Hello all. Pickup is a 1993 F250 with a 460. I am having horrible luck with radiators, and I'd like to know if my worn out cab mounts could be the culprit. I suspected my original radiator was leaking last March. I brought it in to get tested, and it was plugged, leaking, and beyond repair. I installed a three core Champion in its place. Five months later, I had a coolant leak that I couldn't pinpoint, so I pulled the Champion radiator to get tested, and they found multiple leaks where the fins meet the tanks. The shop that tested my other radiators is a Cold Case distributor, so I figured I'd pay the extra money to prevent having to ship radiators in the future. The Cold Case went in October 6th, and it is already looks like it's leaking where the fins meet the tanks.

My question is, am I just terribly unlucky to keep getting defective radiators, or is there something else causing them to leak? The body mounts are worn out and cracked; could that cause enough vibration or twisting to break radiators? The rubber on the radiator mounts is present and looks fine. I'm beyond sick of messing with coolant! The pickup is going in to the shop this Wednesday to diagnose and repair the leak, and the shop has been great to work with, but I don't want to get caught off guard.

Thanks for your time.
- Joe

 

Your radiator is mounted to your radiator support therefore I would deduce that your rad support along with support bushings and maybe even frame mounts are so rotted it cant support the radiator rigidly enough anymore...Take a block of wood and a 2 ton jack and jack up under the radiator support to see how bad it is...

Mine was rotted and damaged from a crash sometime in its lifetime before I got it then weakened as it rusted away but I will tell you that doing both will be a hell of an improvement once you do them...

I used to get alot of feedback through the wheel and the frontend always shimmied a lil and the cab rattled pretty harshly.

When I did my total refurb I ripped the frontend off and noted all the damages to the rad support aswell as the body cushions..Its a good thing my front cab supports werent rotted but my rockers and cab corners were and that caused the cab to flex and caused the windshield to leak..I bought another truck for a better cab and although the rockers were stellar the cab was more worse than mine so I had to do the laborous task in replacing both sides of the rockers & cab corners also doubled-up on the floor pans under both feet too...

I used lots of paper towels from the dollar store and a 5 gallon can of Evap-O-Rust along with shrinkwrap to derust everything down to bare metal then epoxy painted the parts with VHT Epoxycoat then recoated again with POR15.I was tempted to powdercoat using a flame applicator but it would of been too risky also very time consuming for the time of the year I was doing it which was this time last year...LOL

I bought premium silicone body cushions from SB Filters and a new rad support from crash n rust........Best part about the body mount kit is they also supply the tools needed to extract the old ones so no extra fabrication of making removal tools makes doing the job alot easier.....

Good Luck












Good Luck

 

Hey, at least it was not like my 6.4 where the rad sat upon the frame and cracked. Combine that with the poor early cab mounts, they always seemed to leak.

I swear I read somewhere the Champion brand leaking was common. I would see if you can receive a refund and pick up a rad at ORLY, AZ, Napa, etc.

 

@Surgemaster1277 That turned out fantastic! My pickup doesn't have any rust/rot on the body or front end area, so I don't think that's the cause. I actually have a new set of poly cab mounts sitting on the passenger seat. I started installing them, but couldn't get the old ones out with the tools I had. Do you know if the removal tools are available separately? Could I talk you into selling or loaning your removal tools to me?

@Hit Man X I commented on a youtube video from Champion, and they seemed offended and told me how good their warranty was. Well, fool me once.... I bought that one through JEGS and received a refund. I thought the Cold Case would be the ticket based on price alone, and when I received it, I was blown away by the appearance. Champion tanks are square sheet metal welded together, whereas Cold Case tanks are stamped just like OEM.

I appreciate both of your advice. What gets me is that body mounts are a commonly neglected maintenance item, yet leaking radiators are not so common.

 

I did Energy on the dually, I think I ended up sawing some of the old out. Front core support bolts were junk so they received cutoff wheel treatment also. I made a puller from an exhaust pipe too for a few. I like the S&B as all the bits are new, but that price is spicy! So it boils down to cost versus time...also S&B was not available when I did the Energy.

Mishi had to redesign their 6.4 style a few times and come up with an extra upper brace to keep it from flexing. Lots of warranty...but who cares if you are always swapping the damned thing that large?