Technical What Radiator did you use ( SBC in 53 Chevy Coupe)

Putting a SBC in my 53 Chevy Coupe --- what radiator did you use?

 

Autocityclassics.com

 

R4954 and lower hose = correct. Not sure but these may be made by Champion, which is fine. I have one of theirs in my Ford.

 

Uh, Stock one works great. SBC in a '54 Sedan for 14 years now.

 

I agree with TERPU - unless you have no rad.. I've had a couple of early '50s Chevys and a '54 Pontiac (Canadian) with small blocks and had no issues with stock rads. I even had the local shop modify the bottom tank in the latest one to allow for plumbing the Turbo tranny.

Dave

p.s. I like your coupe!

 

I have a walker radiator in my 54

 

There is an early 70's Dodge truck radiator that works great in them. Ii just about bolts right in. You just need to drill the mounting holes. I used a few of them. A radiator catalog had pictures and measurements if you want to buy a new one or refine the junkyard search.

 

I plan to install A/C in the car and want to go with a rad that will do the job

 

I have A/C in my Buick with the stock radiator and it cools just fine.

 

I have a 48 Chevy 1/2 ton panel truck with a 350 Chevy. Built it about 35 years ago. Used a Chrysler radiator at first. Took it to the 1st Ameracruise in southern Ill. Had overheating issues.
Ordered a radiator from Walker. Installed that and never any issues since. Mechanical cooling fan driven off water pump.
I have a dislike for electric cooling fans.

 

I used the stock one in my 51 until the tank blew off at the drive trough. it was in pretty rough shape though... I put an aluminum one in it from Chevs of the 40's works great fit perfect and less than 300 bucks. always stays at 180 with a mechanical fan, very nice quality too.

 

I went with an aluminum Champion for my Ford. Its for a 1965 Chevy but the dimensions were great and I only had to add 2 holes to the flanges. The other 2 were right on.

 

Unless your rad is no good I certainly wouldn't go through the expense of buying one until the stocker proves it can't handle the task - even with air. Why spend cash on something unless it's necessary?

Dave

 

I bought one from eBay, dual core. Works good

 

Yes, stock. Guys been doing it for decades.

 

I put a Walker in my 51.

 

We fought this problem for some time. When we upgraded our 50 Chev Ute to 350, I got a big 4 row ( I think it was a Walker from the Chevy Toy Store in Orange CA) with the thought bigger is better. Well it wasn't. We had trouble with overheating while idleing.
I finally figured out we weren't getting enough air through the thick radiator. I tried by adding a electric fan but even the thinnest one wouldn't fit between the water pump and radiator. I took the auto trans cooler out of the picture by bypassing the radiator and just using a remote cooler, still would get hot.
Finally I put in one of the abs plastic radiator shrouds which solved the overheating problem.
And yes I checked the timing and such, and I think some of the problem was the narrow engine compartment which was made for the narrow 6 cylinder that held in a lot of motor heat.
So a thinner core radiator might have been better as our 350 is not a high compression-high horsepower motor.
But then again I am not a builder, just a back yard hack.

 

That's what we always used.^^^^^ Sometimes we had to rod them out to get them to cool but that was just maintenance 101 back then, if you couldn't rod one out you knew someone who could.

 

My 53 has a aluminum headed big block 496 I used a champion 3 row aluminum 1 inch core with a straight blade push fan on the outside no mechanical fan on the motor... no overheating problems...

 

No offense intended but you are aware that louvers are for letting the heat out of the engine compartment, correct?

That has always been a problem with the pre tri five chebby. They were basically ignored by hot rodders for years because of the size and shape of the engine compartment. Many won't remember but there was a time that you could not buy motor mounts or headers to fit a small block into these old cars.

You had few choices, one was to take a pair of rams horns and modify them to clear the steering or build a set of headers if you could. I remember a lot of guys using the stock radiators and other guys adapting radiators from later small block cars. Corvette setups were popular, but they were something that could be found. Not so much today at least not for a price that keeps hot rodding fun.

 

Yes louvers are excellent or heat removal, but that was not an option for our vehicle. Yes it is just a 50 Chevy, but it was a mostly original Ute we bought from the original owner out of his shed. Also having talked to a few owners of louvered hoods, you have two other problems, they allow water to run in and cut the shit out of your hands if you are not careful when washing it.
And I forgot to mention, we had the original air tubes and I think it contributed to the lack of proper air movement. When we did a remake with the shroud I removed the tubes as they would only blow hot air, which came from the close exhaust. And to correct myself, old age and faded brain cells, our radiator is a US Radiator.
And no offense taken, no two builds are the same.

 

I didn't really think you would be offended.

Utes are hard to come by I think even down under anymore. I personally don't think that one needs much to be outstanding as a mild custom or a hot rod.

 

I tried to buy a stock one for my Ford in a 3-row core with the bottom hose on the passenger side, only one I found was a 2-row core and they wanted $465 for it. Aluminum one ran me $219 delivered.

 

Nice thing about the SBC is they run nice and cool. Usually a stock radiator will do fine, unless maybe you add a whole lot of HP goodies.

 

Uhhh, that would be apples and oranges. Move along.

 

Which means what???