Put new t-stats in my car today to replace the tired old ones. Upped the temperature range from 180F to 192F and changed out the coolant while I was at it.

Car warms up much quicker now. Oddly enough the temperature needle didn't really go up very much when fully warm (a hair below the N), it just gets there a lot quicker. I suspect the old ones were done and weren't really blocking off the bypass passageway...

Anyways, I also put in some homemade coolant filters by chopping up some stainless steel mesh from a kitchen sink drain filter. Also put a bevel in the banjo flow port so I could use generic crush washers from the local auto parts superstore.

I intended to buy some Tefba coolant filters to replace my homemade ones, as they are easier to service. I went to Fasterjags... $155 for the set plus shipping!? No thanks. Homemade ones cost me $1.98 for the pair at Wal-Mart and will do just fine. Maybe I'll ask Santa for some Gano ones for Xmas...

Incidentally, instead of draining my coolant out the lower radiator hose, after removing the banjo bolt I siphoned it out with 3 feet of 1/4" copper tube I had laying around. Idea for that was in the Book. Got over 3.5 gallons that way. Very clean and very easy.

Cheers,

Will

 

@Will

Sounds good. I am just about ready to swap out my blocked original rad with the FasterJags one that arrived this week.....



If its cooling capacity is as good as it's shininess, we should be in good shape

 

That looks great!!! was your old one not cooling well?

 

just saw u said blocked ha

 

Macboots....any chance you could post a pic of your do it yourself filters? I'd like some filters but there are a couple of other things i need to do first.......Thanks

 

@ Sarc: Looking good! I'm sure I don't have to remind you to put weatherstripping all around so the lower 1/3 doesn't get blocked up with crap.

@ Terry: Will take photos in the near future. I just checked them last night, there was only 1 small 'pebble' in it over a week's drive to and from work so it looks like my system is pretty clean and I'll probably remove them after another week. I put a finer mesh in the heater hose line, that had a lot more in it. For the lines coming out of the thermostat, I literally just cut some wire screen from a $1 stainless steel sink drain I bought at Wal-Mart, formed it around the thermostat outlet, and installed the rubber coolant hose over it to hold it in place. For the heater hose line, bought some brass fittings meant for a garden hose at Lowes and purchased some rubber washers with built in mesh screen (also meant for a garden hose) to replace the washer that came with the fitting. Brass garden hose fittings can be found in the garden section, the gasket/screen is in the specialty washer section in plumbing. Inserted it at the highest point in the line to the heater hose. Makes refilling the coolant easier, as I disconnect that line and it's the last area to overflow when refilling (well past after the bleed valve is shut).

 

And the stupid shall be punished.

When reinstalling the bleed air banjo bolt, I replaced the wafer thin Jaguar copper crush gaskets with thicker generic ones. Did not think about the width of all 3 copper washers taking away necessary thread from the bolt engagement. Everything went together fine last week, but when reinstalling last night stripped out the banjo bolt with hardly any torque.

Went to the local hardware store today and purchased 3/8" ID fiber washers I can reuse as well as a shorter 3/8" ID spacer to replace the stock one on the banjo bolt to allow more thread engagement. Also ordered the replacement banjo bolt that FasterJags offers, as they say it is longer and I figure the more thread the better...

Everything is back together now and took it very easy on the torque. It's not leaking, so good so far I guess and lesson learned to be more careful when I use generic replacements...

Cheers,

Will

 

Received the replacement banjo in the mail from FasterJags. I also decided to go ahead and order the Tefba filters. I was skeptical that they are worth the price, but after installing my home brew filters that require draining coolant to service, I do see the value in having filters that you can service quickly without any draining.

Before doing the install, I took advantage of having some coolant out to remove the upper radiator support rail and pry back the radiator. Cleaned out a lot of junk that was wedged between the radiator and the oil cooler, and then installed weather stripping everywhere it seemed appropriate. Hopefully that space will stay clean now, as I would guess about 1/4 the radiator's surface area was blocked.

The FasterJags banjo is actually very similar to the one I had installed on my car. It is longer, which is what I needed due to some of the threads being stripped, but the hole is the same size and position. Perhaps at some point someone installed an aftermarket banjo on my car, or Jaguar switched banjos at some point.

I'm on the fence on the Tefba filters. They come with two different screens, one being finer than the other (installed the fine one). There is tons of surface area, so you'd have to have a really bad system or forget to service them for a very long time to block these things up. Both filters have a spring at the bottom which pushes up a plastic plate the actual filters sit on.

One of the plastic plates had some plastic flashing preventing the filter from sitting down fully. Easily corrected with a razor knife. Both filters are slightly too short, so the plate sticks up into the flow path. There is also a *small* cutout in the plate that allows unfiltered coolant through. Perhaps this is meant as a final relief in case the entire filter gets blocked, but it is such a small area you would be severely overheating. In any case, I put in a 1/8" thick 1 3/4" rubber washers to sit under the lid and push down the filters to remove this channel.

With those two corrections, the Tefbas are very nice. But for the money (about $75 a pop) I think they should be more or less plug and play and not require any fiddling or trips to the hardware store.

Here's photos after my install.





After installing the Tefba filters and refilling the coolant I took a 10 minute drive. Did another coolant air bleed and then serviced the Tefbas. Sure enough work as advertised, no need to drain any coolant. Screens were perfectly clean though... guess my coolant system is pretty clean (my homebrew filters, which were not as fine as the Tefbas, only picked up a few small pebble like objects over the course of a few weeks).

Cheers,

- Will

 

ive got a spare radiator for sale if anyone is interested. hasnt been cleaned, but it worked good and i didnt have any problems overheating once i did the initial flush after purchasing the car.

 

Tefba follow up:

Filters are working well. They are very easy to clean, which is a huge plus and ensures lazy folks like me will check them often.

The first 500 miles I was checking them about every 150 miles or so. Very little was in the filters. The car sat in the garage for a month and then I drove it another 500 miles before checking the filters. This time about 1/3 the surface area was gunked up with all sorts of debris. Looked like someone dumped a handful of fine gravel into the coolant.

After seeing that glad I have them in now. Scary to think what has been going into my radiator.

Cheers,

- Will

 

There is another USA distributor for the Tefba Inline Radiator Coolant Filters in Utah. I bought a couple from them on E-Bay. They buy them directly from the manufacturer and has a large quantity always in stock. He sells them at the same price as the manufacturer for $69.50. I also purchased the extra strong Tefba collector sludge tray Magnet ($3.49) for greater capture of all particles in the cooling system. I bought the Filter and Magnet on a Thursday and it was at my door on Saturday. Very fast, easy transaction with super fast shipping. The reviews I read online about Fasterjags was not good and when I found out I could buy be them cheaper and recieve it faster I bought them on E-Bay from the company in Utah.