Ebay radiators

My radiator sprang a slight leak over a month ago. It was just about 2" from the top so I didn't lose any cooling but I still wanted to sort it asap. Needless to say I was less than happy with the £350 the stealers wanted for a genuine Toyota one so I had a look on eBay. Thus follows a guide to what radiator to buy and what one not to touch with a 10 foot barge pole.

The first one I bought was from IEZURA PARTS. I chose it cos it was the only one that had the pipes for an auto tranny oil cooler. It arrived quickly enough but not overly well packaged - the drain plug handle was snapped off. No matter I pressed on, removing the belly pan, fan housing, drained the old rad, disconnected all the pipes, lifted the rotten rad out and then noticed a few fundamental problems -

Yep, the lower water pipes is on the wrong end. The captive nuts for the fan housing are also all wrong and the posts on the bottom are nowhere near where they should be.

I sent a message to Iezura and received no reply for 4 days. Sent another message, still no reply. I then opened a dispute through Paypal and after 9 days they finally replied, just before the deadline that Paypal set. I have sent the rad back (at my own expense! ) and am waiting for a refund.

I had a look around the net and liked the Fluidyne one but they only do one for manual cars, requiring you to buy a seperate oil cooler for the autobox. This reminded me of another eBay rad so I had another look and found this from ASI performance in china -

Look familiar? It should lol

This is a fluidyne one -

The ASI rad cost £154 including £45 carriage from China. I got it 6 days after I paid for it. I bought a new transmission oil cooler on eBay for £22 and fitted both today. The rad fitted perfectly, everything lined up, the mounting holes for the fan housing and the aircon fan were spot on and the quality is amazing for £109. It is made exactly the same way as the fluidyne one, using 'an advanced aluminium brazing process' and has the 52mm thick core as well. Needless to say I am delighted with the result and wish I'd bought this one first

This is a pic of the oil cooler fitted behind the rad -

The fan shroud is fitted but the top bit was broken off by the last owner. Its on my 'to-do' list, somewhere near the bottom

thats interesting i was looking at the asi 1 today but thought at the price there'd have to be a catch,i have a fluidyne atm,but its got a blockage that im told cant be fixed,so i maty well give the ebay 1 a go

which trans cooler did u go for

Paid the same sort of money for my Golpher one, was spot on

Seriously I can't recommend the Asi one highly enough. The aluminium is even polished! lol. The cooler was a Dynacool 13" x 5" x 7/8" one that a guy had bought but never used. I was lucky in getting one so cheap to be honest but I think you can pick them up for around £50-60

I could have done the oil cooler plumbing a bit better though. One of the rubber hoses fouls the small electric fan so that is disconnected. I understand its not necessary anyway:shrug:

Paid the same sort of money for my Golpher one, was spot on

I just had a look at their site. They look great too

I didn't know about them

Have you got a link to the ebay shop for the ASI rad, i may be in need of one:)

Have you got a link to the ebay shop for the ASI rad, i may be in need of one:)

Here you go matey

http://stores.ebay.co.uk/Asi-Sport-Club_W0QQssPageNameZstrkQ3amewaQ3amesstQQtZkm

How many fins/rows per inch?

I ask as just cause they look the same doesn't mean the cheap knock offs will perform the same...

How many fins/rows per inch?

 

I ask as just cause they look the same doesn't mean the cheap knock offs will perform the same...

Omg! Oh ye of little faith! I'll go out and count them lol. Hang on...

..... 14 fins and 3.5 rows per inch. And aparently its a twin core whatever that means. Now does someone have a fluidyne one that can go out and count theirs?

ps i hope that didn't seem cheeky. I'm curious about rows/fins myself

does the bonnet close ok? i brought a similar one and the rad cap was touching the bonnet so i had to mess around with the lower rad support panel to make it fit...

I am a dental technician in a private lab and we are getting serious competition from a lab in China. There is 2000 technicians in it. It is the size of a small town and the employees live in the complex. Their work is very good and very cheap. The reason it's cheap is they pay the workers per year what I earn in a month. Just cos its cheap don't mean its crap. This is what the chinese do best - copying western technology. They had a working copy of the Harrier jump jet a few years after our went into service

does the bonnet close ok? i brought a similar one and the rad cap was touching the bonnet so i had to mess around with the lower rad support panel to make it fit...

yep no problems with the bonnet. It is only about 5mm higher than the standard rad. The top clamps fitted fine

Omg! Oh ye of little faith! I'll go out and count them lol. Hang on...

 

..... 14 fins and 3.5 rows per inch. And aparently its a twin core whatever that means. Now does someone have a fluidyne one that can go out and count theirs?

 

ps i hope that didn't seem cheeky. I'm curious about rows/fins myself

fluidyne is the same 3.5 rows/inch 14 fine/inchbut mine has a sensor bung in the bottom but in the pic you posted of the asi 1 it looks blanked of 2 inch's left of the drain tap.

so did you use the sensor in the bottom?more to the point what is that for?

That is just a big bolt there to stop crud gettin into the rad during storage/shipping. The sensor screwed in no probs. It also comes with rubber caps over the pipes which impressed me no end The Iezura one didn't have that and the sensor hole was missing too. The sensor is for your water temperature gauge in the dash

the fluidyne looks like single core to me but i may be wrong

How can you tell? Is twin core one core in front of the other? And why is twin core better?

looked on the fluidyne site and the cor on their rad is only 38mm,and doesnt say how many cores so im assuming its only a single as other rads on the site are stated as 3 core.

That is just a big bolt there to stop crud gettin into the rad during storage/shipping. The sensor screwed in no probs. It also comes with rubber caps over the pipes which impressed me no end The Iezura one didn't have that and the sensor hole was missing too. The sensor is for your water temperature gauge in the dash

The sensor is to switch the auxiliary electric fan in and out.

The sensor is to switch the auxiliary electric fan in and out.

oops! Thanks Chris. So where is the water temp sensor? I thought that was the most logical place for it. Am I right in thinking that the aux fan is not really necessary? I hope so cos I disabled it due to an oil cooler hose interfering with it.

I'm possibly looking at another rad soon.

I have an Auto and have also been looking at the ASI rad. Do you need the auto cooler?

yes you do need the ttrans cooler or you'll cook the atf

i just happen to have 1 for sale:innocent:

Do these coolers perform any better then the standard rad?

I've had one of these fitted since January, been a dream so far with no problems, when it arrived i checked it all over against the Fluidyne rad in my mk3 supra and the workmanship was spot on. very pleasing for the price.

Wonder is anyone has done a temp reading comparison. Don suppose anyone has, but would be nice to know if it lowers temps at all.

How can it lower temps? The thermostat dictates the coolant temp unless the rad is SO bad it can't control things under high loads. The only point in a different rad is either weight, aero drag, or a need because coolant temps go out of control under high loading.