I tow a 6000 lb (total) boat regularly and I'd like to add the tranny cooler to my '04 Expy EB. Does anyone have any suggestions on the specific type I should use or places I should get it from? How about some installation tips? Thanks.

 

Welcome to FTE and thanks for joining us in the Towing forum!

 

Coolers can be had anywhere at reasonable prices. Advance Autoparts sells a brand made by Hayden which is a good price/performance unit. TrueCool makes the best. That's what's on my van.

If you live in a place where it doesn't get very cold in the winter, bypass the OE cooler and install the biggest aftermarket cooler that will fit. Try to place it in front of the engine fan so it gets good airflow when you're not moving. A thermostat and temp gauge are nice to have too. I don't have them on my current van.

Steve
'95 Clubwagon XLT

 

BP -

Whatever brand you get, make sure you mount it with brackets and NOT with the plastic rods that go thru the condenser/radiator; they are easy to use but can saw a hole in either core (yeah, I found out the hard way!).

Steve

 

That's what happens if you don't use the foam mounting blocks between the cooler and the radiator and if you don't get the zip ties tight. We installed literally hundreds of coolers at my shop over the years and never had that happen.

Steve
'95 Clubwagon XLT

 

Although some people do this, it is very, very bad advise.

Bigger is not always better as you can overcool the oil and restrict its flow. Also the tranny does its best around 180 to 200 degrees and running it colder can cause increase build up of moisture in fluid from condensation can it not being evaporated off in "normal" hotter fluid temps and reduced seal life because colder temps increases the shearing forces on then with colder thicker fluid. If you need a cooler the size of your raditor to heep tranny cool then it is time to regear your vehicle because it is spendding too much time on the converter stall when loaded. The proper way to do it is route fluid through tank cooler then through aux cooler and something around 6"x12" in size should be fine for the orginal posters application. Also one more thing to consider and is often overlooked is engine cooling fan becaue on a lot of LD SUV's the clutch fans calibration is very conservative to maximize MPG and leads to higher engine temps because ram air is not always engough to keep this cool when towing.

 

That's why I asked if he lives in a cold climate. If you live/drive in the hotter climates this is not a problem. Nor will you be able to fit a "cooler the size of your radiator" in an Expy.

Bypassing the radiator is common practice in warmer climates and works just fine. Incidentally, the ideal operating temp for an automatic transmission is 175F. I have a truecool, and bypassed the radiator, on my van with 200K towing miles on the original transmission.

Steve
'95 Clubwagon XLT

 

Thanks everyone for the replies. I live in Cincinnati so I see below freezing temps in the winter and 90's in the summer. But I don't tow in the winter so my only concern is to have it operate at a cooler temp during those hot summer days when I'm pulling the boat through the hills of Kentucky. Do you all think that getting Ford's OEM cooler that is an option on Expy's is the way to go or should I go aftermarket?

 

I am not sure I would call 175 ideal with 180 to 190 being ideal. Tank cooler also helps tranny warm up quirker and keeps temp more stable. THe perfect setup it to cooler in in tank first and then cooler more in aux cooler as needed. I have a old J20 that started life as a farm truck and tow trailers weighing up to 23K with grain to mill and later it plowed snow for many years. It had a small aux cooler in series with tank cooler (about 5 x 13 in size) and tranny still work great after 25 years and the fluid has never been other than bright red and that tranny has had a very hard life. In a TV you want to make sure engine and tranny stay cool when working hard for long life.

 

A MODERN tranny that is running too cool will stay in a "warm up" mode(My terminology) to warm up the fluid. This consists of the tranny running about 500RPM higher on upshifts. This causes a bit more wear and tear and mpg loss. I have also read that it can damage the tranny in extreme cold. Main issue in my mind is that you may not burn off the contaminants if the tranny is too cold.

I used to live in snowy Portland Or until last year. My 94 F250 E4OD 4.10 has a tranny gauge. In winter, when temps are below 50, the tranny took literally an hour or more to get above 150 degrees. It took many miles to even get the gauge to wiggle off the 110 bottom marker. In blazing desert heat, hills and towing my 8,000# trailer, I rarely got above 190 degrees and only once under extreme conditions did I see 230 for a short blip. This was all with the factory tow package.

On cold startups the tranny would shift high for probably 10 miles of freeway driving until it shifted normally. All 4 of my most current or recent vehicles did this.

My truck has the factory aux cooler in line with the radiator tank cooler. The tank cooler warms things up when it is cold and cools things down when it is hot. Ford put both there for a reason and did not bypass the radiator cooler.

Way back when I blewup my first tranny I asked the shop owner, an old raciing buddy of my then boss. He said DO NOT run just the aux cooler, DO NOT buy the biggest cooler he could sell me. Run in line with the tank cooler. This was in sunny So Cal.

Various magazines such as Trailer Life recommend not going too big on coolers and not bypassing the tank cooler. They claim wear and tear, deposits and mileage issues.

In most cases, you are probably safe running with the biggest cooler you can find and bypassing the tank, but most experts recommend against it. I would guess a multi billion dollar company with warranty claims at stake would design it right for the majority of us, ie aux cooler in line with the tank cooler, and a "warmup" mode when the fluid is too cold.

The usual recommnedation is to pick the cooler size rated for the maximum expected payload. In otherwords do not buy the 36,000# rated cooler if your truck plus payload will never see past say 12,000#. Just by a cooler rated for 12-15K#s.

This is info I have read in several magazines, and advice heard from 2 trusted tranny shop owners.

More cooling is not always better, if it was, you should probably pull out the thermostat while you are at it, your engine will run lots cooler and last longer, yup.

I used to be one of those, "cooler is better" guys until I read enough that this was not the best policy. Still I occasionally am tempted to get the biggest horking cooler I can find, but my tranny gauge says NO.

Just my opinion,

Jim Henderson

 

Hi Jim,

I owned an AAMCO Transmission center for several years. (Sold it not long ago) I can tell you that the transmission's shift routine on your E4OD does not use transmission temperature to alter the shift points. The ECU does monitor engine coolant temperature to determine TCC engagement. The higher rpm for the shift points is due to the lack of TCC engagement until the engine coolant temperature approaches normal operating temperature.

As for bypassing the radiator when installing an aux cooler, this has been the industry norm for many, many years. It is not uncommon for the factory cooler (in the radiator) to become restricted and rather than replace the entire radiator it is bypassed and an aux cooler is installed. This is accepted practice universally throughout the industry. The only acception is in extremely cold climates where the winter temps gets so low that the ATF begins to jell. At that point the radiator will actually help heat the ATF.

The old story about overcooling is pretty much a myth. Yes, you can overcool a transmission but it has to be VERY cold outside and you would need a very big cooler.

The temps you see are pretty much the same that I see with my van. I use the factory cooler, which is a truecool, and it works just fine even in severe use.
175~180 is typical of normal towing in summer temperatures, which is right in line with the industry's ideal of 175.

When I tell the owner of an Expedition to install the biggest cooler he can fit I also know that the practical limit will keep him in the ballpark of the appropriate size for his truck.

By the way, I got out of the transmission business because it became too difficult for an honest shop to compete with the ripoff artists and still make a living. We tried very hard but far too many customers want to believe what the ripoff guy's tell them. We tried to be honest with the customer, do quality work and stand behind it. Unfortunately, the ripoff shops tell customers that they work miricle for cheap and customers just seem to want to believe that.

Steve
'95 Clubwagon XLT


Steve
'95 Clubwagon XLT

 

Maybe for Ammco but it is not the correct norm. A exteranl cooler is no less suseptable to blockage than a tank one (maybe even moreso because of increase oil flow path when comparing a aux only to a tank only. If it was realy such a great idea, OEM's vehicle would come that way for improved reliabilty. One go reason not to go to Ammco if this is there "norm"

 

You need to cut open a cooler from the radiator from a Dodge pickup. You won't find a more effective filter than what you find inside.

Also, then how do you explain why we had hundreds of OE coolers stopped up on vehicles we overhauled and in all of the years I was in the business, I never saw an aftermarket cooler stopped up?

Despite your opinion of Aamco, and everybody's got one, they are the standard of the industry.

Well?

Steve
'95 Clubwagon XLT

 

Sounds like a dodge quality problem, not a problem inherent to tank coolers because myself in over 30 years of driving I have never had it happen to me or to a friend. Everyone may have/offer a aux cooler but to use it souly is a bad practice.

 

When a tranny fails, usually there are some solid materials in the ATF, and they can get stuck in the cooler. (I don't think it makes much difference if it's the OEM or aftermarket) As it was mentioned, this can restrict flow, but they can also get dislodged later, and get back to the freshly rebuilt tranny where they may cause premature failure. The Ford service manual actually mentions one or machines that can be used to flush oil coolers before reconnecting them. I guess many of the smaller shops don't have such equipment, and for them it's simpler to install an external cooler and completely bypass the factory one.