[scottiej]

Thought I'd share this here, I've fitted a few vit rads into SJs over the years but this is my favourite way that I've done it so far. bolts onto stock mounts, sits low enough to clear the bonnet and clears a jimny PS box.

[Gwagensteve]

There are holes in the shroud around the fan??

[Gwagensteve]

*sitting at a computer*

I've seen a number of methods of running a vitara radiator in a Sierra and I'm not in love with any of them. All seem to rely on moving the radiator into a position where it's a very tight fit, on a funky angle, compromises the fan choice or is a complete pain to remove/work on (or all of these)
Personally, I dislike thermo fans and any fan is only as good as the seal between the shroud and the radiator. This is the case for both electric and engine driven fans, which are my preference.

Whilst the mild climate in the UK might mean that radiator/fan combination is adequate for your use, the fan is only working to a fraction of its potential, and in a warmer climate (like here in Australia) I'd expect that to have mammoth cooling problems. On the flip side, my experience has shown me a standard Vitara viscous clutch fan and Sierra shroud and radiator will cool a G16B converted sierra perfectly adequately in even high ambient crawling situations, with a transmission cooler in front of the radiator. Out of interest, what was the reasoning behind the holes in the shroud? Was the idea that at speed it would allow air to flow through he radiator and have a means of escape? Are they for ease of cleaning the core?

The quality of your workmanship is absolutely first rate Scottie, and for that reason alone, thanks for sharing, but that solution isn't aligned with my understanding of fan/shroud operation and definitely wouldn't be adequate locally.

[scottiej]

Cheers for the feedback Steve.

I had a feeling some questions over the design might pop up, I guess we'll see how well it functions as soon as this build is finished but I'm pretty confident it should be ok, I know that the cooling from that fan isn't going to be as efficient as it could be but as you say the climate is much cooler here in the UK so I have found that electric fans work fine without a shroud at all. The main aim was that I wanted a way to mount the rad with a fan and for it to be a bolt in solution that is easy to remove and it works really well in that respect.
I was in two minds about making the mount also function as a shroud, If I was going to do that I would have made it seal better without any holes, however I think it would have made it a lot harder to fit and remove.

We don't seem to have much luck with the 1.3 rad over here, it's often wet and muddy and that of course leads to the rad getting clogged up with mud, the extra capacity of the 1.6 rad really helps in that respect as you can get away with some of the rad clogging up before overheating becomes an issue.

I need to build another one soon for my lwb so I might see if I can do a similar thing but with a sealed shroud.

[Gwagensteve]

With my understanding of U.K. Conditions I don't think I'd be running a front mount radiator at all.

[scottiej]

If this was a comp motor then it would have a rear rad that's for sure.