocharger, it occupies the left end of what would be the standard radiator for the K based Chrysler products, leaving a much smaller area for the actual radiator. I was lucky, when I first acquired one, a fellow Marine had a radiator shop. I removed the intercooler and took him the radiator, he completely overhauled it and repainted it in the original flat black then attached his shop ID tag (a star with Steve's Radiator Service and a sequential number) to the bottom frame so it is not visible installed in the car.

Since then I have acquired a spare assembly that I may try the oxalic acid soak on, then rinse, cap and save.