I'm far enough along in the buld of my 30 tudor to start shopping for a radiator. My question is, when using a 32 shell on a model a with a 30 frame and front crossmemeber, do I need a radiator for a 30-31, or for a 32?
I used a radiator for a 32 on my model A with a 32 shell and model A frame and front crossmember. It will cool much better than a short radiator that fits an "A" grille shell.
I think you would be best served by planning for the cooling capacity you need for your planned motor, then finding a modern radiator that will fit in your grill shell. None of the true 30's radiators are really set up for the engines we run today. Are you running a hood or sides,ecetric or engine driven fan,fan shroud or ope? Lots of questions-list what you plan and many folks here will help you calculate what you need and will know what will fit.
To keep the profile of your car from looking like it's running uphill, you're going to have to drop that Deuce grille shell down a couple of inches between your frame rails. If it was a 28 - 29, it would have to drop even more. Walker builds radiators just for these A-Deuce applications. They're shortened the correct amount and provide all the bracketry for bolting on your grille shell.
Look for a 2 inch chopped radiator.Only if using a 32 grille. That way your grille wont be s****ing the ground.AFCO radiator is a good place to start .I spent months on researching this myself.Search everybody that makes radiators,Walker ;Afco, and others. Aluminum is the cheapest to go.As SOON as I Look at my favorites ill give you some more places to try.The only other place i found was active radiator.
I thought the three years had the same height radiator. If you are running a stock radiator cap you will need the '32 since the neck location is different. On my '32 (both radiator and car are '32) I am running a pressure cap inside and hold the stock cap on with metal bracket. Remember you will need to account for the fact that the '32 uses a stainless steel piece for a hood center hinge and the Model A uses a rod. Charlie Stephens
i agree with speed kings I have used mustang radiators on a bbc and a sbc with no cooling problems on either one. if you look they come with outlets on right or left
ok, well now I am as lost as I ever was...lol I am looking at new radiator, so trying to cool it with an 80 year old one won't be an issue. My grille shell is allready filled so I won't be needing the stock fill location but I don't really want to go through the trouble of making brackets for the mustang rad either since I hopefully can buy one that is a bolt on fit.
I agree with 5 window. I work for a cooling system company that does custom radiators and water pumps, coolant etc. I tell my customers every day that if you are making anywhere from 300hp and up, you need to use a radiator that will handle that kind of power, especially on a 85-90 deg day. And if you are running an automatic, to use a seperate trans cooler as you don't want the radiator having to cool the coolant and the trans. You should look at tube width in the radiator , that's where the flow is coming from.
The 32 shell should bolt up to the 30-31 radiator without too much trouble but the sidewalls at the bottom will need a little t******* to eliminate clearance issues at th crossmember. The 30-31 hood should work OK with a little tweaking and installation of the upper hood hinge rod bracket from a 28-31 shell available from any Model A Parts vendor. The 28-29 radiator is shorter than the 30-31 why doesn't everyone know this!? LOOK at them, it is pretty obvious even without a measuring tape. The 28-29 radiator and shell are short and wide in comparison to the 30-31 and 32 which are narrower and taller. The side panels must be shortened on a 32 shell to use over astock 28-29 radiator because of this height difference.
As noted, a Deuce radiator on an A will result in the hood line running uphill. Maybe these pics will help - I ran a 1" shorter Deuce radiator on my 31 on 32 rails roadster and it didn't look right. A better hood line flow from cowl to radiator was accomplished with temporary ajustable brackets that duplicated the height of a 2" shorter Deuce radiator. The bracket. You'll need to trim 2" off the bottom sides of the Deuce grille shell so it fits. No sectioning required. Imo the grille shell looks better hanging down a little lower in front of the crossmember.
Is that a gennie Deuce shell? The reason I ask is that I have a '32 shell on my '30 A pickup and it doesn't run uphill, and my brother has a 'gl*** '32 shell on his A sedan, and while he chose to drop it an inch, it clearly runs a tap down hill. Then there's a guy in our town who has a repro '32 three window coupe and even though it's at stock height, the shell is obviously higher than the cowl, just as your is in the first photo. Perhaps there are some variations, or maybe it's because yours is on a '32 frame, but having had both on my A pickup, I can tell you they are the same height.
Everyone is right. I think the confusion is running a '32 frame and a '31 body. Look at the frame specs at http://wescottsauto.com/Tech/frame_specs.html. The Model A frame is level and the '32 frame runs down hill to the cowl. Apparently the '32 cowl is higher than the Model A cowl. Charlie Stephens
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