Oil Cooler

[shelbydoug]

Saying it is a Harrison means very little. There are more then a few. Following the thinking on that car is challenging to say the least.

I would think that the simplest "off the shelf" cooler would have been a 427 Cobra cooler? A horizontal layout. The changes that would be needed would be with the ports closest to the output adapter, then at that point you have a GT500 oil cooler?

Maybe the cooler was added just in anticipation of testing the car in the heat of Arizona? That's where the picture of it and Cantwell in his driving suit is right?

I think possibly that we are just seeing the thinking develop from "put a cooler on it" to "that thing ain't right"? Certainly trying to use those hoses by twisting them through the car wasn't right either. That particular hose isn't very flexable and if you insist on using it, you put a tubular elbow on the hose to do the bend?

Hey wait, isn't that the "production oil cooler hose"? Huh? Go figure?

Is the car one of the first FE Mustangs Ford built? Ford normally would have tested the FE's in the heat of the desert before production.

Looking at the history of the FE's in general, I'm a little surprised that nothing really was done to the oil pans. At some point after introduction of the CJ's in the Mustangs, there was an acknowledgement of an oil capacity issue because of engine failures under warranty.

Typical of Ford's , "put a band aid on it" procedure, just oil capacity was added to the engine.

It's not like the engine hadn't been around for years and the use in the Mustang suddenly challenged that? The entire scenario is strange to me?

For instance, I would have thought that the 427 in the SS would have required some sort of additional oiling modification to run flat out? That "lightweight 427" was not really known for being a "tank". That had to be Ford's influence.

It's true that they were run in the MarkII's but the documentation shows that Ford said they needed to be kept at a 6,000 rpm red line in order to survive the race. I don't think that was what Shelby did with the SS and the impression I got from that testing was that the team was tip-toeing through the graveyard and hoping not to blow the engine in front of the press?

At over 6,000 constant rpm, you are going to pump the stock oil pan dry.

[67411F--0100-ENG.]

Saying it is a Harrison means very little. There are more then a few. Following the thinking on that car is challenging to say the least.

I would think that the simplest "off the shelf" cooler would have been a 427 Cobra cooler? A horizontal layout. The changes that would be needed would be with the ports closest to the output adapter, then at that point you have a GT500 oil cooler?

Maybe the cooler was added just in anticipation of testing the car in the heat of Arizona? That's where the picture of it and Cantwell in his driving suit is right?

I think possibly that we are just seeing the thinking develop from "put a cooler on it" to "that thing ain't right"? Certainly trying to use those hoses by twisting them through the car wasn't right either. That particular hose isn't very flexable and if you insist on using it, you put a tubular elbow on the hose to do the bend?

Hey wait, isn't that the "production oil cooler hose"? Huh? Go figure?

Is the car one of the first FE Mustangs Ford built? Ford normally would have tested the FE's in the heat of the desert before production.

Looking at the history of the FE's in general, I'm a little surprised that nothing really was done to the oil pans. At some point after introduction of the CJ's in the Mustangs, there was an acknowledgement of an oil capacity issue because of engine failures under warranty.

Typical of Ford's , "put a band aid on it" procedure, just oil capacity was added to the engine.

It's not like the engine hadn't been around for years and the use in the Mustang suddenly challenged that? The entire scenario is strange to me?

For instance, I would have thought that the 427 in the SS would have required some sort of additional oiling modification to run flat out? That "lightweight 427" was not really known for being a "tank". That had to be Ford's influence.

It's true that they were run in the MarkII's but the documentation shows that Ford said they needed to be kept at a 6,000 rpm red line in order to survive the race. I don't think that was what Shelby did with the SS and the impression I got from that testing was that the team was tip-toeing through the graveyard and hoping not to blow the engine in front of the press?

At over 6,000 constant rpm, you are going to pump the stock oil pan dry.

Hello Doug and Everyone,

The car that Chuck Cantwell drove in Arizona was a preproduction prototype.  My car, 0100, is the first production GT500.  I believe that 0100 is the first Mustang to have a 428 installed on the Ford assembly line at San Jose. Here is what I have been able to put together over the years:

I believe that Car and Driver was the first magazine to test 0100, and that it was prior to December 7th.  None of the photos that I have are dated, but the article states the car had less than 100 miles on the odometer.  The article states an oil cooler is standard equipment, but that it had been removed for some obscure evaluation on our test car.  The article also states the car had an oil temp gauge mounted under the dash and that during testing the oil temp never got over 230*.  The interior photo that I have shows the oil temp gauge mounted just to the right of the standard Shelby under dash gauge pod. Unfortunately, this photo does not have the necessary resolution to read the odometer.  I think SA told a little white lie about the oil cooler being standard equipment, but they had removed it for some reason.  I think SA suspected they needed an oil cooler and they had installed the oil temp gauge to confirm that a cooler was in fact needed. 

I believe that Sports Car Graphic was the next magazine to test 0100.  Based on the photos that I have, Sports Car Graphic had 0100 for photography and testing on Friday, December 9th.  The photos taken by Sports Car Graphic are really high resolution.  One of the interior photos shows the gauge cluster very clearly and when you enlarge the photo, the mileage can be read at 1,488 miles.  That is too many miles for a car that has a SA completion date of 12/7/66. The car has the oil cooler on it in the Sports Car Graphic photos, but the oil temp gauge has been removed from under the dash.  Sports Car Graphic was a Petersen publication.

I believe that Motor Trend (another Petersen publication) was the next magazine to photograph 0100.  Based on the photos that I have, Motor Trend had 0100 for photography on Monday, December 12th.  The photos taken by Motor Trend are really high resolution.  One of the interior photos shows the gauge cluster very clearly and when you enlarge the photo, the mileage can be read at 1,856 miles.  The car has the oil cooler on it in the Motor Trend photos, but the oil temp gauge has been removed from under the dash.

The Road & Track article is frustrating to me.  The text does not give any clues about when they had the car for testing and the photography was poor.  There are no interior photos at all, so there is no verifying the presence of an oil temp gauge or seeing the odometer.  The exterior photos that show the grille area and the rest of the front end are too dark to see if the oil cooler was there, or not.

The dragstrip photos from Car and Driver and Road & Track were all taken at Carlsbad Raceway.  Randy Gillis identified the dragstrip in the photos for me.  So, I am wondering if Car and Driver and Road & Track possibly had 0100 at the same time – prior to December 7th?  That may help explain why 0100 already had nearly 1,500 miles on it by December 9th when Sports Car Graphic had the car for testing.  If this is the case, the testing done by Car and Driver and Road & Track (with the oil temp gauge in the car) may have been enough to convince SA that an oil cooler was needed.  By the time Sports Car Graphic and Motor Trend have 0100 for testing, SA is "confident" the oil cooler is doing its job and the oil temp gauge is no longer needed. 

Any thoughts?

Thanks,
Eric

[JD]

Also, if I understand correctly the Red pre-production car (Lowell's prison car) did not have air conditioning and Eric's car #100 did/does have air  - would that have had bearing on the vertical vs horizontal mounting of the add-on oil cooler?

[shelbydoug]

Well, I know on a '68 GT500/KR an oil cooler is standard with a/c. I don't know if the '67 was the same and the '68 is just a carry over or not?

I've played with oil coolers on these cars for at least 35 years. I can tell you that fitting them in isn't difficult in the horizontal "factory production" position. Vertically it makes no sense what so ever.

Not unless you were stuck along the road somewhere and had to install something and that something was a vertical unit with nearly impossible to work with thick unbend-able hoses?

So obviously there is a reason that the vertical is in there. It's just a mystery as to why? Maybe something stupid like the mechanic that it got assigned to was on KP or detention and not allowed to be in the service area, just out back where the garbage bins were? Who knows at this point?

What's with all the mileage the car would put on between the tests? These guys would go for burgers and drive it out into the desert and back? Good thing it wasn't my car. People have lost body parts for less then that? 

I thought -0100 was originally built as a 390 by Ford and Shelby installed the 428? By the same token I thought that picture with Cantwell WAS of -0100?  Sorry to have made that mistake. No criticism was intended by me.

Oil cooler. Hum? What would I do if it was mine? I think I'd go with the "final" configuration, i.e., the one that was put into production.

If the car was running 230 WITH the cooler then I'd say that they all needed the cooler otherwise you are looking at about 240 which you had better change the oil every 1,500-2,000 miles I think?

Again, the Ford recommendation of going to 6 quarts in the pan plus the filter doesn't happen until sometime into the 428cj Mustang production. I'm wondering now if that had something to do with seemingly every 5,000 mile 427 Cobra I looked at having either a broken engine or a new one?

I know the sodium filled exhaust valves were time bombs but there were a lot of spun bearings in these cars also. I personally believe that Ford was trying to get out of production with the 427's because of warranty concerns, like maybe a 50% failure rate but that's just a suspicion of mine.

[Bob Gaines]

The oil cooler on #100 is of a foreign design and location relative to a regular production 67 Shelby GT500 with Air. A oil cooler came on all regular production 67 GT500 with air conditioning. FYI the oil cooler used on the 67 GT500 w/AC continued to be used  on 68 w/AC cars. The location of the cooler was relatively the same between 67 and 68. So much so that the oil cooler lines are the same between 67 and 68.  There is a slight difference in bracketry on the cooler between 67 and 68. 67 coolers were typically painted black (over the MFG paint) and the 68 coolers were left the factory bluish shade of paint.   

[shelbydoug]

The oil cooler on #100 is of a foreign design and location relative to a regular production 67 Shelby GT500 with Air. A oil cooler came on all regular production 67 GT500 with air conditioning. FYI the oil cooler used on the 67 GT500 w/AC continued to be used  on 68 w/AC cars. The location of the cooler was relatively the same between 67 and 68. So much so that the oil cooler lines are the same between 67 and 68.  There is a slight difference in bracketry on the cooler between 67 and 68. 67 coolers were typically painted black (over the MFG paint) and the 68 coolers were left the factory bluish shade of paint.

I have NEVER seen a 67 GT500 with a/c in person. I've looked for them at every convention I've been to.

[Bob Gaines]

The oil cooler on #100 is of a foreign design and location relative to a regular production 67 Shelby GT500 with Air. A oil cooler came on all regular production 67 GT500 with air conditioning. FYI the oil cooler used on the 67 GT500 w/AC continued to be used  on 68 w/AC cars. The location of the cooler was relatively the same between 67 and 68. So much so that the oil cooler lines are the same between 67 and 68.  There is a slight difference in bracketry on the cooler between 67 and 68. 67 coolers were typically painted black (over the MFG paint) and the 68 coolers were left the factory bluish shade of paint.

I have NEVER seen a 67 GT500 with a/c in person. I've looked for them at every convention I've been to.

There were not many 67 GT500's with the A/C option relative to production so they are rare to see.

[67411F--0100-ENG.]

Hello Everyone,

This early "experimental" oil cooler set-up on 0100 had to be the first attempt at providing extra cooling capacity for a big block with AC car and probably used parts that were already on hand at SA.  I would guess that one of 0100's Engineering Department duties was as a test bed for other types of oil cooler set-ups.  Maybe it was even the first car to have what became the standard oil cooler set-up for AC equipped GT500s.  When I bought 0100 back in December of 1979 it had the black painted standard style oil cooler set-up installed.

Thanks,
Eric 

[shelbydoug]

Hello Everyone,

This early "experimental" oil cooler set-up on 0100 had to be the first attempt at providing extra cooling capacity for a big block with AC car and probably used parts that were already on hand at SA.  I would guess that one of 0100's Engineering Department duties was as a test bed for other types of oil cooler set-ups.  Maybe it was even the first car to have what became the standard oil cooler set-up for AC equipped GT500s.  When I bought 0100 back in December of 1979 it had the black painted standard style oil cooler set-up installed.

Thanks,
Eric

I wouldn't be surprised to learn that several designs and even locations were tried. Part of the concern with a large cooler is that you don't want to block flow to the radiator. That could be rationale for the vertical cooler to the side.

Think of the 427 Cobras. A flip down license plate holder was used so the license plate wouldn't block the flow to the radiator.

[67411F--0100-ENG.]

Hello Everyone,

This early "experimental" oil cooler set-up on 0100 had to be the first attempt at providing extra cooling capacity for a big block with AC car and probably used parts that were already on hand at SA.  I would guess that one of 0100's Engineering Department duties was as a test bed for other types of oil cooler set-ups.  Maybe it was even the first car to have what became the standard oil cooler set-up for AC equipped GT500s.  When I bought 0100 back in December of 1979 it had the black painted standard style oil cooler set-up installed.

Thanks,
Eric

I wouldn't be surprised to learn that several designs and even locations were tried. Part of the concern with a large cooler is that you don't want to block flow to the radiator. That could be rationale for the vertical cooler to the side.

Think of the 427 Cobras. A flip down license plate holder was used so the license plate wouldn't block the flow to the radiator.

Hello Doug,

You bring up a good point with the front license plate.  In looking at the photos again, SA must have figured out pretty quickly that 0100 was having cooling issues.  The photos show:

Car and Driver prior to 12/7/66: Front license plate is present.
Road & Track possibly prior to 12/7/66: Photographs are too dark in the grille area to tell if front license plate is present or not.
Sports Car Graphic on 12/9/66: Front license plate has been removed.
Motor Trend on 12/12/66: Front license plate has been removed.

Thanks,
Eric

[shelbydoug]

They had lots of experience with the Cobra. Big blocks need lots of cooling. Why repeat the same mistakes?

You can design a heat exchanger for low loss of air flow through them with the same efficiency. The vertical one doesn't have that feature. Neither do the GT40's. The Shelby unit does.

That means that mounting the oil cooler in front of the radiator won't starve the radiator and a/c condenser from air flow. The Shelby unit would be the better one to use for that reason.

It isn't a haphazard design. It's compact, light and efficient AND designed for that car. 4 big pluses.

[2112]

Eric,

Do you have a picture of your current oil cooler in it's current location?

[67411F--0100-ENG.]

Eric,

Do you have a picture of your current oil cooler in it's current location?

Hello 2112,

I took a quick look through my photos just now.  I actually do not have a photo that shows the oil cooler on the car.  I will try to take one this week and post it.

Thanks,
Eric

[Richstang]

Hi Eric,

I just took a look at the online R&T article and photos. They mention putting over 800 miles on the car during testing. (towards the end of the article)
https://www.roadandtrack.com/new-cars/first-drives/reviews/a7871/1968-shelby-mustang-gt500-drive-flashback/

Also, I opened the front view photo in my "paint" program and adjusted the brightness, contrast, and mid-tones. Although they are very poor quality photos with a lot of scratches, it does NOT appear to have a front license plate.

[67411F--0100-ENG.]

Hi Eric,

I just took a look at the online R&T article and photos. They mention putting over 800 miles on the car during testing. (towards the end of the article)
https://www.roadandtrack.com/new-cars/first-drives/reviews/a7871/1968-shelby-mustang-gt500-drive-flashback/

Also, I opened the front view photo in my "paint" program and adjusted the brightness, contrast, and mid-tones. Although they are very poor quality photos with a lot of scratches, it does NOT appear to have a front license plate.

Hello Rich,

Good catch on the mileage that Road & Track put on 0100.  If it does not have a front license plate installed in those photos I think it is safe to conclude that they did not have the car at the same time as Car and Driver.  Unfortunately, the article and the photos do not give any clues about when they actually had the car for testing other than it was after Car and Driver.

Thanks,
Eric