Final Installation of Radiator – 4 Hours

Also this week, the 2nd batch of panels was powder coated, including the radiator shroud. This meant that the radiator could be permanently installed and the coolant hoses, cut, fitted, and bent to shape.



Ideally the radiator mount should account for vibration and not be a sold connection to the frame as this can lead to premature failure. To account for this the fan was mounted to the shroud using rubber washers, a 1/8” thick by ¾” wide rubber strip was used between the shroud flange and the radiator, the same rubber strip was used between the radiator and the fame.

The Breeze lower radiator support uses rubber hose to provide a vibration mound at the base of the radiator. As per Breeze instructions the radiator angle was set at 51 degrees to the horizontal.

Factory Five provide a length of corrugated stainless steel hose which requires cutting to length, and formed to fit. The upper hose needed bending into a simple S shape to accommodate the vertical displacement between the radiator and the billet coolant filler.

Routing of the lower hose is more involved, first clearing the chassis and then running the hose under the X member and over the 4” round chassis cross member before connecting to the engine. As this is a long run and a customer cushion mount will be manufactured to connect this hose to the underside of the X member.

TIP of the week: Many complain that the corrugated hose does not seal with the rubber joint, the hose should go into the rubber joint about 1 ½” the hose clamp needs to seal on the outer corrugation, by measuring the pitch the distance between 3 serrations is ¾” using this the hose clamp can be positioned correctly. Of course this won’t be validated until first engine start!