DHM Race Crash Bar and Intercooler!

[twolf]

Think you'll be able to slide it in at an angle with the bumper on the car in order to reinstall? That was my thinking but I don't have the piece in front of me, so it's hard to imagine.

 

[jayrod1980]

Think you'll be able to slide it in at an angle with the bumper on the car in order to reinstall? That was my thinking but I don't have the piece in front of me, so it's hard to imagine.

If you reinstall the bumper without attaching the black plastic shroud that also holds the rubber trim that keeps the edge of your hood from rubbing then perhaps. What you would have to do is leave that piece off, do your sanding work, then pop the hood, pull the headlights (one of the screws in the headlights also goes through the shroud), then slide the grill through the gap (since the shroud is off). I think with the number of tabs it would be difficult to get fully seated without cutting up your knuckles, but worth a try. Then once all the tabs click into place you have to slide the tab side of the shroud back in there and get that to click in before reinstalling the headlights. Might be better just to pull the bumper.

The only pain of doing the bumper (if you have some extensions and a swivel ratcheting wrench) is the three screws/tabs in the wheel wells if you aren't using a lift. I could probably have the bumper off, grill popped back in, and fully reinstalled in an hour right now... And I'm slow as dirt. Once you've pulled the bumper more than once it's pretty easy. It's not even that many screws/bolts.

 

[jayrod1980]

i just wanted to confirm to everyone that has a MAP hard charge pipe kit that it will not fit with DHM race intercooler, it doesn't have enough flex in it to make it fit. i was thinking about cutting it apart and use couplers to give it more flex but then i was scared of having to many connections and having them come apart so i decided to just use oem hose for now but i was thinking about getting mountune ones but their really expensive for just silicone.

View attachment 8983

The MAP charge pipes will fit if you get an angle grinder and cut it down some. No extra couplers are needed! Just used a cutting disk on a 4.5" grinder to take about two inches off the small cold side pipe where it meets the 3 inch long coupler. Then I took a flap disk on the same grinder and smoothed and beveled the edges. I used a Dremel to deburr the inside of the cut. On the hot side, you take off all but an inch and a half of metal from the end of the pipe where it goes into the 4 inch long hose to the intercooler. This gives you enough room to not run, and retains enough of the "straight" part to have a place for the spring clamp to attach the pipe to the silicone hose coupler. It works best to test fit the pieces and determine exactly how much to cut, but it was really worth the extra effort! I love these pipes with the absolute best IC on the market. To clarify, once you cut the hotside pipe down, the 4 inch coupler has enough play I believe to not be an issue with engine movement.

 

[vegaspyder]

Yup Jay, just cut that off and the tabs down as far as you can before you sand.

It would definitely take longer to try and install the grill with the bumper on the car than just removing the bumper after you've figured out how to remove/reinstall the bumper.

You could have the xpel guy fill in that area that he didn't do and I'm sure it's be virtually unnoticeable. Get that plate holder off!! Do it!

 

[vegaspyder]

Here's the pic I meant to post

 

[vegaspyder]

 

[jayrod1980]

Thank you, thank you! When I first saw it I was like... What the...!

My car looks like yours in that pic except white. I doubt I'll have enough time to finish the project tonight so I'll be making my long drive to work without a grill! Should give me a chance to see if temps are any lower without the grill. Just noticed my coolant reservoir is at the minimum when cold... Not very happy about that. Ford doesn't give you a hot or cold mark either.

 

[vegaspyder]

As long as it's at the minimum when cold that's just fine. It'll rise when it's hot.

 

[jayrod1980]

I wonder if some kind of collar or clamp could be made that would allow the mishimoto oil cooler to the race crash bar after the fact.

 

[arlisscm]

I wonder if some kind of collar or clamp could be made that would allow the mishimoto oil cooler to the race crash bar after the fact.

I believe someone already had Russ put mounting tabs on the bar for a mishi cooler. So the easiest way would be to have that done. But I dont see why you couldn't use some U-bots and a plate with mounting points on it later down the road.

 

[jayrod1980]

Thanks but doesn't help me... I've had mine for months

 

[arlisscm]

Like I said in the second part of my post, I see no reason as to why you couldn't use some appropriately sized U-bolts and fab up a mounting bracket. I bet you could find some U-bolt style muffler clamps about the right size tehn maybe just have a thin piece of rubber wrapped around the bar to get more bite.

 

[Perfblue15]

Like I said in the second part of my post, I see no reason as to why you couldn't use some appropriately sized U-bolts and fab up a mounting bracket. I bet you could find some U-bolt style muffler clamps about the right size tehn maybe just have a thin piece of rubber wrapped around the bar to get more bite.

Yeah im at the same dilemma as I already have the Mishimoto oil cooler and my [MENTION=1098]DHM[/MENTION] crash bar and race cooler are in the mail as we speak. Once I have all the parts here and the car apart I will post up my mounting solution. I'm thinking of using flat stock to connect the oil cooler mounting tabs to the tabs on the intercooler for the airbag sensors. I'll have to test this once I have everything here though. [MENTION=1098]DHM[/MENTION] also sent me a link to some clams that would fit the crash bar that I could use for mounting as well. I'll update as I install stuff and get an idea of mounting.

 

[RAAMaudio]

If you want to make it look nice get some billet tubing clamps designed to hold parts to a roll bar.

Here is one example, you can probably find others, I have used different ones for catch can vents, helmet hooks, shock remote canister mounts, camera mounts, mirror mounts, etc....

This one with some 1/4" aluminum straps, bent if needed, would do the job but you might find some you like better.

http://www.speedwaymotors.com/All-In-One-Roll-Bar-Accessory-Clamps,42491.html

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Just found this with a quick Google search, just a few bucks more.

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I like this one as well, the bracket can be bolted on via both screws.

There are many to pick from, probably some in colors as well besides plain, clear or black

 

[Perfblue15]

If you want to make it look nice get some billet tubing clamps designed to hold parts to a roll bar.

Here is one example, you can probably find others, I have used different ones for catch can vents, helmet hooks, shock remote canister mounts, camera mounts, mirror mounts, etc....

This one with some 1/4" aluminum straps, bent if needed, would do the job but you might find some you like better.

http://www.speedwaymotors.com/All-In-One-Roll-Bar-Accessory-Clamps,42491.html

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Just found this with a quick Google search, just a few bucks more.

There are many to pick from, probably some in colors as well besides plain, clear or black

Those are the style of clamps that [MENTION=1098]DHM[/MENTION] told me to look into for a mounting solution. I'm just stubborn and want to try it my way lol.

 

[RAAMaudio]

Low weight, strong, easy to use, look good, do the job, but I like to make things harder or different as well, have done a ton of it to this car

 

[Wimp Lo]

I look forward to seeing what you come up with.

I am going to buy a Mocal/Setrab setup from Track Speed Engineering who do a ton of turbo Miata stuff. I'm going to make sure that I show them whatever I come up with so that they can offer a Fiesta ST oil cooler kit. Hopefully it will fit stock as well as the DHM race intercooler.

 

[vegaspyder]

I wonder if some kind of collar or clamp could be made that would allow the mishimoto oil cooler to the race crash bar after the fact.

I plan on getting an oil cooler myself and will have the same issue of no brackets added before hand...... So I think that possibly there is no reason for me to buy he expensive mishimoto fiesta st specific cooler when I'm going to have to fab some brackets up anyway. I'm sure there is a cooler out there with equal or better cooling at a less cost.

Anyone have insight on this? Was your setup easy to install onto the bar Rick? I like the weather here, but it also makes it necessary to dump extra money into the cooling.

 

[Wimp Lo]

Setrab is the gold standard in oil coolers, evidently they are built well enough to survive racing use reliably. Mocal makes sandwich plates and also has a good reputation for quality and durability. Mocal also sells thermostatic sandwich plates so you don't have to worry about long warm up times in cold weather and they are cheaper than Mishimoto thermostatic sandwich plates which don't seem to have quite the reputation of Mocal.

The fact that I am located close to Track Speed Engineering means that I can show my car to Savington to get his opinion and order the DIY oil cooler kit through him.

In the end I don't think I will save much money compared to Mishimoto but I will probably get a higher quality cooler with a thermostatic sandwich plate.

Initially I was looking to see if there was anything cheaper than Mishimoto and there are lots of cheap generic oil coolers out there but the cheap stuff had a common thread of cracks and leaks due to torque applied during installation or poor construction. The exception was Setrab and plenty of serious racers and auto manufacturers use them. I have learned that listening to racers is usually a good idea because they hate DNFs so I'm going to try Mocal/Setrab.

 

[jayrod1980]

Not to derail the nice vibe regarding oil coolers for this bar, but opening the grill on this car was a huge undertaking. Whatever that plastic crap is ford uses on the grill is frustrating to work with... And that's after you manage to separate the grill from the bumper and shroud.

Light sanding makes almost no impact on the grill, while anything fast gets too hot and the material then runs and cakes. I tried my dremel first and ended up with the grinding stone completely encased in black plastic.

I'm the end I followed the advice above and just hit it hard with my angle grinder with flap wheel, getting it hot enough to sort of melt the plastic away from where I was working. I was afraid I'd screw up something so it took me a while to expose any of the honeycomb. Once I figured out the heat thing, everything went faster. Still, before getting to finishing I was already 3-4 hours in. Once you slice, break off, etc all the slag plastic and have your grill open... Then comes finishing. I'm a perfectionist so it took me about 5 hours to get the work close to perfect as possible. It turned out alright. Thanks for all the tips!