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Fitting the radiator
I did not start again until the end of January due to catching one of the bugs going around, not the bad one but it just hung around and going in an unheated garage did not seem to be a good idea.
Now to sort out the new radiator and fan mounting, I opted to go for an Civic alloy rad complete with fan and shroud apparently good for 160 BHP as the rad that came with the part built marlin looked well past its best and a re-core would end up costing 2-3 times the cost of the rad/fan unit £75.00. I did think about getting a standard new Civic rad £30.00-£40.00 ebay, which is good for up to 120 BHP but by the time I bought a electric fan as well it was about the same cost.
When buying the radiator I checked the dimensions and knew it may not fit under the nose cowling but checked there was space behind the front chassis member to drop it down a bit, what I could not take in to account was the fan and shroud units size, this effectively doubles the thickness of the radiator. A trial fit confirmed that although the radiator would fit any attempt to add the fan unit would jam up against the steering rack OH WHAT FUN!
At worst I could put the fan/shroud to one side until I start on the Vitesse, After lots of trial fits walking away going for a think/drink etc the solution worked its way out thus. Fit the mounts 90 mm down from the top of chassis member leave a gap of 10-15 mm in front of the rad take the fan/shroud off the back of the rad, take fan unit off shroud, drill fan mount holes 12mm higher mark where fan ring is blanked cut slice out of alloy shroud, take fan blade off turn round and put back together. Now the fan/shroud should slip in front of the radiator with the bottom part hard up against the chassis member and with 10-20mm clearance from the steering rack. Now to the top rad and shroud mounts, a trip down to Screwfix and £5-6 later in my hand was 5x600mm round edge roof ties. Four lengths of metal cut and bent will have the shroud fixed to the rad and the rad fixed to the back of the steering rack mounts. The photos will give you a better idea of whats been done.
What would I do differently
The lower rad spacers, I made this over complicated and 3D printed some spacers, now I would put 3 layers of heatshrink tube around each mounting pin and drill the mount hole to fit and cut two dougnuts of 5mm rubber to fit between lower rad and mounts.
Lower rad mounts I would keep the same width and thickness but use longer bar with two opposite 90 degree bends so they could be welded to the top of the chassis member. My welding skills are very basic as I do this rarely, in practice it was fine on a flat surface with lots of room but working in a confined space under and over the chassis also using a welding magnet to hold the brackets in place was a big cause of frustration. It took me a while to realise why my welding rods were going all over the place, the magnet was so strong when I got close to the work it was pulling the rods around I ended up cutting them in half, also it was pulling the molten metal as well when arching, perhaps I should put my brain in gear sometimes! It took me ages to get some pretty rough welds done.
I did not start again until the end of January due to catching one of the bugs going around, not the bad one but it just hung around and going in an unheated garage did not seem to be a good idea.
Now to sort out the new radiator and fan mounting, I opted to go for an Civic alloy rad complete with fan and shroud apparently good for 160 BHP as the rad that came with the part built marlin looked well past its best and a re-core would end up costing 2-3 times the cost of the rad/fan unit £75.00. I did think about getting a standard new Civic rad £30.00-£40.00 ebay, which is good for up to 120 BHP but by the time I bought a electric fan as well it was about the same cost.
When buying the radiator I checked the dimensions and knew it may not fit under the nose cowling but checked there was space behind the front chassis member to drop it down a bit, what I could not take in to account was the fan and shroud units size, this effectively doubles the thickness of the radiator. A trial fit confirmed that although the radiator would fit any attempt to add the fan unit would jam up against the steering rack OH WHAT FUN!
At worst I could put the fan/shroud to one side until I start on the Vitesse, After lots of trial fits walking away going for a think/drink etc the solution worked its way out thus. Fit the mounts 90 mm down from the top of chassis member leave a gap of 10-15 mm in front of the rad take the fan/shroud off the back of the rad, take fan unit off shroud, drill fan mount holes 12mm higher mark where fan ring is blanked cut slice out of alloy shroud, take fan blade off turn round and put back together. Now the fan/shroud should slip in front of the radiator with the bottom part hard up against the chassis member and with 10-20mm clearance from the steering rack. Now to the top rad and shroud mounts, a trip down to Screwfix and £5-6 later in my hand was 5x600mm round edge roof ties. Four lengths of metal cut and bent will have the shroud fixed to the rad and the rad fixed to the back of the steering rack mounts. The photos will give you a better idea of whats been done.
What would I do differently
The lower rad spacers, I made this over complicated and 3D printed some spacers, now I would put 3 layers of heatshrink tube around each mounting pin and drill the mount hole to fit and cut two dougnuts of 5mm rubber to fit between lower rad and mounts.
Lower rad mounts I would keep the same width and thickness but use longer bar with two opposite 90 degree bends so they could be welded to the top of the chassis member. My welding skills are very basic as I do this rarely, in practice it was fine on a flat surface with lots of room but working in a confined space under and over the chassis also using a welding magnet to hold the brackets in place was a big cause of frustration. It took me a while to realise why my welding rods were going all over the place, the magnet was so strong when I got close to the work it was pulling the rods around I ended up cutting them in half, also it was pulling the molten metal as well when arching, perhaps I should put my brain in gear sometimes! It took me ages to get some pretty rough welds done.