Advice on removing an oil cooler on a Series 1 4.2

[club3999]

Hello

I've just joined the club following the Silverstone event, where my E Type suffered with the delays to get on to the parade lap.

The car is fitted with an oil cooler but what with this and the extra fan in the nose, air flow to the water radiator is somewhat restricted. I'm now fitting the latest Kenlowe to suck the air through the rad and intend to remove the oil cooler and its pre-historic fan which sit right in the nose of the bonnet. In my view I don't drive my car hard enough to warrant an oil cooler despite the reported advantages that they may bring.

My question simply is, can I simply blank off ,with appropriate fittings, the inlet and outlet ports,which are on top of the unit which the two pipes leading to and from the oil rad are attached to?

The actual unit with the ports bolts to the engine, on to which the oil filter spins on and off. Ideally I would like to retain this unit so that I can continue to take advantage of the spin-on oil filter capability Logic tells me that this isn't a problem blanking off the ports but I've been caught out before with E Types.

I hope all of this makes sense!

The oil cooler is the one that is readily available from Barratts, XK Engineering and others so I assume some of you will be familiar with it. Any help gratefully accepted.

Finally whilst the E Type Club centre was a real haven of help when my E Type expired, I like many of you was extremely disappointed by the organisation by Silvertsone officials.

Robert

[PeterCrespin]

You can run a loop of large oil hose from one fitting to the other and remove the cooler. I'd double-clip or crimp the hose, as this is a high pressure system and the 'aorta' of your engine. We don't want any aneurysms at high revs....

Better still, most dealers will sell you an alloy casting which is a horseshoe-shaped fitting that you simply fit in place of the two unions and it does the same thing but much neater and more securely, using the same central fastener.

They are rather expensive though (circa ?30 IIRC), so contact me if you want to try a cheap one, because I 'think' the one on my spare AJ6 engine is the same size. I can take it off and try for you if you like. Failing that, the same oil filter housing was provided with/without cooler fittings machined on it, so you might be able to source a non-cooler version and swap.

I might be interested in your cooler, so some kind of trade is even on the cards. PM me if interested

Pete

[club3999]

Thanks for the response Pete. How quickly could you get that part to me, or I could collect of course?I'm in Newark which isn't too far from Cambs. You can have first refusual on the oil cooler if you wish too.

many thanks

Robert