Engine Drivetrain 1st Gen Cooper S Oil cooler technical help needed / custom made oil cooler kit (by me) inside

Hello Everyone!

by no means new to the mini scene, but many of you may know me from NAM, potentially facebook, or r/mini.

Currently in the process (almost ready to crank!) of building a turbo setup on an R53 from scratch, in house using CNC machining, all tig welding, and some wet-layup carbon fiber work (Engineers get bored too afterall :biggrin5: )

Anywho,

This thread pertains to my oil cooler.

I CNC'd and welded up a plate with -10AN fittings
http://www.reddit.com/r/MINI/comments/287yvy/made_an_oil_sending_plate_for_my_03_mini/








and welded up a Bell intercooler core for my oil heat exchanger
weld detail shot



install location



Now that I have gotten the eye candy out of the way ( :wink: )


I have a technical question.


So with this setup I am also running a thermostat (oil thermostat).
This will allow the oil to bypass the cooler durring warm-up of the car to get temps up a little quicker and help regulate things a little better than just leaving it an open loop.

Now, to install this I need to know which outlet from my plate will be the "sending" port.

And if you do not KNOW!, please do not guess.

I may just have to pull the ignition and crank the car a few times with the lines hanging out and see which one starts gushing oil, but it would not be bad to know ahead of time.

you can simply refer to the ports by saying the one with the 45 adapter welded on, or the straight fitting.

front/back of the car also works for designating things.

Any help is much appreciated!

Thanks!

(if requested, I will see if I can start a build thread over here as well)
:cornut:

 

also, if you have any questions as to my work, reasons I designed things, or any other general comment, please feel free to ask away / post them up and I will answer anything to the best of my ability.

 

Just came in today, will be mounting it, or at least thinking of locations when I get home.

Thermostat is an Earl's (holley) part.

Holley Performance Products Oil Thermostat 501ERL

 

well, apparently no one knows off the top of their head.
As well as no one seems to be running an oil thermostat on stand alone oil cooling systems :/ .
To me it seems like a good idea haha, so I did it anywho.
from earl's (holley)



(yes, there are bolts everywhere. Its a full custom build, not a lot isn't being touched or changed)

Anywho, started with the mount for the thermostat.
Rough cut two pieces of aluminum, bent one of them, blued them up, marked them with a scratch awl



put a riv nut into that random hole in the factory sheet metal



then I finish cut, filed, deburred, removed the blue, clamped the two pieces together and welded them up




Next I drilled two holes and put riv nuts in those to mount the thermostat.




then I trimmed two areas in the front radiator surround to pass cables through.

These were cut so that I could unbolt the radiator and swing the whole mess out of the way without disconnecting any cables.



Will probably be printing a piece to fill that hole in the return line (the one with the 180 ° AN fitting


And then I set about cutting and assembling all of the AN lines.

I did some checking and the thermostat should work both ways in reality.


but in either case it will not starve the motor of oil.
I can at least crank it, get everything wet, shut it off, disconnect a line and then re-crank it briefly and see which line starts gushing.

Trimmed both AN lines to have some slack so they can be moved as needed.





Another shot of the front



Very glad I didnt go any larger. This is probably the largest radiator I could have ever hoped to fit. (clearances are less than 1/8" at a few points when the hood comes down. )

Hope you enjoyed!:biggrin5:

 

Thanks Rum4,

oh, and hello from the upstate (lake bowen up in Inman, SC)

 

Awesome! thanks! And turns out I guessed right. Haha. it was a 50/50 though :3

and as for the turbo, it is a comp ct2 5147 oil less, billet compressor wheel, water cooled housing rated for -29.5inHg

cooled with water from the w2a setup and not engine coolant