Iron Duke Radiator

[phantomlvii]

hey guys,
I'm in the market for another radiator.  What other cars share the same radiator as the Iron duke eagle?  Finding a 4 cylinder eagle in a junkyard is like finding hens teeth.  info would be appreciated.
Derrik

[captspillane]

I bought a brand new radiator for one of my Eagles. I used a CJ5 with Iron Duke. When it came the radiator was offset differently than the Eagle radiator. You will have to take the  side panels off your old radiator and have them soldered onto the new core, or you can do what I did. I cut the long side off, overlapped it and bolted it to itself, then cut the short side off and overlapped and bolted on a cut down piece from my old radiator.

The Iron Duke radiator has the top hose and bottom hose on exact opposite sides of the radiator as a 258 or AMC 150 4 cylinder. There are SX4s out there from 1983 with the AMC 150. I've seen exactly one. Its obvious because there is a funky shock absorber on the bottom of the engine. My next radiator I got an aluminum one meant to be installed in a CJ7 with small block Chevy conversion. A Chevy has the hoses on the same side as the 151. There is alot of options available, they're nicer and won't rust, they're cheaper, and there are even ones that come with electric fans already installed. The core part is wider, so I went to an auto parts store with my old hose and found a really long one hanging up that could be cut down to work. The CJ7 Radiator is the same as our Eagles.

[phantomlvii]

thanks for the info. the cj7 radiator i found is much cheaper than the radiator on rock auto. 
derrik

[jim]

Did you check radiatorworld.com?

[captspillane]

It is true that CJ7 radiators are identical to our Eagles. The exception to this is that the installation holes are different. Our radiators have the holes already drilled to be installed on a CJ7, but the aluminum radiators do not arrive with holes drilled for our Eagles. Here is a picture that shows an old Eagle radiator in comparison to the new aluminum radiator for a CJ7 I am installing in my SX4. It was easy to drill the correct hole:



If you have an Iron Duke 151 four cylinder, the radiator hoses are on opposite sides from an AMC 150 four cylinder. The evil bay also has Jeep CJ7 aluminum  radiators intended for Chevy small block conversions with the input and outputs on the correct side for the Iron Duke 151 engine.

Here is a picture of the CJ7 radiator installed in my SX4 before I drilled the proper holes up higher. The spacing is correct and the radiator bolts in as is, except that it sticks up too high until you drill the new holes in the right spot:

[captspillane]

For those of you who are not overtaken with how incredibly sexy an aluminum radiator looks inside our Eagles, there is an option to use a CJ7 Iron Duke Radiator. A CJ7 aluminum radiator will sit in the same spot as a 258 Eagle, which is further away from the engine than the original. Longer radiator hoses are easy to find and the evil bay sells aluminum radiators with electric fans already mounted as a package.

If you don't want to go this route, its still possible to buy a radiator like the stock one. The first one I bought was intended for a CJ5. I did not bolt it in as is because the offset was different. I wanted to reuse the original radiator hoses, so I changed the offset. In other words the flat metal was too long on one side and too short on the other. I made a spacer on the short side and cut down the long side to give it the Eagle offset. I ended up with spacers on both sides because I accidentally cut the long side too short. Here is a picture of it installed:



The other side is visible in this picture:

[siguy8]

This is exactly what I need. One question though. If I put the Aluminum one in now, and then swapped in a 4.0 (from a newer jeep or something) a few years from now, would I be needing to buy another radiator, or would this one be enough to handle the six cylinder?

[captspillane]

Your profile says 1982, so you have an Iron Duke. The Iron Duke has the radiator input and output on exact opposite sides as the 258 and 4.0. That means you need the "CJ7 SBC Conversion" radiator, and it also means that you'll need to switch radiators when you make the swap. The aluminum radiators come in 2, 3, or 4 cores and they heat exchange much better than the stock units. They will handle a V8 just fine.