New gal from TX

[DonC]

Welcome to the madness.
All good suggestions going here and I'll add my .02 worth. Definitely make sure the radiator is completely shrouded. Any air not going through the radiator is wasted. In general make sure there isn't any air in the cooling system. I use distilled water with a bottle of Water Wetter and about a quart of antifreeze just to keep the PH honest. X2 on checking the gauge to make sure it's somewhere near accurate. Laser thermometers are pretty inexpensive.
Get as much air out of the engine compartment as possible. Poke arount the ERA website for the vented wheel wells. Every little bit helps. Try a test with some sort of soft wedge (rolled up shop towel) under the rear of the hood and see if that helps keep the heat down. If there is a significant difference look again at some way to get the hot air out. A couple of the folks in our club are running vents or louvered panels in the hood to help with cooling.
You might also try a lower temp fan switch to catch the temp increase sooner. look at different models of fans to find the most efficient.
Keep us posted on what you do. No end of experience out there on correcting the problem.
On a side note keep an eye on the Mile Hi Cobra Club site for their annual Cruise Colorado event. A great run and there are usually a few cars from Texas that come up along with us other foreigners from Oregon, Illinois, Ohio etc.
DonC

[Racer_X]

Welcome to the board, SnakeWench! There's a Houston Cobra Club on yahoo groups you ought to sign up on also. They usually meet once a month for a get together (just met yesterday) and do some fun events together. Usually have a lunch meeting in different spots around town to hopefully make it somewhat convenient.
The heat can be murder down here as you well know. might check the thermostat, make sure the water isn't flowing too fast thru the radiator (doesn't have a chance to cool off), try adding some water wetter for heat conductivity increase. A fellow Houston Cobra Club member James Yale has a shop in Tomball and specializes in the Backdraft Cobras, but they are all the same under the hood.

I'll second making sure the front area is sealed to force the cooler air thru the rad. What temp thermostat is in the engine? a single 16" fan might be too small for our climate.

[snakewench]

Originally Posted by Racer_X

Welcome to the board, SnakeWench! There's a Houston Cobra Club on yahoo groups you ought to sign up on also. They usually meet once a month for a get together (just met yesterday) and do some fun events together. Usually have a lunch meeting in different spots around town to hopefully make it somewhat convenient.
The heat can be murder down here as you well know. might check the thermostat, make sure the water isn't flowing too fast thru the radiator (doesn't have a chance to cool off), try adding some water wetter for heat conductivity increase. A fellow Houston Cobra Club member James Yale has a shop in Tomball and specializes in the Backdraft Cobras, but they are all the same under the hood.

I'll second making sure the front area is sealed to force the cooler air thru the rad. What temp thermostat is in the engine? a single 16" fan might be too small for our climate.

Thanks, Racer_X! Great info! The car has a 180 degree thermostat with 16" electric puller fan, which was the largest single fan available from MS when the car was built. She runs aluminum heads w/10.5:1 compression, so I should get by on 93 pump gas, but just in case I have been adding a bottle of Lucas octane booster with each tank fill. Never heard detonation, but then again that's pretty tough with those sidepipes blaring away!

You mentioned the Houston Cobra Club yahoo group, but I can't find it...did a yahoo group search, but nothing close came up...do you have a link by any chance?

Thanks!

[YerDugliness]

Originally Posted by snakewench

The car has a 180 degree thermostat with 16" electric puller fan, which was the largest single fan available from MS when the car was built. She runs aluminum heads w/10.5:1 compression
Thanks!

Welcome to the Houston area. The guys are right, the Houston heat can get to a Cobra. My Cobra has a 16" puller fan and it does keep the temp down below boiling, but at times I really doubt my temp sensor is correct as I have seen the needle pegged all the way to 250* and no issues, 13# cap. If you want to never have to even watch the gauge, do the shrouding in the front to force all the air that goes through the fishmouth the radiator, that's a great start. I don't have a shroud on the engine side of the radiator and I have managed without it, but I have no doubt a dedicated shroud on the engine side of the radiator with the puller fan would be a safer option.

Originally Posted by snakewench

You mentioned the Houston Cobra Club yahoo group, but I can't find it...did a yahoo group search, but nothing close came up...do you have a link by any chance?
Thanks!

I am a member of the HCC, but for some reason Yahoo quit sending me the daily post links....they are a good bunch of folks, you'll feel right at home. The guy on here to look up is mtpockets......do a member search on him and tell him you'd like to sign up for the club and he'll hook you up!

Cheers! I know right now a Cobra doesn't seem all that usable with the weather we've been having, but come February you'll find it much better and by May it might just be too hot....you'll be looking for heat guards for your firewall soon as your feet start cooking in the footboxes on 59 near the arch bridges...VERY slow in rush hour, you'll appreciate any cooling upgrades you do there more than anywhere else in Houston....the traffic SUCKS!!!!

Cheers!

Dugly

[TexasSnake]

Sankewench,

Are the cooling fan pushers or pullers? (in front of or behind radiator?) In hot climates like Texas the only way to go with any big cubic inch motor is a good puller fan system that is correctly shrouded in front and behind the radiator. I have a 500HP FE big block my car and have never had it overheat even on the hottest day in the Houston. I'm running a 180 degree thermostat and a fully shrouded dual puller fan system.

[Seagull81]

Welcome to the Madness. You might be interested in the Texas Cobra Club Meet in San Marcos the first weekend in April. There will be over 100 Cobras there. Hook up with the Houston group and they can tell you about it. here is the website.
Texas Cobra Meet

[snakewench]

Originally Posted by Seagull81

Welcome to the Madness. You might be interested in the Texas Cobra Club Meet in San Marcos the first weekend in April. There will be over 100 Cobras there. Hook up with the Houston group and they can tell you about it. here is the website.
Texas Cobra Meet

Thanks, Seagull! Sounds great...I sure will look in to that! Whatta fabulous sight (and no doubt sound) that must be with 100 Cobras together!

[jwoodard]

Welcome to Club Cobra and the fun of owning a cool car. One thing you might check is to verify you have good grounds on your gauges. The first Cobra I built ran hot and several times I actually pulled off the road to let it cool off. One time I decided to open the hood and check things out when the gauge was reading really hot. I felt the radiator hoses and listened for any boiling noises and looked for any overflow, and nada. The hoses were hot but not what I expected them to be at the temp shown on the gauge.
That led me to think about the ground so I ran a temporary one direct from the gauge to a verified good ground and voila, no more over temp issues. Later I rewired the ground system for the dash to insure I had good grounds for all gauges.
Just something to check.

[Clois Harlan]

I was going to suggest you stop by James' shop. He is one of the really good guys around Houston. By the way he likes bikes too! I have fought the battle you are fighting. Good Luck.

Clois Harlan

[427 sam]

Nice looking car you have there, and good driving weather too ,life just aint fair, we got snow here at the moment, Regards Sam

[xlr8or]

Wench,
Here's what I did. Solved the problem for less than $200 and was able to sit in Phoenix traffic when it was 115 degrees out with no problem.

I was having problems with heat and the supplied cooling fan was blowing fuses in my wiring harness. Decided rather than keep putting that stress on the main harness i would go ahead and upgrade the fan and the wiring.

The wiring harness is available for with and without A/C.. I got the basic with A/C option. it was $79
It's available from The Hollister Road Company and is designed specifically for this swap. Mark VIII, Taurus, Two Speed fan relay kit.




For the fan upgrade I got some info from the Hollister site and a few others and settled on one that is from the mid 90's Cougar and Lincoln. Dorman part# 620118 It's a Dorman OE replacement part for $89 at RockAuto Auto Parts

Install was pretty straight forward but the fan was taller than the radiator by about 1 1/2 inches. Width was perfect I trimmed the stock mounting tabs off the fan shroud and added some 1 1/2" aluminum angle to the flanges on the radiator so the shroud slides right over the top of them. Then drilled through the shroud and angle and added captive nuts and bolted the shroud down.

Here's pic of it installed.

[snakewench]

Wow, guys, I am in awe of the amount of incredible information put forth here! I cannot thank all of you enough for your input. I am sooooo glad I joined CC!

You Cobra dudes ROCK!!!

[xlr8or]

He'll we're just glad to have some estrogen around here.

[jolsen42]

I'm surprised that no one mentioned it, but also check your timing. Might be a little retarded.

John O