Upgrade on oil cooler??

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icouldabeenav8
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Re: Upgrade on oil cooler??

Post by icouldabeenav8 »

Not to beat a dead horse, but I just thought of something else.... I've owned several bikes with oil-in-frame and most of them did not get the oil temp hot enough to make the temp uncomfortable to bare skin.

I once had a Rickman with a Trident triple shoe horned into the frame where the seat was right over the oil filler cap with an opening at the front of the seat for access to the filler cap. With the seat upholstery compressed by body weight your nuggets rested gently right on the cap. As long as the bike was ridden sanely, said nuggets were cozily warmed, but you really had to think twice before cranking it on because the temperature rose shockingly fast and you were suddenly squirming all over the bike to limit the barbecuing or riding like a jockey with your butt off the seat.

Gosh, I miss that bike.
Last edited by icouldabeenav8 on Sun Mar 27, 2011 11:19 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Don
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Re: Upgrade on oil cooler??

Post by Don »

Unless you always ride in a really cold climate, I don't think there is any danger of any CBX having oil that is too cool, no matter what you use for an oil cooler

#1 and #6 may be essentially air cooled cylinders but the rest of them get so little air over and around them that my personal belief is that the oil does more to cool them and the head than airflow does - The oil will always get near 200 degrees or more, no matter what. Keep in mind that the 200 indicated on the gauge is the overall sump temp, cooled by circulating through the cooler . . . . the oil running down from the head is probably 50 or 75 degrees hotter

I drove old Chevy V-8's for years and years with the water temp stuck on 180 degrees and never suffered from moisture in the oil problems. I also drove an air cooled Corvair for years which had a stock cylinder head temp gauge and it usually read between 300 and 350 degrees. I would suspect that a CBX cylinder head operates in about the same range . . . . or hotter - The Corvair heads were forced air cooled

Don

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Re: Upgrade on oil cooler??

Post by EMS »

As I said before
EMS wrote:.. it is more of an issue with bikes with an oil tank (dry sump) .
If the oil temp in your tank sump is not high enough to boil out the water, and the crank is the first place the oil pump pumps oil to, you are ending up with an oil/water mix to the journals long before the head will heat up the oil. Especially as the oil pump picks up fluid from the bottom of the tank. Also, consider, that the CBX has a seperate oil feed to the head. Only a part of the oil goes there, before it is returned back to the cooler and the sump.

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Re: Upgrade on oil cooler??

Post by Samelak »

Living in Okinawa is great, but the temperature during the summer is really hot and the traffic is slow. I am interested in converting to an Earl's 10 row cooler. I imagine the only custom part I would need is where the oil lines connects to the engine. The rest should be standard aftermarket parts. Don, I read that you have an Earl's installed. Can you provide some more input on the install and take some pictures of the engine fittings? I'm a machinist, so making adapters shouldn't be too difficult. Also, does anyone have any thoughts on the oil pan extension from Tim's? Would an extra quart make real difference in temperature for the price?

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Re: Upgrade on oil cooler??

Post by Jeff Bennetts »

Don wrote: The Corvair heads were forced air cooled
Of course, thats when and if the fan belt hadn't flown off. LOL

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Re: Upgrade on oil cooler??

Post by Don »

Samelak wrote:Living in Okinawa is great, but the temperature during the summer is really hot and the traffic is slow. I am interested in converting to an Earl's 10 row cooler. I imagine the only custom part I would need is where the oil lines connects to the engine. The rest should be standard aftermarket parts. Don, I read that you have an Earl's installed. Can you provide some more input on the install and take some pictures of the engine fittings? I'm a machinist, so making adapters shouldn't be too difficult. Also, does anyone have any thoughts on the oil pan extension from Tim's? Would an extra quart make real difference in temperature for the price?
I can take whatever pictures you need. My current set-up uses the 100% stock oil lines . . . . unhook the factory cooler and replace it with the Earls . . . . no modifications to the oil lines needed. You can fabricate all new oil lines if you like by having someone crimp new hoses on the Honda factory fittings which bolt to the engine . . . . or you can use the stock hoses and cut off the oil cooler ends and use barbs and clamps to install new ends on the factory hoses

If I were you, I would get with John Smarsh and discuss what you want/need - PM me and I'll get you his e-mail address. He can supply the parts you'd need to go any of the 3 ways I described for the hoses

There are several issues to consider and John has done lots of engineering on this . . . . and you can't beat his prices. He uses custom bent tubing to make the hoses fit the cooler . . . . his fittings pass above the frame member under the tank - I don't recall if he buys 120 degree bends and then alters them to 135 degrees, but it's something close to that. He supplies an aluminum channel which *exactly* fits the top of the cooler, precut with the large holes that the oil fittings pass through. He supplies custom rubber mounts to adapt this alumninum channel to the stock oil cooler mounting arms, along with all the hardware to go with them

I'm a pretty handy guy and originally planned to do exactly what you're suggesting . . . . design and fabricate my own mounts and oil lines, but I couldn't have done anything any better than John and I sure wouldn't have been able to do it all for what John charges. I spoke to him recently and he's still 'in business' so I'm sure he'd be happy to work with you. I bought my own 10 row Earl's cooler from Amazon.com and saved some money there, but I bought everything else from John

As to the extended oil pan - I think I would if I was building a turbo bike, but for a stock bike, 5 quarts is plenty IMO . . . . the extra oil wouldn't change the operating temp by enough to be worth the extra cost

Don

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Re: Upgrade on oil cooler??

Post by Samelak »

I picked up an oil cooler kit from John Smarsh, but don't see how to connect the oil lines to the engine. Am I supposed to cut my old lines off the fittings on my engine or should the kit come with fittings. All I received was the cooler , cooler mount harware and lines. Has any installed one of these?

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Re: Upgrade on oil cooler??

Post by NobleHops »

Hey Lee,

Yes, from what I have read you are correct. Lay out lines, note orientation of fittings axially, cut off old ones, swege on new ones.

N.
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Re: Upgrade on oil cooler??

Post by Don »

Samelak wrote:I picked up an oil cooler kit from John Smarsh, but don't see how to connect the oil lines to the engine. Am I supposed to cut my old lines off the fittings on my engine or should the kit come with fittings. All I received was the cooler , cooler mount harware and lines. Has any installed one of these?
John sells 3 different versions of his kits, depending on how you want to hook the Earl's cooler to the oil lines

One has AN fittings to screw onto custom made stanless braided lines - If you're replacing your lines with new custom made ones, this would be the one you want. Yes, you will need to cut up your old hoses so you can get the stock Honda engine fittings off the lower ends so you can have your new hoses crimped onto them. A good hydraulic shop should be able to do this. I would carefully install everything first so you can get your new hoses cut to the exact proper length. If you cannot find a hydraulic shop, there are some really fancy clamps which have covers and look like crimped fittings, if you want to go that way

A second version comes with hose barb fittings at the cooler, but no hoses - You cut the top ends off your stock hoses, force the hose ends over the supplied barbs and use a screw clamp to hold them on. A word of caution with this setup . . . . your 30+ year old stock hoses may not like being stretched over the hose barbs and they may be brittle enough to cause them to split

The third version comes with a pair of custom machined blocks, 2 'O' rings and 4 bolts. This setup allows you to remove your stock cooler, bolt on the Earl's using your stock hoses without modifying anything . . . . and it's 100% reversable. Using this version, the stock hoses are a bit too long and you'll have to reroute things a bit under the tank to take up the slack. This is the version I currently have on my bike and it works perfectly. I'll keep this until I decide to go with new, custom hoses

Hope this helps,

Don

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Re: Upgrade on oil cooler??

Post by Samelak »

The kit I have came supplied with braided lines that screw onto the cooler, but the engine side of the lines are just cut-off for use with hose clamps. I did not receive any engine oil line mounts. I just want to make sure that I have to reuse the old oil line mounts before I cut the lines apart. I tried to get a hold of John to ensure this, but he hasn't responded to my e-mail.

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Re: Upgrade on oil cooler??

Post by Don »

Yes, you'll need the fittings off your old lines - Pretty sure he doesn't supply those

If you don't want to cut up your stock hoses, buy a spare set on eBay . . . . doesn't really matter how bad the hoses are as you'll be cutting them up anyway

Don

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Re: Upgrade on oil cooler??

Post by NobleHops »

Lee,

I bought a set of hoses and fittings from Tom Neimeyer for this very contingency. If you want my ends I'll chop them off and mail them to you and you can take your time finding a decent deal on a replacement, ship them to me then. Louis will have a bale of these too, and I'd expect he'd sell and ship them pretty reasonably.

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Re: Upgrade on oil cooler??

Post by Samelak »

I appreciate that. I'll cut my lines since they are looking kind of tired. I saw a nice set on ebay I'll try to get as spares. I installed much of the kit last night, but there where 4 button-head allen bolts with nuts that I have no clue what they where intended for. If anyone knows please let me know.

Thanks, Lee

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Re: Upgrade on oil cooler??

Post by NobleHops »

I confess when I did my project I spray painted my lines. Looks great, still. I do wonder about 30 year old lines though...

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Re: Upgrade on oil cooler??

Post by SteveG »

I redid the lines on my 900F and had to cut the old lines off the fittings. I used braided line from ebay:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/?cmd=Vie ... 26_fvi%3D1

Image

and cool looking clamps that are basically worm gear hose clamps with a cover over them. Some say I would never use a worm gear hose clamp on an oil line, but my thought is if I can use a worm gear hose clamp on a radiator hose that carries more pressure and about the same temp, it should be good. Have over 3,000 miles on them on my 900F, not a drop or ooze of oil anywhere.

The fittings:

Image

Image

And the final product:

Image

Image

Hope this helps!

Steve
82 CBX, 82 CB900F Project, 81 CB900(985)F, 79 CB750(810)F, 06 Wee-Strom

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