auto box still cooking..

[Chillitt]

ok i was towing and on the uphill bits she got very hot checked on here consensus was bung a cooler on... air con was dead so i used the aircon rad as a trans cooler. job jobbed as they say. today towing same trailer, (8'x5' about 7' high box carrying 2 oak doors and frames so not that heavy..) she does the same thing. any auto box wizzards out there? friends who have driven it say its a bit 'lazy' on the changes, but nothing major.. please tell me its not going to be expensive!!

[Gamedawn]

Why not check the Yello Pages for a local auto box specialist and have a service done. Mine only cost me around £100 and they flushed the oil, cleaned the filters and tested the operation, etc. Good peace of mind if nothing else.

[jotto]

ok i was towing and on the uphill bits she got very hot checked on here consensus was bung a cooler on... air con was dead so i used the aircon rad as a trans cooler. job jobbed as they say. today towing same trailer, (8'x5' about 7' high box carrying 2 oak doors and frames so not that heavy..) she does the same thing. any auto box wizzards out there? friends who have driven it say its a bit 'lazy' on the changes, but nothing major.. please tell me its not going to be expensive!!

What was getting hot??

[Chillitt]

my feet mostly! temp guage worked like an inclinometer.. first sign of a hill, up she goes! pipe to oil cooler was hot enough to leave skin on...cooled down again real fast on level ground.

[TonyN]

Maybe the air con rad has to small cores to shift much fluid, or its to big and the fluid is flowing back out before its had time to cool properly.

Stump up and buy a proper tranny cooler tightass!



(The first bit of the post is the serious tech bit BTW.)

[jotto]

my feet mostly! temp guage worked like an inclinometer.. first sign of a hill, up she goes! pipe to oil cooler was hot enough to leave skin on...cooled down again real fast on level ground.

Sounds more like an engine cooling problem to me?. But I could be wrong!!

[TonyN]

Sounds more like an engine cooling problem to me?. But I could be wrong!!

The Bullet did that when towing the Tractor home from cornwall, once the ATF gets to hot, it heats the coolant again as it leaves the rad, so the motor gets hot.

We had to have the heater on full blast to keep it out of the red on steep hills. Towing normal stuff its just fine.

[Chillitt]

i think you might be right with the tightass thing tony...
but even if i do get another cooler, surely this is just masking the original problem or is the box getting so hot 'normal?

[dirtydog]

just to let you know I was towing today only the 2nd long drive since fitting the cooler, the temp only went up when I gave it some stick up that loooooooong hill on the M40 just past Oxford towards London... ita about 2miles long and at 3000-3500rpm in 2nd for 2 miles it got a bit warmer than normal, but only right at the top!
I can only come to the decision that it will always get hot but only if its unusually heavy and for strangley long steep hills.

Trailer not particularly heavy but loads and loads of drag caused the slowness... i was even slower than the lorries
Otherwise I have done other long long hills with no probs at all and before you ask Yes I have fulled cleaned the rad of all mud now since Salisbury

[Chillitt]

i never thought to run it without the bumper! going to try it, back ina bit!
i think my surf would look like chernobl if i tried THAT hill!

[Tallyman]

Chillit, have you got an A bar and spots on the front of your motor? I found with mine that the spots and the squared off no. plate were cutting down the free flow of air through the rad in warmer weather.

After fitting the ATF oil cooler I also got myself a new long front no. plate and remove the spots in the summer when I'm going to be towing the caravan. Together that sorts out the temp, which (touch wood) hasn't moved off normal at all when towing recently, including up both sides of the M5 on the stretch between Portbury & Clevedon (J19 & 20).

[Chillitt]

nope, mine is the base model all yours started out as.. no a bar no spots no aircon(now) no leccy windows no sunroof no spare on the back no alloys . nuffink. not even wind deflectors( i took em off, too flash...) its even got a long thin front no. plate...
and its grey.

[kitesurf_phil]

nope, mine is the base model all yours started out as.. no a bar no spots no aircon(now) no leccy windows no sunroof no spare on the back no alloys . nuffink. not even wind deflectors( i took em off, too flash...) its even got a long thin front no. plate...
and its grey.

You just can't keep a low profile in a Surf. It's no use trying

Is your viscous fan working? Does the electric fan kick in when it gets hot?
Mine is much better now I have got the crud out of the ATX bit of the rad and straightened the fins that got bent by over-enthusiastic pressure washing.

[Chillitt]

electric fans good, i was sure about the viscous fan, but i'm going to change the oil in that just to eliminate it...
my surfs not low profile its just purified surf, without the bits...

[Bobby Doc]

ok i was towing and on the uphill bits she got very hot checked on here consensus was bung a cooler on... air con was dead so i used the aircon rad as a trans cooler. job jobbed as they say. today towing same trailer, (8'x5' about 7' high box carrying 2 oak doors and frames so not that heavy..) she does the same thing. any auto box wizzards out there? friends who have driven it say its a bit 'lazy' on the changes, but nothing major.. please tell me its not going to be expensive!!

I wonder? As you know cool oil is thicker than hot oil, so the oil in the oil cooler will slow sirculation down and the oil left in the tansmission will be held in the same location for longer, getting hoter and hoter.

I know on a engine, the oil cooler you have has to be the right size because if it is too big the cooling effect is greater and the oil will thicken up inside the cooler making it harder for the oil pump, but leaving the engine with too low a presure, but an oil cooler the correct size will still cool the oil but not so much it restricts the oil flow.

I hope this makes sence?