How to attach a Griffen Radiator?????

[renaissance man]

How in the world do you attach a Griffen Radiator? No instructions at all. No flange on the side with holes to mount it??????

[DAVID GAGNARD]

Ren Man;

Although my car is a 65 Mustang,the mounting should be similar. I went to the local welding shop that also does aluminum welding and got some flat pieces about 1.5 inches wide and up to 10 inches long,mostly out of their scrap pile.. Came home and put the radiator in place with wood blocks and rubber straps and then figured where the flat stips needed to be and the length. Then took the radiator and stips and had them welded to the tanks. One on each side top and bottom,then got some rubber grommet looking things about 1.5 inches in diameter and an inch thick and used between mounting points and radiator tabs. It allows for flex and some movement (very slight) of the radiator....I think if mounted solidly the tanks would eventually tear where welded....This setup has been on my car for 12,000 + miles over the last 4 years or so with no problems what-so-ever....

This is probably one thing that will vary from car to car and depends on the car itself... Griffin sends the radiators with no mounting tabs because they are considered a "universal" radiator....BTW, the Griffin is a very good radiator.....

Hope this helps,I may take some pictures as the radiator is out of the car right now if I could figure how to post them. I'm not to good and stuff like that on the computer....

David

[renaissance man]

Most of the radiator places that I have talked to told me that Griffen uses epoxy on the tubes and that putting heat on the radiator that a welder puts out will melt the epoxy in the griffens. They suggested making a cradle with spacers to fit into the current radiator slot on the car.

[RallySnake]

These are the kind of projects I love most. You get to use your imagination and ingenuity to make parts that do the job. I made a lower cradle out of scrap aluminum piece from an old PC case. It was about 20 inches long and 5 inches wide and the front and rear edges were bent up 90 degrees, providing 1/2 inch lips. It is punched with holes all across the surface and that makes it lighter and better looking. I used two pieces of 3/8 inch rubber fuel hose to provide cushion. I slit each of them down the full length and pushed the slit onto the lower edges of the radiator's aluminum bottom brace (about 16 inches). The radiator sits perfectly in the cradle. I mounted the cradle to the top of brackets that extended back from the frame under the nose of the car. These brackets also support the rollbar on the underside. (I try to use the Formula One concept of having every bracket do multiple jobs). The top of the radiator is held in place by two small aluminum angle brackets that also support the hood hinges. Again, I used slitted rubber fuel line to make it a soft support. These have been on the car for about 4 years and the radiator is doing fine.

[Bob Putnam]

We "just" rivet top and bottom channels with studs to the original radiator. The studs go into grommets of the top and bottom supports.

Like the original car.

[Jack21]

Also used the cradle approach, trying to emulate the way GM mounts radiators in rubber mounts. Making cradle type mounts with rubber inserts for the radiator is fairly straightforward. Making brackets on the aluminum radiator to hold it in place in the rubber, or mount the fan was a little more difficult. I used Devcon (hardware store) Z7 epoxy and shelving bracket (hardware store) wall mount pieces cut to size and epoxied in place on the radiator. No welding, and no penetration of any radiator surfaces.

Used 1 3/4" stainless exhaust tubing for the lower water crossover.