Returning cooling system to stock

farrier

farrier

New Member
Joined
Jan 18, 2018
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17
Location
Kingman, AZ, United States
LOL nothing like getting to the point of what made me find this forum, a few details to begin things, Taz and I's 2000 TJ has been in our custody for just about a year now, we traded our 2006 charger for it straight across muhaaaa (we got the better of the trade I think) and for the most part it's pretty much perfect for our daily driver and our level of wheeling, (we have a cj7 we are building for rocks etc).
The previous owner though made some sketchy choices on a few things and thats what brought us here to begin with, the search for a replacement radiator, he replaced the oem with a 2 core BeCool full aluminum and because the clearances are so tight at that thickness of radiator he also removed the oem fan, shroud, etc and replaced it all with a spal 16 inch electric which with the upgraded radiator keeps the jeep at 210 always, crawling, highways doesn't matter, it is thermo controlled so does shut off on it's own but when it's on sounds like a c-130 setting up for a short runway take off and also causes enough static in the air to disrupt every radio in a 100 yard radius, now we were fine with all that because temps were stable and everything had the rep of being pretty bullet proof, yeah well not so much, whoever/whichever shop did the work for him informed him he could use whatever antifreeze water he wanted to use, not so good for a alum radiator or any radiator for that matter as it now is suffering from the pinholeitis that decomposing alum gets.
So researching radiator replacements brought me here since that is actually a really well detailed write up on these forums, and since my search was a bullet proof cooling system and you all back oem for as close as can get for that here we are, (there are some physical reasons it has to be bullet proof or trail repairable).
I ran down the check list that is in the one write up, fan, shroud etc adding it all to amazon as I went and low and behold no mention of any bolt sizes and since every bolt from the water pump forward oh and rubber offsets etc has to be replaced I'm here asking if you all have any ideas on sizes and stuff like that that we will need to pick up before we start. Also a recommendation as to what to use to flush the old system out since as far as I can tell there isn't much rust but it is full of green anti freeze
 
So let me try to understand this. You're looking for a radiator replacement, correct?

The stock one is the best radiator you can get, period. It's not going to be any more repairable on a trail than one of the cheap aluminum ones is. If you're running into stuff to the point where it's damaging your radiator, I think you have other issues you need to address first (I don't mean that in a rude way). Even repairing an aluminum radiator on the trail would be hard unless you had the tools to weld aluminum, drain (and refill) your cooling system, etc. Not sure many people carry those tools on the trail.

Maybe I'm missing something?
 
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LOL no I've already pretty much decided to go back to a oem system thanks to your write ups about it although I dislike the idea of ever putting another anything with aluminum in it radiator back in, just trying to figure out all the stuff that wasn't covered in your writeup like bolts, the rubber spacers etc
 
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Are you going to ditch the electric fan and go back to the OEM fan clutch? What fasteners are in question? The radiator mounting bolts are metric. I know that for sure. The fan shroud mounting screws are a sheet metal type screw.
 
Thanks for the topic name change Chris and yeah, oem is pretty well researched and insider info has it they did alot of the high temp testing for the TJ somewhere around Kingman cough (Yucca) at the old ford proving grounds, watched which ones broke down and talked to alot of the test drivers that worked there regularly and they were all happy with it stock so finding what everybody here had to say about it it was a easy choice other than aluminum is only barely good for holding beer but thats another subject lol especially since the last radiator only made it 4ish years and whats wrong with dino oil? I guess I'm getting old cause our 71 travelall still has it's original brass and copper in it and doesn't leak :confused:
 
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farrier said:
LOL no I've already pretty much decided to go back to a oem system thanks to your write ups about it although I dislike the idea of ever putting another anything with aluminum in it radiator back in, just trying to figure out all the stuff that wasn't covered in your writeup like bolts, the rubber spacers etc
Click to expand...

Ahhh, I gotcha.

Good choice. There is absolutely no reason whatsoever for any aftermarket cooling system components whatsoever, unless you have some sort of engine swap that requires it (i.e. a V8 swap).

I'm not sure what all your TJ has in terms of aftermarket cooling system parts. However, if you're trying to find all the little odd ball parts like nuts, bolts, washers, etc, I would download the part diagrams from this thread: Jeep Wrangler TJ Factory Service Manuals (FSM) & Technical Documentation

Those part diagrams will give you all the little details about stuff I don't even know off the top of my head without looking at them myself. It's very helpful to have that PDF, I'll tell you that. I use it from time-to-time myself.
 
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TY for that link, and what needs doing to restore it is everything from the water pump forward including hoses are aftermarket except the overflow can so that link will come in real handy and if anybody wonders about pricing to restore it using the links to amazon from your writeup it's 375 dollars for all of the parts minus, water pump, belt and the nuts and bolts so ty for that part too, when we started looking I thought it was gonna bankrupt us to fix it and it would if we went after market parts, the oem stuff works out to be considerably cheaper in the long run for what is a well engineered cooling system
 
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Ok to update this post,
1) I suck at taking pictures so my bad for not having any to post up about what we did although I'll try to get some tomorrow of all the new shiney stuff in place.
2) w00t New OEM radiator, new shroud, new fan clutch and 6 blade fan, hoses, water pump, t stat, sensor, and the best part no leaks lol.

All this caused us to also return the air intake system back to OEM also, new tube, air box, air cleaner, yay no more oiling air filters once a week due to dusty roads, removed the hi lift off the hood (dumbest dam place to put something if your trying to see corners of the front end when out wheeling)
Still need to finish remounting the cb , it was mounted to a all steel piece of channel between the cross bar and windshield frame and no padding which has left the building due to one to many lumps on my head.
So basically we are set to do moab in 2 weeks now lol, ty Chris and everybody else who came up with links to parts and writeups etc
 
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