well, ive been getting oil in my coolant since i got the truck. it was the reason i got the truck for so cheap. so.......... i finally got around to changing the oil cooler "O" rings and gaskets. i read somewhere in here that you had to unbolt the engine on drivers side and jack it up. well, thankfully i didnt. all i had to do was unbolt the steering shaft and move it over. got that sucker right out.... anyways, i took it apart, cleaned the hell out of it and put on the new "o" rings. used some assembly lube and it slipped right in.

Threw some high temp rtv on the gaskets, bolted it on. started with a small leak, 20 seconds later after reving it a few times it sealed up...... 30 minutes later it sprung a huge leak. shut it down, pulled it apart again and the "O" ring was broken in half. i picked up a new one, bolted it back up and theres just a trickle now. its about a drip every 20 minutes. annoying still. thinking about just sealing it up with rtv... what do you think?

also, the tube isnt fully compressed by the ends when it bolts up to the engine. like it could have been 1/4 inch longer and still fit fine. i took a hammer and screw driver agains the stopper and slid it twards the leak until that stopper bottomed out. gotta run flush a few times though the radiator to get all that oil out.

 

noooooo not RTV heh

be careful with that stuff.. especially on the oil cooler. These weren't huge gobs of silicone, they were small strings folded over on themselves 2 or 3 times. Just an average "ooze" on the inside that eventually broke away and plugged it up. It lost over 50% of it's cooling capacity. Though the previous owner seemed to assemble the entire engine with silicone - oil pan, valve covers, water pump, thermostat....

<img src="http://www.airplanesathome.com/FTEpics/OilCooler.jpg" width ="640">

 

How do the housing ends look? any visible corrosion inside the end caps that could be the cause of the leak instead of the o-rings themselves?

 

they were smooth as a babys butt. I shoul have honed it. Gave it more grip and groove seal...

 

the rtv would be 100% external. No chance of getting internal either. Just a second seal, an exoseal if you would.

 

Worth a shot then! I just figured I'd caution about the silicone on the oil cooler - makes me glad I proactively did it before I put the turbo on!

 

If you don't hold everything just right as it goes together, the cooler bundle will cut the O rings.

The internal ring is usually the one that gets cut, then you oil/coolant mixes even worse.

The fact your ends could slide on farther makes me think the internal O ring on one end or the other may be cut.

 

All the coolers I refurbed had an alignment tab that didn't allow for you to install the ends on too far. Maybe this is your problem, your pressing the ends on too far screwing up the o-ring. You can see it in SWOOSH's picture.

 

I'm strong but not that strong lol. I pressed them on by hand.