Hi guys, I hope everyone is doing well as the racing year is winding down in the next month or so. As per usual I have a winter project(s) on my dads crx.

To make a long and boring story short, we ran Marrs 9 at Summit Point last weekend, and for once, actually made it through a weekend. Marrs 9 of this year was the first race we had an oil temp gauge installed in the car. It procceded to peg at 260 degrees after about 4 laps. Our temporary solution to make it through the weekend was change the oil after every session with fresh mobile 1. That gets expensive in a hurry. 6 quart oil capacity and 3 track sessions. Needless to say we pretty much bought all the mobile1 5w-30 the Charles Town WV autozone had. Lol

The motor in the car is a B20vtec. B20B4 block(stock), gsr head with itr cams. Probably considered slow by most of you, but fast enough to have a good bit of fun with. This motor has been in the car before. It has eight race weekends on it to be exact. Those were all pre-oil temp gauge. (Just a side note, we've always had oil pressure and water temp gauges from the get go; they have always been normal and were normal last weekend as well.) We put the oil temp gauge on to make use of the port in the back of the moroso oil pan we installed on the motor. Great reason right

Now, obviously an oil temp of 260+ is not good, but I can only assume it has been that hot all along which is why we opted to just finish out the weekend. So after the first session of enlightenment from our new gauge we decided to talk to someone that knew a lot more than us(the nascar team paddocked beside us). Their mechanic told us to look for something about 5 inches tall, 3 inches deep, and 20' inches long with -12an fittings for the oil lines. He said that should cool it down to around 200ish degrees.

We got home sunday night and I found this: http://www.ebay.com/itm/220611617116...84.m1438.l2649 which pretty much fits the bill. I measured and it will work on the crx so as of now that is what I'm going with.

Now after that seemingly useless background information, here are my actual questions. Is what I found overkill? What are you using? Would you suggest anthing else?

Thanks for any help fellas.

 

Actually 260 is not horrible if it stays around there. And to answer the oil cooler I don't think I'm going back to an oil cooler. Think about the size of the lines also if you want to run one.
Usually oil runs considerably higher than water , I would say a differential of 60 degrees is not bad.

 

I don't think the cooler is too big, but I don't think you need to run-12 lines with that engine, at the most -10 should be fine, you do need to use a thermostat, that way the oil stays around 200 and isn't too cold,

I don't have my car running yet, so I don't have any data on my cooler setup, but this is Turbaka's setup on his race three g, you might want to look him up over at three geez and see if he can give you some specs, I'm running the same thermostat he is.

 

That's the thing...I don't know how high it's actually getting because the gauge only goes up to 260. If its pegging at 260 after 4 or so laps in an 18 lap race how much hotter is it actually getting in that 14 lap window?

The temp may be pushing the limits of ok, but I'd rather be safe than pissed when something breaks as a result of a high oil temp that could have been prevented.

I guess I'm just not ok with a temp that high. If it was staying around 250 I'd be ok with it.

One thing I neglected to mention was that it was only about 65 degrees out during the race. So pretty cool compared to a 90 degree summer race. That really makes me wonder what this thing would get up to on hot summer day.

 

Honestly, if the cooler comes with -12 ports I'm not going to change them to something smaller. Seems counter productive to me.

I would however have no problem running -10 lines if the cooler had -10 fittings.

My thing is...I guess I would rather over-do it now and not need to worry about it later if you know what I mean.

Something else that I've wondered for the longest time...how do the fittings hook to the line. Are they just pressure fittings as in stick line into fitting and thats it or...?

 

they are AN fittings, I wouldn't use a barbed fitting with a hose clamp on a lawnmower, let alone a race car, your cooler may have larger ports then what is needed for a -10 line, but that's only because someone may be using it for an engine with a much higher oil volume ,then what you are running. if you feel better running -12, then run -12, but it's just going to cost more for the lines and fittings, and is probably overkill

 

http://pitstopusa.com/p-4111-how-to-...ing-sizes.html

 

Actually found a video on a dsm forum showing how to couple the fittings to the hose. Seems simple. I'm sure saying that will come back to bite me later though.

So you would run a -12 to -10 reducer then? As opposed to just using-12 stuff.

I see your point with the different application thing.

 

your fittings on the cooler are most likely NPT pipe thread, generally AN stuff is run with AN to NPT adapters, some stuff is designed with AN threads directly on it, but most use NPT stuff, you would probably run a -10 to 3/4 npt adapter, very common stuff, you also can get the fittings,hose and ends from places like Summit racing, jegs etc, I use a lot of their brands, and it's just as good as Aeroquip stuff, just a lot cheaper

 

For the description of the one in the link I posted it says the cooler has (2) -12an fittings, (1) -6an fitting, and (1) 3/8 npt fitting.

So I'll figure on the -12 to -10 reducer. I was planning to get everything from Pegasus Racing. I'll check prices on JEGS and Summit too. Thanks for the help.

 

I forgot to mention Pegasus, just don't fall for the aeroquip is better, they might be if you have a huge budget, but the store brands of places like Summit,JEgs,etc are just as good, Also look for earls, Holley makes them, I suspect they also make a lot of store brands too.

 

Your talking to someone that just learned how -an fittings are coupled to hose about 10mins ago. I've never even heard of aeroquip. I've heard of earls and thats about it. So for me its going to be earls from summit or jegs or what ever brand pegasus sells. I have no intention of paying more for something because it carries a name. Trust me.

 

this is my setup, I'm running an aircraft cooler in a forced air setup with a blower, I went with this, because I'm going to try to keep the temps reasonable
running a highly modified engine in the middle of Georgia summers in traffic

 

well summit has their own name brand, which looks to be extremely high quality to me, and isn't nearly as expensive, probably renamed earls stuff

 

Thats a nice setup you have. Your probably right on with summit being renamed earls stuff. Thats usually how things go.

 

I would not want to see 260 in my engine and am surprised to hear other say it ok. imho, I think you've got issues and good reason to be concerned. My exceptionally good mechanic who builds reliable, fast honda race engines has a high side target of mid 240-250 max, ever.

What water temp where you getting? Have you considered the possibility of an inaccurate gauge or sender? I had that problem once.

fwt, my EK si track car's tuned B16A making 168whp at 9200 has never been much above 245-250 water temp and 240 oil temps and that only briefly while having the **** drivin out of it on a really hot CA central valley days at Thunderhill and those temps came down quickly if I choice to ease off. My most common reading is ~220/225 both water and oil

The car saw several 95 degree+ track sessions this summer in NorCal. Never did the oil get above ~240 and it never exceeded water temp by 10-15 degrees. The oil temp always lagged the water temp on the way up and the way down. But for most of the 20 minute track sessions the water and oil temp were very similar. 225-240 at max. The oil temp sender located in sandwich plate at oem oil filter location.

I have a huge full size Fluidyne radiator and a ~8x12 x 2 thick oil cooler AN10. Pictures posted in HT threads elsewhere. A really good syn (Amsoil) can handle 300 degrees. Mobil-One not sure.

 

Water temp stays pretty much around 210 even when being raced hard for the entireity of the session.

I considered an inacurate gauge or sender until I stuck an infared(i dont know how to spell it) lets just say laser thermometer on the oil pan after the car was back in the paddock. The thermometer said 240 and the gauge said 240.

We use mobil1 because it is considered a very good syn oil after you throw in zinc additive and because its readily available. Even an autozone in the middle of podunk west virginia had it.