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MG MGB Technical - 'Made In England' Radiator

I see the Proper MG has a radiator on sale (around $200) that's "Made In England". Are these rads of a decent quality? I've heard some bad things about some available through Moss and others that I believe are made in China. Has anyone had any experience one way or the other?

Mike King
'69 BGT
Mike King

My experience is that you are much better off takeing your present radiator to a radiator shop and having it recored with a new modern core. Thy to find a shop that specializes in rods and custom cars. I used
ANY RADIATOR in Lake Havasu, cost $195.00
No problems since even in summer.
Berady

Mike. I bought two radiators from Brit-Tek, both marked "Made in England". Both have worked fine for several years. I do know that Wes's Heavy Duty Radiator at the NW corner of Main and Alma School does a good job re-coring radiators and will hot tank gas tanks. Should be other people closer to you who can advise on recoring also. Les
Les Bengtson

I've experianced the "Made in China" radiator routine. Not good. I've since had the "new" radiator recored with an updated 5 core, 72 fins per square inch core. Much better, more capacity to cool in the hot summers down here, got it in a couple of days too.

My 2 cents.

Luis
Luis

My radiator is at the shop right now being recored. I considered buying a new one but a four row core- with half inch coils turned out be about $20.00 cheaper plus whatever shipping would be.
william f ox

I agree with Luis - stay away from the made in china ones until they get their quality control under control. I have told the story of my son's Made In China BMW radiator escapade on this BBS before and how I had to spend time shaking the shards of solder out of it to make it fit for service. It worked, but that is a helluva way to ship something like that. I would not buy one like that and I am sure my son won't again either.

Brit Tek seems to have the consistency of product from people's comments, so I think I will look to them when I need another.
Bob Muenchausen

I'm not sure about the rads, but I believe all heater matrixes for Bs are made just up the road from me, by a company called MotoRads in Redditch. If you can trace your source back to them then I can vouch for the quality of their work.

fwiw,
--
Oliver Stephenson
Oliver Stephenson

I think I probably need a new radiator {tried timing adjustments, increased pressure with a new radiator cap, even put a new theostat and still my '66 mgb roadster run offly hot in the summer months.) The Made in England radiator that Mike earlier mentioned from Proper MG states in their ad are for a '68-'78.

Does any one know if it can be installed in a '66?

Proper MG also shows a "uprated replacement heater core" for a $74 good for MGBs '62-'80. Has anyone here ever installed one of these? Are they made in England or China? Is this a viable option to having a radiator shop recoring my current radiator? If not does anyone know where the best radiator shop in Seattle-Tacoma Wash. to have one recored?

Any information would be greatly appreciated, Thanks
rick funkhouser

Mike-
Due to the increased heat output of my uprated engine I had my tired old radiator recored with an aluminum core. I also had the shop install a drain valve to make changing the coolant more convenient. This was one of the smartest things I've done on my car. Even driving hard in the mountains the needle on the gauge never gets near the red. Total cost? Less than that of a new stock radiator.
Steve S.

Rick, the '68 and up rad has the top hose connection in a different place. You could use it if you changed your thermostat housing to a later one as well, so that the hose goes in the right direction. Vicky Brit's catalog lists this part (#10-348)and states that it does not have the air pump bracket. That would work perfectly for your '66.
Ken Lessig

Steve, that's interesting, I recently had my V8's rad recored and I had specifically asked if it was possible to put an alu core in a regular brass rad ... they said nope so I had to settle for a 4-row brass core ... which is acceptable but still dicey in hot weather ... how do they bond the alu core to the brass tanks? BTW I assume you can't mount an electric fan with those plastic thru-core things to an alu rad?

(I remembered to ask for the drain petcock in the bottom ... a must!)
David

I didn't do the actual work, so I can't say just how to do it. I had the old radiator recored by a professional shop. So far, there's been no leaks. Many others have had this procedure done to their radiators. You made the classic mistake: you asked if it could be done. I presume that the shop that did yours just didn't really know how to do it, or didn't have the right equipment, or just didn't want to be bothered with it, so they told you that it "can't be done". That's Jersey.
Steve S.

Yup also had to have the petcock installed in my rad at the same time as the re-core. Why don't they just include these?

Steve- I mounted my aftermarket electric fan and two flat aluminum bars in front of the radiator. The 3/4" flat bars are around 1/8" thick and came from a regular Home Depot. Just bend the bars gracefully 90 deg. from where they can be attached to the radiator supports and bend them back 90 deg. around the core. Drill the attachment holes at the ends and attach them to the radiator shroud. My fan luckily had its attachment holes at the same measurement as the lengths between the two bars and could be attached without any other arrangements.

Most aftermarket fans attach with those thingys that go through the radiator core but I've had two occasions where the road and engine vibrations (even with the cushy foam on both sides) cause holes in the fins. hence the change in mounting my last fan. It looks good and professional. Most people ask me where they could get the "kit' for their car.

Cheers,

Luis
Luis

speaking of fans:

recently there was reference to SPAL fans from Italy (i'm not really happy with the folks at Kenlowe) I emailed the Italian address and was referred to http://www.spal-usa.com/html/oemframe.htm in Iowa.

I spoke with them last week - while they specialize in electric windows and power locks for hot rods, they do make aftermarket fans.


rn

RN Lipow

This thread was discussed between 27/11/2001 and 01/12/2001

MG MGB Technical index

This thread is from the archive. The Live MG MGB Technical BBS is active now.