This got long and i didn't proof read it!

Water pump: I like to stick with Motorcraft part when ever possible but know sometimes that is not possible or the Motorcraft part is just outrageously over priced.. Do not use an economy brand pump as you don’t want to have to do this job over again for a long time. Be as careful as you can when removing the bolts as they are prone to breading. The big problem is normally the long bolts that go through the pump and timing cover housing. The steel bolts tend to choroid where they pass through the aluminum housing.

While you are that far into the engine you might want to check the timing chain.. How many miles on you engine? There are several videos and articles about how to check the timing chain.. If you can see your timing marker and timing marks on the harmonic balancer, line them up to “0“. Take the distributor cap off. Using a socket and ratchet or breaker bar, rock the crank shaft back and forth slowly and record how many degrees the timing marks move before the distributor rotor starts to move. I forgot how many degrees is allowable before it is considered too much slack in the chain. Just a thought because you are half way there already with the water pump off.

Radiator: I have a brass/copper radiator and took it to a reputable radiator repair shop to have it cleaned and rodded out. A “good” shop will tel you the condition of the radiator after they get it apart. They also have to re-solder it so they should give you a warranty on their work.
If you hae an aluminum/plastic radiator, I would just replace it. They can be cleaned as well but most people just replace them if they are old. If it were a newer aluminum/plastic tank radiator and the plastic tank cracked, I would just replace the plastic tank..

If you replace it with aluminum one, I would of course buy an all aluminum, not the plastic tank one.

As to which one is better in my opinion? There is a big debate on this but for me, one of my vans is 33 years old and the other 30 with the original copper/brass radiator.
As to rows, the more the better to a point I would think and that would also depend on what size engine you have, how much weight you are carrying or pulling, and the landscape and temps you drive in most. Way oversized and your engine may have a problem staying warm in very cold temps. You often see big trucks with part of the radiator covered in the winter..
I think average for our vans is a 2 row aluminum and 4 row copper/brass. Aluminum will typically be 1“ wide rows while copper/bras will be 1/2“ wide rows.
Maillemaker has a big 460 engine crammed into a small space and his new aluminum radiator is working great for him.. The 5.0 is much smaller and I really don’t think it is that critical.

I still have the mechanical gauge connected to my engine and have a Ford 192F recommended thermostat. With the stock dash gauge, it moves reacts much slower to temp changes compared to watching the mechanical gauge. That was a problem for me when I first installed the mechanical gauge as I could watch the actual temp fluctuate. My gauge fluctuates from 182 to 198 in town on flat roads with the AC on and the outside temps in the mid 90's. I have seen just under 205F pulling up long grades on the interstate in overdrive. once the transmission kicks down to drive, the temp rapidly drops to 195 or lower on that same hill. I also noticed that the higher temps in OD up that grade is because I have the gas peddle almost all the way to the floor to maintain my speed of 70mph. If I kick it down into drive i only need to have the peddle half way down to maintain 70mph. So it is burning a lot more gas trying to keep it in OD and that heats the engine up..

I also tested 3 thermostats in water on the stove with a thermometer. My 192f thermostats did not begin to open until the temp passed 192F and were only just a little at 212F. All 3 opened just a little different. The probe on my thermometer is about 1/8“ diameter and at 212F, the probe fit in the opening of one and not the other two but none of them opened at all till they reached 192F. On a mechanical gauge this difference will show up on the temp reading with the gauge reading bouncing back and forth while the stock dash gauge will barely move. I was concerned at first but finally I realized (after several posts) that the temps were just fine.

Ok enough of that...

The mechanical gauge: you remove the stock temp sender and install the mechanical gauge sender in the same place.. It is right behind the distributor on the intake with a single wire connected to the top of it.

Air bubbles: My radiator does the same thing... If the van is on a slight angle it can get some air at one end or the other and will show up as small air bubbles from time to time..

The flow in my radiator is barely visible and after revving the engine the level will change sometimes overflowing with the cap off.. That is why I did the block test as posted in the video.
i was concerned about a possible head gasket problem but it turned out to be normal.

The varying temp gauge: That can be the temp sending unit, gauge, or both. The first thing
I did was change the sending unit and thermostat. The temp on the stock gauge read even higher then! The best way is to just buy a cheap mechanical gauge and install it... It does not have to be permanent unless you want it to be... You can just use it to verify the actual temps.. I think I posted earlier about a instrument panel voltage regulator IVR on my 88 that can go bad and cause the oil, temp, and fuel gauge to bounce around. That is why my temp gauge shows so high in the pic above.. I do not know if the 1993 uses one or not..

 

Just saw Maillemaker's post after I posted my reply. Lots of good advice there!

here is where the stock temp sender is located. Nestled behind the distributor and behind the AC compressor. It can be done on my 88 from the front or better with the dog house removed but that is a lot of work to remove.



With the boiling over I would do the block test to make sure it is not a head gasket before spending money! I always worry about this when buying a used van as someone could have dumped in some stop leak and it show up after you buy the van. Lots of folks not as nice as we are here at Ford trucks forum!

Advice on the thermostat. be very careful as the thermostat bolts are known to break off.. the first one I tried to remove of of mine of mine did break and I used a chisel and just went a head and broke the ears off of thermostat housing instead of taking a chance on breaking the second bolt.. The problem is the steel bolts choroid in the aluminum. Once I removed the housing the bolt with the head on it came tight out..



When installing the new thermostat you have to be careful because the thermostat is known to slip down out of place while you are trying to put it to the block. here is what I did.. I out the thermostat in the housing and used a rubber band to keep it pulled back in the groove it fits in the housing. Once you have the thermostat held in place, glue the gasket to the hosing over top of the thermostat.. Once installed I simply pulled out the extension and rubber band.



When installing the thermostat remember the pointy end faces the "front" of the van! Dont mix this up or you will overheat!!!




You will probably find that the lower bolt on the thermostat housing is very difficult to get to because it is behind the timing cover and water pump.. I started the upper bolt and then used a pair of angled pliers to turn the lower bolt in as far as I could... After that i used 2 different wrenches (each was a different brand and had a different angle to how they fit) to tighten the bolt back up as seen in the pic. Also notice the red line in the pic below at the base of the distributor. You may have to loosen the distributor hold down bracket/bolt and turn the distributor in order to have enough room to loosen and tighten the lower thermostat hosing bolt. If you have to move the distributor, clean the area, take a screwdriver and hammer and mark the spot where the distributor is sitting before you loosen it. This way you can put it right back where it was without worrying about having to reset the timing.




If you are going to change the water pump,,,,, make sure you have time and are prepared just in case some of the bolts do break off.. It is quite common and can become a real job extracting them.. Hopefully that will not happen.. WD40, PB Blaster, ect will not help when removing the pump as the problem is the corrosion where the bolts pass though the timing cover housing and none of the penetrating oils can soak in there.. So just take it easy and be careful..hopefully they will all come out... Fear of that happening is the main reason I have not changed my pump yet!


Fan clutch... I installed a heavy duty from NAPA on mine. Do ot use the severe duty as they say it can cause the water pump bearings to wear out prematurely.
If the fan clutch is good it should not spin freely. If you try to spin it should spin a little but quickly stop. Check to see if it has any play in it back and forth towards the engine and radiator. If so that indicates a bad bearing in the clutch.. you can also have a bad bearing in the water pump..

Here is a good video on how to find a noise.. most part stores sell a mechanics stethoscope. I got mine from harbor freight for a few bucks..

 

So many good tips and tricks here! Thanks for the help.

I meant to call my local shop about local rod shops but work was very stressful and I forgot. After reading the horror stories about new radiators failing I am less afraid of rodding an old one. I didn't place my parts order because of it. I think the first step might be to get a rod shop and have them do a sniffer test first.

​​​​​​Seems like I really need that thermostat housing for a second temp gauge and visually inspect the thermostat for operation. I definitely followed the picture on the packaging and could see the OE guage drop at temp but now I'm worrying I did it backwards. BTW, that rubberband trick is slick!

I'll continue my research but is the zinc plug something you pick up at an auto store or a marine shop?

 

New radiators cost less than $300. When I took my radiator to a radiator shop, he said it would cost nearly that much to re-core the old one. My fear of rodding the old one was that the core, being 28 years old in mine, would be prone to leak failure anyway.


Steve

 

$260 of parts are heading my way

Radiator
Water pump
Mounting bolts
Fan clutch

 

Hmm. I'm leery of plastic cooling system parts but keep your lifetime warranty info. The coupon trick is pretty slick, eh?

Steve

 

Last doodad gadget I can think of. Does anyone use one of these filters? They have one for the heater core line too. Since that's also new, I'm tempted to get these.

 

Since no particulate is introduced into the coolant system, I don't think a filter is particularly (hah) necessary. If you did put one in, you would not need one on the heater core line since all the coolant goes through the radiator eventually anyway, so one filter on that line would do the trick.

But, if all you pour in is antifreeze and distilled water, then there really shouldn't be anything else in there that a filter will pick up. My suspicion is that even the incrustations that appear from using water with minerals in it is that a filter would not help - these are dissolved particles that precipitate out on the radiator cores.

Steve

 

Thanks for the thoughts steve! I should think of it like the string in the salt water science experiment. The salt doesn't form on the walls of the cup, since it can deposit on the string.

I bought the thermostat housing with the port for a temp probe. Would it make sense to put the zinc rod into the thermostat housing and put the temp gauge at the bottom of the radiator to confirm the engine block temp and then the post cooling temp? If I wrote all the readings down at the various temps with the new system, I would know (roughly) what normal operating temps should be going forward.

If I did do it this way I probably would need a filter to catch the particles breaking off the zinc rod every time the thermostat opened.

 

The zinc anode needs to be grounded to the aluminum of the radiator. If your radiator has plastic end tanks where the fittings thread in, I'm not sure there is any benefit to having the anode threaded into the plastic. However, maybe it will still work if you run a ground wire from the plug somehow to the frame. I am pretty sure the anode must be grounded relative to the thing being protected in order for the anode to work. I had not thought about what happens to the corroded bits of zinc that come off the sacrificial anode. But my guess is they are very, very tiny and not likely to be caught by the screens I have seen in the main coolant hose. They do make coolant filtration systems that are like oil filters that would probably catch such small particles but I suspect this is overkill in most situations.

Ideally, your sacrificial anode should not be sacrificing at all. If your engine is well grounded it should not be a problem.

In fact, if your tanks are plastic, then your coolant lines are already grounded from the aluminum radiator. That leaves the mounting holes. Are they in the aluminum or plastic? You might discover that your aluminum core is already electrically isolated from the chassis ground (easy to test with voltmeter) in which case you don't have to worry about galvanic/electrical corrosion, I don't think.

I do not think you can stick the anode in the thermostat housing. It is too long. I suppose you could trim it down. But I don't know how close in proximity the anode needs to be to the radiator to protect it.

I would not want the engine temperature probe in the radiator. I would not be interested in the radiator temperature, but the engine temperature. Measuring the coolant temperature where it exits the engine is going to give you the worst-case maximum temperature of the engine coolant, which is what you should be interested in seeing. It isn't much use to know what the temperature is after the coolant has gone through the radiator (mine is a down-flow radiator so my sensor port would tell you the after-cooled temperature of the coolant).

Steve

 

Well, armed with your advice and some time on my hands this weekend, I am finally throwing the new parts in. I have removed the fan clutch and shroud. I already have a couple questions.

First one: the fan clutch that I pulled out has the exact friction that the new fan clutch has. Is there a way to test these? It feels like compressed gum when turning the shaft.... Meaning it turns (and smoothly), but not freely. I'm going to read up on how these clutches work, but should I put the old one back in until it burns out or I figure out why itsi always engaged? And is there a way to test if the clutch is still good? I will attach a picture below. It looks brand new.

Two: The radiator is bolted on with nuts that clip on to it like tinnerman's. The bolts insert from the grill side facing aft. Is there any reason I can't clip these nuts onto the vehicle frame and install the bolts from inside the engine bay facing forward to the grill? I don't think there is, but it seems odd they would be installed that way in the first place.

Three: Do people generally prefer to reuse the old Ford radiator hose clamps that are the wire type, or do people prefer to replace them with the new style hose clamp that you nut down?

Thanks again everyone!

 

Okay a little reading convinced me to replace the clutch regardless.

A bad clutch bearing will blow out my new water pump bearing so then I'd be out even more money and time.

And mine is a thermal clutch, so despite having a "cold " engine, I believe it was 90° out when I looked under the hood at idle. Ambient temps were probably to warm to disengage tge clutch and the rpm was too low to break the friction of the silicon gel... Double wammy.


https://www.haydenauto.com/fan%20clutch%20tutorial-part%201/content.aspx

 

The parts are in. New radiator, water pump, thermostat housing with temp probe, and hoses.

I also put in a glass coolant filter. It's actually really easy to see when the thermostat cycles now. The cycling is happening around 200° according to my backup tempd gauge 😎 Only thing is, the temp probe in the thermostat housing is not sealing.

Would you recommend I try Teflon tape again or use permatex indian head water seal or do something else?

Also, I replaced the idler pulley and tensioner pulley which quieted things down in the engine bay. I am hearing a slight tick. Could it be a breather tube to the valve cover?

 

I tried figuring out what this part is, but couldn't figure it out. Any idea what the kinked hose is connected to?

 

I sealed my temperature sensor with Teflon tape. But some kind of goop should work also.

Steve