Joined: Aug 2017 Posts: 2,748 Threads: 31
Reputation:
95
Location: Auckland, NZ
23-07-2019, 10:22 AM
(This post was last modified: 23-07-2019, 10:24 AM by Bob Culver.)
Temp gauges in radiator tanks can be treacherous. If a lot of water is lost, read cool. A factor to be aware of.
I have mentioned before but for decades my RP was run with a tiny hole in the cap. Steam could be seen. But on heavy braking a very thin jet of rusty steaming water went clean over the top of the car! I dont know about the shrouded radiators but the earlier seem to lose a lot of water due sloshing out the overflow.
Joined: Aug 2017 Posts: 919 Threads: 18
Reputation:
13
Location: North Yorkshire
Since having the radiator on my RL saloon recored 10 years ago (with a proper Austin pattern core) it has never boiled, and as those who know me will appreciate, I live close to one of the most ferocious hills in Britain and the car is used for some quite demanding runs. I decided to have the radiator recored on the way back from the VSCC Malvern Anniversary week when climbing a long hill near Buxton when the radiator cap, complete with calorimeter, exploded out of the radiator like a champagne cork, flying over the top of the car and landing in the road. Despite having an HGV on my backside at the time, I was able to pull over onto the verge to retrieve the cap, which miraculously was undamaged apart from some minor scratching to the chrome of the calorimeter. The rad cap was a plastic repro with no brass threaded insert. The threads were cut into the plastic and stripped easily. It was consigned to the bin.
I digress. If you have a good radiator and the engine block is not caked up with crud, then if the engine is set up correctly it should not boil. Petrol is a critical factor in this discussion. Always use a super unleaded fuel, the cheaper grades of petrol are far more likely to cause higher running temperatures and vaporisation in the carburettor. I use an SU carb which facilitates adjustment of the mixture. On the Cumbria Run in June I faced the ascent of Kirkstone Pass in Cumbria, fully loaded, two up on a hot day. As a precaution I stopped at the Patterdale Inn at the foot of the pass and made the mixture a flat richer. The car climbed the pass with no bother despite a spell of first gear at the top and the added difficulty of road work traffic lights towards the top.
Joined: Aug 2017 Posts: 1,462 Threads: 26
Reputation:
17
Location: North Yorkshire
We were behind Malcolm as he pulled into the Patterdale Inn and, not having an SU to adjust, decided to 'go for it'. The car didn't boil BUT, like the last time we went up the Kirkstone Pass, we did get petrol boiling in the float chamber and, therefore, fuel vaporisation. The traffic lights towards the top actually helped as stopping for them seemed to cool things down and off we went to the top. Tomorrow, we're driving down to our Daughter's near Derby, coming back Thursday morning (Grandson and friend to and from his School 'Prom' tomorrow evening). Forecast says they'll be the hottest days in living memory or some such. Bog standard SWB Saloon with two blade fan, bronze updraught and an old, but basically sound, radiator. What could possibly go wrong!!??
Steve
Joined: Aug 2017 Posts: 2,402 Threads: 33
Reputation:
36
Location: Deepest Frogland 30960
Car type: 1933 RP Standard Saloon
Kirkstone Pass? That's nothing. When I were a lad we'd get up before we went to bed the night before and then push our RP all the way to the top of Ben Nevis, backwards and then have a cup of gravel for tea at Bettie's in York on us way back ter Barnsley.
Joined: Aug 2017 Posts: 1,641 Threads: 93
Reputation:
15
Location: Monmouthshire
Hairdressers, pushing Austin Seven saloons. Down by'ere we had to carry dad's K4 lorry up to the top of the tip in the middle of the night to fill it with coal, so that when the foreman opened the gates in the morning he'd see no tyre tracks. Mind you, we were better off than the lads in North Wales. When they emptied the slate out of their dad's lorries, no amount of kindling could get it to burn. No porridge for breakfast for them. Who's next, maybe the construction of rafts from disused tyres to bring coal along the F&C canal from Twechar?
Joined: Aug 2017 Posts: 1,230 Threads: 33
Reputation:
7
Location: Salop
Car type: '28 GE Cup. '28 AD Chummy '30 RL Saloon. '34 RP Saloon. Too Many toys!
Take the bonnet off Steve. Or run with one side open.
My RL boiled and vapour locked going up passed Llyn Brianne in 1st gear one day many years ago. In torrential rain!. But it was a sidedraft fed by gravity.
