I don't like it HOT HOT HOT!

hi again, i wish i were on here more but for the last two years i've been working 80-90 hour weeks and it was all i could do just to keep this thing on the road.

get comfortable and make sure you've got about ten minutes to sort through the questions. i live in phoenix arizona where daytime highs have been 110*+ and overnight lows have been 85-90*.

here's what i know about it, or at least what i think i've figured out...
-1961 Club Delux Station Bus
-1965 200 I6 - falcon sedan maybe?
-Carter YF type carb from a 1975 Jeep CJ5 w/ a 258 I6
-3 core radiator with a new 15lb cap
-17" electric fan with adjustable electric thermostat with the ampule inside the upper radiator hose PUSHING 1500 CFM; i wanted to run it as a puller but it didn't fit.
-6 blad flex fan with spacer that has it about 1/2" from the radiator
-192* thermostat
-new water pump
-MSD 6AL
-DSII distributor freshly rebuilt that goes to a 78 Granada, no stock computer from Granada just using the mag pickup to trigger the MSD
-8MM MSD wires
-plugs gapped at .045 IIRC
-heater core is from a 1987 suzuki samurai, it was a good fit and just happened to have it in the back room from one i parted out BUT it doesn't have a shut off valve inside the factory heater box that's mounted up front under the dash & water is always cycling through.
-3 speed top loader, 3.50 gears & 205/75/15 tires all around
-dog house cover has the original "flap" on top that kinda seals the radiator off to make the fan draw through it not around it
-i think i have all but one of the factory tin covers under the cab (big skid pan & the one that goes below the alternator on the passenger side
-harmonic balancer spun the timing ring so i don't have a timing mark to follow but it's been timed and tuned by vacuum.

i will preface this with the fact that i am a maintenance engineer, have been a mechanic on everything from a VW to Blackhawk helicopters & currently own a Welding and fab shop where we build a lot of custom stuff so i'm familiar with how to make things work when you can't find the right pieces.

when i bought this back in december it had been sitting for 10 years and needed a lot of TLC but i also needed a solid work truck so it's been "under construction" for quite some time but has remained driveable except the day i lost the outter ring from the harmonic balancer. it sees a minimum commute of 40 miles per day and sometimes as much as 600 miles a week. it has been loaded with big steel doors and all the welding equipment we needed for the install & has been dragging around an all steel 20' tandem axle car hauler heavily laden. it runs great and will easily cruise the freeway at 70mph humming along steadily at 3000 rpm. when i got it on the road back then it ran hot in the afternoon according to the stock gauge and in the morning wouldn't build enough heat to get the heater core above about 120* when it was ~30* ambient. now with the temps what they are it's running about 205* in the mornings at 2500rpm/60mph and in the afternoon i have to run at 55mph to keep the temps below 210* if i go any faster it gets to 220* real fast and i have to get off the fwy.

i just pulled out the 160* thermostat and put in the factory recommended 192* and this seems to have stabilized the temps up to about 55mph/2500 rpm but once it gets hot it's difficult to cool. i have tried a fan that came with the truck when i bought it, it's a 4 blade factory fan that is more of an "X" than a "+" shape. when i bought it there was a 2 core radiator in it from unknown vehicle and the holes didn't line up quite right on the core support and it was leaking & someone had rasied the radiator to allow more room for the flex fan as it was cutting the upper radiator hose. but when i switched to the 3 pass radiator i had to shim it away from the fan with 1/2" nuts leaving an air gap between the radiator and core support - this might be a mistake? so now i have a 1500cfm electric fan that can be switched from auto/thermostat to off just to see if it's a help or hinderance.

i'm sure i'm not the first to run into this BS and am hoping you guys can help me out...

things i suspect...
-when the engine reaches hiway speeds is teh flex fan flattening out so much that it's not efficiently moving air?
-with the radiator spaced off the core support am i pulling air AROUND the radiator rather than THROUGH the radiator?
-when the electric fan is running is it drawing hot air from the engine compartment through the air gap between the radiator and core support and just cycling hot air through it over and over?
-is the electric fan pushing such a different CFM from the mechanical fan that the air is buffetting and not moving?
-is the rubber hose from the fuel pump to the steel gas line and rubber hose from the steel gas line to the carb screwing things up?
-how should the steel fuel line be routed around/over the valve cover (pix would be VERY helpful)
-was there, or should there be a fan shroud, on the radiator around the mechanical fan? ** no idea how you would have room to put one in there**
-how should the vacuum advance steel line be routed around/over the valve cover
-does coolant via heater hoses HAVE to run through the intake manifold spacer? (when i swapped out the carb to the YF i had to make a new spacer as the YF is much too large for the stock mounting point. it's 3/4" T-6 aluminum machined to go directly on the manifold and then the carb bolts to that but i didn't rifle drill it to accomodate the water jacket and but never had that hooked up to the stock manifold adapter because it was rotted out and broke. will this help keep the cab & fuel cooler? i thought those were only for preheating in the winter)

if anyone has pix of a STOCK engine or even pdf from a service manual that would be FANTASTIC!

you guys are welcome to email me directly with suggestions stonesoupmetalworks@gmail.com



you can see from the mods that i have been trying like hell to get this thing to run smooth and cool.

i just took a 100 mile trip and have a little more data to provide as most of my driving is less than 20 miles at a time.

at 2000 rpm in 3rd gear it runs like a champ, smooth power and between 190-200*

at 2500 (55mph) it starts pusing 205-210*

at 3000 rpm (70mph) there is no way to keep it cool.

as i was driving i played with the timing a bit. you gotta love the fact that you can pop the "hood" going down the fwy and tweak it a little. but none of that helped and i ended up right back where i started.

something else to add... the harmonic balancer on there is from an unknown vehicle, i picked it up at the thunderbird connection where they do a lot of t-birds, fairlanes and falcons. when i lost the belt i asked for one to suit a 65 falcon with an alternator. it was a couple inches too short. as i was looking into replacing that balancer, once i realized the timing ring spun, i found that there were three different pulleys made for the small block sixes. these are round numbers from the top of my head so they aren't exact, but i seem to recall ~6.1" to ~6.9" range. is there a chance that having a larger than factory drive pulley/harmonic balancer that i am over-driving the water pump to the point of cavitation above 2000 rpm?

this might be of interest as well... the DSII dizzy i installed was modified IAW what i read on inlinesix tech. i changed the lighter spring to the MR.G 1925D i think it was & tweaked the larger spring tang in about 3/32" as recommended. that along with the vacuum advance seems to be leaving me with too much advance on the hiway & a little too low at idle to get a good flame travel. i'm probably going to tighten up the larger spring to delay the higher rpm advance.

i've had a lot of the same problems you have, the faster you go, the hotter it gets. the damn thing could sit idling in a hot parking lot under the sun all day long, or even cruising around at 35mph without breaking a sweat temp-wise.
but get on the main road and it boils over.

here's what i changed in my vain attempts to get it cooled down:

-cleaned/flushed coolant about nine times in a row
-installed some crazy-looking 6 bladed non-flex fan from a mustang
-installed a closer fan spacer
-installed 2 12" electric pusher fans
-new rad cap
-new 180 thermostat
-water wetter
-bumped the timing down a wee bit
-enriched carb mixture a wee bit

so none of that worked, still ran hot as ever.
said f-it and got a new radiator, 3-row from advance of all places. got it and found out it was made in china and it's about the flimsiest thing ever. oh well, it had a warranty, so it went in.

somehow, it worked. temp needle lives between 1/4 and 1/3 on the instrument gauge no matter what. i got mad and started debilitating the coolant system to find out how much difference the rad made.

-bypassed the heater core
-replaced the water wetter/antifreeze with straight water (lower boiling point)
-turned off the electric fans
-advanced the timing
-leaned out the carb mixture
-took the belly pan off
-took the bottom side tins off

and it still ran cool as ever. i felt like a moron.
although, even with it running as cool as it's ever run, it started boiling the gas out of the carb (no lie, up and out onto the hot intake manifold).
so then:

-bought a fire extinguisher, hehe
-rebuilt carb
-made a spacer out of 3/4" phenolic plate
-used nylon washers and bushings to insulate even the carb/manifold bolts
-got rid of the metal fuel line from the fuel pump to the carb, replaced with 5/16" rubber fuel line completely wrapped with 3/4" heater hose to insulate
-got rid of the dashpot & bracket
-got rid of the copper tube from the exhaust manifold to the carb (it's summertime, don't need it), blocked off hole on carb


so far, so good. still runs cool as ever, and no more gas boiling out. it's turning out to not even need the electric fans at all, so i will be taking them out soon. the only problem now is it has a nasty flat spot on acceleration, regardless of speed. cruising is fine, but any gentle push of the gas pedal and it stumbles. mash the gas, and no problems.

how old is your radiator?

since you were giving degrees of coolant temp, can we assume you have an aftermarket coolant temp gauge?

if so, how much do you trust the sending unit and the gauge?

has it ever boiled over?

dead spot is acclerator pump

The radiator is an old one & when it started leaking at the seam between the core and upper tank I flushed it out really well repeatedly then soldered it back together than rinsed and flushed again. I have flushed the motor many times as well. The gauge is an inexpensive electrical gauge but seems to be accurate when checking it with my non contact thermometer, and that's not a cheap tool.

My carburetor is the kind with the metering rod in a variable jet similet to the motorcycle cv Carb, but this is a butterfly down draft not a slide style side draft, so I can't really bump up the jetting for the main circuit and its too rich on the idle circuit as it is.

I've never been a fan of flex fans but bolted this on just to give it a try, I'll probably switch it back to the stock one this afternoon. This Carb is in decent
Condition and if I don't let the electric fan run after I shut the motor off it will boil the fuel in the Carb. I need a phenolic spacer but haven't had a chance to track one down and don't have any idea where to buy the material.

I was going to use some header wrap on the stock manifold just keep the cab temperatures down but again time hasn't been on my side. Maybe I'll have the radiator boiled out, there might be an internal clog that the regular hose wont clear.

And I realized this harmonic balancer is smaller than stock not larger as I stated before, this means I'm underdriving my accessories - most importantly the water pump.

The motor got really hot and warped the rings on my #4 cylinder but with the msd ignition the plugs don't foul out now, it just puffs a little smoke from the valve cover breather but its not burning a huge amount of oil at all. The day that happened was when I initially installed the electric fan and removed the factory fan. I was sold a faulty switch for it and it never came on, but I'm working with the manufacturer now and they are supposed to pay for a rebuild... but big corporations take forever to come through on a promise. This was in February I think and I was trying to control the temp from running so low because I needed heat inside to fight the thirty degree outside temps.

As for your hesitation... make sure you throttle linkage geometry is correct, check your timing the 200 should have about 12 initial advance and if it is the load-o-matic dizzy you have to have the correct vacuum connections because there is no centrifugal advance.