Best Radiator for a TJ?

[Kaptainkid1]

Hopefully at something less than another 1000 times of repeating this it will finally become common knowledge. It is a frequent practice for aluminum aftermarket radiator suppliers to blame their crap quality on the TJ Grill Shell.

2 things make them completely full of shit. 1st is the high level of rigidity the grill shell has which anyone can see if they ever have a grill off and it is reinforced further by a V bar brace.
2nd is how the mounting flanges are attached to the factory radiator. They mold in fairly small slots for not more than a nut for a #10 machine screw. The nuts are slid into the slots and the sheet metal flanges are attached that way.

If there were any flex to the grill shell, it would rip those nuts right out of the slots. They just are not that robust.

In my situation my lower engine hose started to leak and the aluminum neck connected to the radiator was the failure point. I know my engine torques and flexes in the engine bay. Maybe these leak are the common fail point and not the mounting point to the flange. I only had 1 failure but if other owners chim in we would find a common failure point.

 

[starkey480]

Good point since there is practically no one on this site that has a Mopar radiator and goes offroad.

We need you to make some heat treated unbendable radiators! Hardcore!

 

[mrblaine]

In my situation my lower engine hose started to leak and the aluminum neck connected to the radiator was the failure point. I know my engine torques and flexes in the engine bay. Maybe these leak are the common fail point and not the mounting point to the flange. I only had 1 failure but if other owners chim in we would find a common failure point.

Almost no engines don't flex in the engine bay. The reason that we have radiator hoses made out of flexible rubber is because engines tend to flex in the engine bay. Lest we overlook the obvious, the hose necks on the TJ Mopar radiator are molded plastic. If an aluminum radiator company can't build a hose neck out of aluminum and weld it to a tank and wind up stronger than a molded plastic version, that tells you all you need to know about the rest of their quality.

 

[mrblaine]

We need you to make some heat treated unbendable radiators! Hardcore!

I've shared this before. When I worked at the ambulance company, the mechanics got conned into buying some fancy convoluted stainless radiator hoses guaranteed to never leak or fail. They bought 80 or 90 of them at some extreme price and started retrofitting them to the fleet. In about a month they started un-retrofitting all of them due to the now much less flexible hoses ripping the hose necks off the OEM Ford all metal copper and brass radiators.

The owner of the company was not pleased.

 

[Obi-Wan]

I just want the Best most reliable for off road, this Jeep will be doing mostly off road, this is not a ”Hangar Queen” or a “Blin Blin Thing”

Really? I'm so glad to know I can finally go off road!!! My TJ has been begging me for 18 years.

Your arguments do not sound like they come from experience.

 

[JEEPCJTJ]

It can't be all plastic.

I have none.

Oversize and easily installed usually don't belong together in a sentence.

My experience with a Griffin radiator is that I paid twice as much as a MOPAR replacement, it began leaking after about two years and it doesn't cool any better than the OEM radiator did.

You're right about radiators not being all plastic and having no suggestion about metal radiators is OK too. I'm also sorry to hear about your Griffin radiator experience and I'm glad you shared that but your third sentence, the one I bolded, ain't quite true. They just need the proper three letter word added.

Oversized radiators are NOT easily installed.

I bet that some four letter words get added if and when it's being done.

 

[Jerry Bransford]

Stick with the Mopar radiator and stop worrying about its plastic tanks. It's not plastic where it counts.

 

[Chris]

I'll never understand the aversion to plastic on radiators. This is one of those silly internet myths (like Dana 35s not being able to handle 35s) that refuses to die. People keep perpetuating the myth and it needs to die already

 

[1904-06LJR]

Why ask a question if you're just waiting for the answer you want to hear?

100% !!

Quite a few threads on here like this.... I say #Mishimoto

 

[GPK03X]

I'll never understand the aversion to plastic on radiators. This is one of those silly internet myths (like Dana 35s not being able to handle 35s) that refuses to die. People keep perpetuating the myth and it needs to die already

Had to replace the leaky BRASS radiator that previous owner installed with mopar

 

[Chris]

100% !!

Quite a few threads on here like this.... I say #Mishimoto

Oh yeah, those Mishimotos come with a grrreat reputation

 

[Jerry Bransford]

100% !!

Quite a few threads on here like this.... I say #Mishimoto

I hope you're kidding.

 

[Zorba]

FWIW, my '85 Mercedes has a plastic radiator. I just changed it out 6 months back because I thought it had a flow problem. It did not, and it certainly wasn't leaking. With that baseline though, I don't understand why Jeep owners consider 15 years an acceptable lifespan for a radiator. It is not.

 

[L J]

I don't understand why Jeep owners consider 15 years an acceptable lifespan for a radiator. It is not.

15 years for that $250 part is acceptable

 

[Jerry Bransford]

I don't understand why Jeep owners consider 15 years an acceptable lifespan for a radiator. It is not.

I also believe 15 years is a good life for a part that sees that much stress as as many miles as most of our Jeeps see by then.

Few aftermarket radiators get more than 1/3 that life.

 

[Brannon]

For use with a Strker buil is it still true that the proven fact that Mopar Radiator is the Best?

 

[Jerry Bransford]

For use with a Strker buil is it still true that the proven fact that Mopar Radiator is the Best?

Yes.

 

[JEEPCJTJ]

I'll never understand the aversion to plastic on radiators.

My aversion to anything plastic in cars started when I was about 13 yrs old and my mother bought a 2 yr old 1978 Malibu Station wagon where the only piece of metal that was visible from the inside was the key in the ignition. It just didn't seem right and I may have accepted that except I remember so many cars after that one with so many broken plastic pieces and plastic that was ready to break I just figured plastic anything wasn't good for anything but some toys. Not all toys because some of that plastic sucked too.

Luckily the plastic in cars has come a long way since then. Probably some time in the 90s the plastic they were using seemed to have much more ability to survive abuse without cracking and felt more like a Hot Wheels track to me. Today there are many different plastics for many different uses and the only thing I wish they could they could do is not fade from UV.

 

[Zorba]

15 years for that $250 part is acceptable

I also believe 15 years is a good life for a part that sees that much stress as as many miles as most of our Jeeps see by then.

Completely unacceptable in my book. How hard is it to get a radiator "right"? Jeep *OBVIOUSLY* has problems in this area. New one for the MBZ cost $200, and replaced (needlessly as it turned out) an identical one that had been in the car 38 years, for 325,000 miles. So 15 years is ridiculously short. I really wish Behr made a radiator for the Jeep - I've never heard tell of any other radiator made in the last 40 years having problems in such a short time. I'm sure they're out there, but I've never lost a radiator in ANY car that I've owned thus far. Granted, the one in my Jeep is apparently still OK, but I don't like what I'm hearing...

 

[L J]

Completely unacceptable in my book.

Is the book titled "First World Problems"?

I've never heard tell of any other radiator made in the last 40 years having problems in such a short time.

Let me tell you a story about Griffin radiators ...