Bed mounted trans coolers

bateman

bateman

Active member
Those of you with coolers under or in the bed, did you eliminate the OE cooler in front of the radiator? I bought a big derale 125k btu I think with a fan and I’m wondering if it will be enough.

Little to zero towing. Tows a wrangler or boat to the beach at most.

Just looking to get some opinions and make sure I don’t miss anything. I will be removing the converter cooler and it would make things much easier to not need more hose to run to the front cooler. Posting a pic of what I am working with. Thanks.
 

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BD’s double stacked cooler setup is 80k btu total so I might have gone overkill.

Do you guys run the fans on a manual switch or thermal switvh? I’m curious of what temp they should cut on. I’m going to remove my temp sending unit from the converter hose to the pan for more leveled reading.
 
Think that's the same cooler I ran under the bed, deleted factory junk also. Never had an issue except for a dead battery (my fault); manual switch.
 
Did mine parallel with the ground, second one I did was bed mounted; neither for a street truck. Probably wouldn't hurt to put a screen or something over the bottom side just to help protect from rocks / debris.

If the fan is on a switch - thermal, manual, or igntion; not sure that mounting on an angle is really necessary for what you'd be doing.

Sent from my SM-G986U using Tapatalk
 
A fellow gave me a ‘92 D250 with the A518 he’d used to pull a 5th wheel. He had two mounted under the bed. They both had thermo switches but they also had manual switches and a gauge on each one. They came on at different temps.
 
Ten four. Should be pretty simple then.

Gotta order the fittings to block off the aux cooler/heater core fittings. 1/2 NPT I think.
 
BigPapa said:
A fellow gave me a ‘92 D250 with the A518 he’d used to pull a 5th wheel. He had two mounted under the bed. They both had thermo switches but they also had manual switches and a gauge on each one. They came on at different temps.
Click to expand...

That’s pretty slick thinking. I imagine that non lockup trans was making a shit ton of heat.

I live in BFE and don’t go through any city nowadays so I think I will have more Trouble getting the fluid warm In winter than keeping cool in summer. Hopefully.
 
bateman said:
Ten four. Should be pretty simple then.

Gotta order the fittings to block off the aux cooler/heater core fittings. 1/2 NPT I think.
Click to expand...


Don’t quote me. But I think the heat exchanger is inverted flare fittings??
I’m installing a 6.0 cooler (slowly) up front on my 05. I removed the heat exchanger and factory tiny cooler all together.

The 6.0 cooler fits surprisingly well in front of the 3rd gen dodge radiator.
 
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Yea I think you’re right for the oil inlet and outlet. The coolant hoses that go up by the water pump are npt I think.
 
I'm running a derale 13870 under the bed along with a b&m plate cooler in front of the intercooler in the factory location. It's honestly way to much. In the winter it hardly ever gets over 100f. Last summer I pulled a 14k mini on a 95 degree day and the temp never got over 160.
 
Good to know so I should be fine in the Alabama summer. It should be possible to add a thermostatic valve and bypass the cooler if needed for winter.
 
All I need now is the 90° 1/2npt male to 1/2 barb. Two ace hardwares with no luck.

Brass is fine to use right?

Any tips on how to go about topping off fluid after install? I can fill the cooler before I install the lines I would think.
 
Oh, well. I tried editing my first post and it just sat there with the spinning wheel of death so I made a new post and it did the same thing. Now it's there twice.....:bang
 
Go to a hydraulic supply shop. You will find all the fittings you could possibly dream of. And their prices are always better than hardware stores. Use pushlock on the barbed ends.
 
Good idea. Might have to make my way into town.

The barbed end fitting will be for my heater core hose behind the water pump. The trans hoses are all soft braid AN with swivel ends.
 
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