Oil cooler..........round two, AKA fun with foam! Options

[East coaster]

So after a little brainstorming on an oil cooler layout, I figured I better actually do it.

Started out by figuring out the mounting of the cooler itself. It's a very large (4 x 24 fin area) and I think a good fit for a 3.6 since it doesn't have an engine mounted cooler. I started by cutting sections out of the front support tray for clearance and then re-boxing the area to keep the shelf rigid and serve as a mounting point for the front of the cooler.

Here's a pic of the cut outs...........

[davep]

Since I deal with heat exchange, air and fluid flow as part of my job, I thought I'd add just a little bit here.
Heat exchangers depend on velocity of the air as much as volume to do the job efficiently. A car at speed with the HX fully exposed will see sufficient velocity. At rest there, obviously, is no velocity. As you restrict the inlet, both volume and velocity decrease. Similarly, on the outlet side any restrictions will reduce volume and velocity. Pressure differences will also have a significant effect on both.
One way of designing a system is to start by measuring the cross-sectional area of the heat exchanger. By rights you should consider only the open area of the rad, that area through which the air actually flows, and of course that means subtracting the area of the tubes. So, if you have a 4" x 20" rad for a total area of 80 sq inches you may find the open area to be 40 to 50 sq inches. Then you can plan the inlet area to be at least this size, and slightly larger if there are lots of sharp edges as opposed to a nicely contoured duct. Generally the inlet is very short and unrestricted. On the outlet side of the rad, paths tend to be a little longer and may not be straight, thus the cross-sectional area of the outlet is generally larger than the inlet. The rule of thumb however is to try to keep the duct cross-section constant even while it is changing shape. The idea is to try to keep the velocity constant. Sharp bends should be avoided.
Placing booster fans in the system can be a real problem. When the car is at rest, and there is no other airflow, then they become a necessity. At speed they are usually a restriction. In this particular design I'd place the two fans in front of the rad and between the ducts in the front; you have three duct opennings, and two spaces between the duct opennings. By placing the fans out of the direct incoming airflow you reduce the restriction to airflow at speed, yet at rest the fans will easily draw air from the opennings on either side of it. I'd place the fans directly on the rad itself. My choice of fans for this would be a pair of 120mm x 38mm high speed units with ball bearings. I have some Panasonic models of this type.

Similar to the airflow design, the oil lines and other parts should be matched. It would be useless, almost, to have -16 lines and a -8 openning into the rad or into the thermostat. I too would place the thermostat close to the engine. I might even have two thermostats, one at the engine and the other at the rad. If the rad does not have a pressure relief valve in it, or with it, then the second thermostat would help. This would stage the cooling, and allow faster engine warmup. It may also prevent over-cooling of the oil on cool days. My friend with the GT always warmed the car up to ensure the hot oil was flowing through the rad before taking the car onto the track. Too many of his friends blew their rads halfway around on the first lap because they did not warm things up properly. He suggests synthetic oil to reduce the problems.

Your system sure is elegant, and that is a good sign. Perhaps this thread should be in the Classics section soon.