vent holes tranny pan

[rookieshooter]

Has anyone seen or know about transmission pans that has tubes running thru pan that are opened at both ends? It lets air flow thru tubes that are submerged in the fluid while drinving. They face front to back. Sounds like it would really cool the fluid/

 

[Hartman]

Haven't seen them but sounds like a fairly good idea. In theory, it should work just like heatpipes and heatsinks used to cool processors.

 

[rookieshooter]

If you scroll down you can see a pic. Im thinking of putting one on a C4 if they make one. Just Goggled and found that site

http://www.partshp.com/Pans.htm

 

[EMG7895]

I think that instead of a bunch of small ones like that one or 2 larges ones with cooling fins would be much better.

 

[gijoecam]

It'll work well until those passages fill up with gunk, at which point it'll be no more or less effective than a regular pan. It increases the surface contact area of the oil exposed to the pan, and as long as there's airflow through it, it'll increase the pan's ability to radiate the heat from the oil through the pan and into the air.

Does nothing if it's sitting still. I'd look at an auxiliary cooler in front of the radiator. Takes a bit more plumbing, but is significantly more effective at cooling the fluid, as well as increases the overall volume of the system.

-Joe

 

[bluestream1]

The stock tranny pan only has about one and a half inches in clearance above the Cat, so those large pans won't fit on our trucks.

Everyone knows that heat is what kills auto trannies, so what does Ford do? Put one cat beside tranny to cook the servo seals, and one cat below tranny to cook the fluid.

 

[410Fortune]

bluestream not all models of the Ex have cats under the trans pan......only the 5.0L 96-01 does as far as I know.


I built heat guards out of sheet steel to help protect my converter and shift solenoids from the exhaust heat, and I wrapped my down pipes with header wrap to help further. I saw a drop of 10 degree in my pan temp. When ford stuffed the Gt-40 5.0L into the Explorer they did alot of strange things.....I do not think its a coincidence that the first year of the 4.6L in the Mustang was 96 and the first year of the 5.0L in the Explorer was 96, seems like they needed a way to get rid of the remaining gt-40 5.0L's to me.

Rookie, what if one was to pump coolant through those trans pans tubes?

 

[gijoecam]

Rookie, what if one was to pump coolant through those trans pans tubes?

That would have the opposite effect. The goal is to get it as cool as possible, and keeping it under 140 would be ideal. The best you could do by pumping coolant through them would be get the oil down to 195 or so (thermostat temp) and the engine already does that for you in the radiator to begin with.

-Joe

 

[410Fortune]

Sorry I meant a new system, with electric pump and radiator, not a part of the engines cooling system

or fill with a therofluid type fluid, like speakers use, when it heats up it self circulates.

Just thinking out loud here.

Below 140? isnt there such a thing as too cool for trans fluid?
Mine peaked at about 165 last weekend when wheeling all day in low range up steep climbs, thats in the pan temp, not out from the converter, so I suspect coming out of the converter it was higher, around 190ish??

 

[bluestream1]

bluestream not all models of the Ex have cats under the trans pan......only the 5.0L 96-01 does as far as I know.

Well, my 4.0 SOHC has one cat right under the pan. The heat coming off this thing in the summer must be incredible. I would like to build a proper shield for this, but I don't know what material to use. The tranny specialist at my dealer mentioned this is a crap design, and causes lots of problems. (They are crooks, but they still know what they are talking about.) Ford doesn't care about it's customers after the warranty is over; I have found that out first hand. That's too bad, because I was a big Ford fan for many years.

 

[rookieshooter]

Hey guys, thanks for the feedback. Just won one on ebay. Got it for $30.50 including shipping, used. Each hole looks like its got somekind of finned thing going down the center. In addition to the pan, an aux. cooler will be used also. Bluestream since this is on a custom rig, I'll run exhaust off of headers so I won't have that problem with depth of pan and heat off exhaust. This will be on my 302 highly modded B11.
What was ford thinking of putting a cat. directly under pan
Good point gijoe. May have to keep check on it. Then power wash out. I'll keep an eye on my tranny gauge. Might have weld a fitting in pan or splice into line for sensor?
410 I even thought of something like your saying. In my racing days we would allways have one of those portable pumps that you pump up to spary and hit the radiator after runs. I bet if you hit those holes with water it would drop the temp real quick.

 

[aldive]

bluestream not all models of the Ex have cats under the trans pan......only the 5.0L 96-01 does as far as I know.

My '99 SOHC does.

 

[spindlecone]

No cats here

 

[rookieshooter]

Here's the pan that I was talking about. Purchased on ebay.

Those tubes have a spiral piece of metal that twists thru each tube. Acts like like a minature radiator transfering heat to the ambiant temp. as you drive along.

I have a tranny temp gauge. Just have to figure out where to put it.

I'll wrap any exhaust like spindel did that comes close to the pan.

 

[spindlecone]

looks like a great item.If you go with an inline temp gauge, post up some temps,Pre and post pan install.

 

[gijoecam]

Interesting.... Not sure if it'll do any good though... the whole principle is based on the assumption that the pan hangs low enough that it's exposed to a high pressure source on one side and a low pressure soource of air on the other. Given the fact that the exhaust pipe crosses directly in front of it, I'd be surprised if it does a lick of good as it's not likely there is significant airflow through the air side of the pan to significantly cool the oil.

To know for sure, you would need to install a temp gauge in the pan and/or measure the heat rejection of the pan in a wind tunnel with it bolted to the underside of the vehicle.... not an inexpensive test to say the least, and I highly doubt that the company did that type of research. Given the hand-built look of the unit, I'd be surprised.

Also, that will do nothing to cool the oil when the car needs it most: i.e. stuck in traffic, stop and go rush hours, etc. An external cooler in-line downstream of the water to oil cooler with an electric fan (a-la Aldive) would be a more productive choice IMHO.

-Joe

Neat concept though.
-Joe

 

[BrooklynBay]

This link has more transmission pans: http://www.performanceproducts4truc...px?pid=109775&name=Mag-Hytec+Transmission+Pan

 

[rookieshooter]

Interesting.... Not sure if it'll do any good though... the whole principle is based on the assumption that the pan hangs low enough that it's exposed to a high pressure source on one side and a low pressure soource of air on the other. Given the fact that the exhaust pipe crosses directly in front of it, I'd be surprised if it does a lick of good as it's not likely there is significant airflow through the air side of the pan to significantly cool the oil.

To know for sure, you would need to install a temp gauge in the pan and/or measure the heat rejection of the pan in a wind tunnel with it bolted to the underside of the vehicle.... not an inexpensive test to say the least, and I highly doubt that the company did that type of research. Given the hand-built look of the unit, I'd be surprised.

Also, that will do nothing to cool the oil when the car needs it most: i.e. stuck in traffic, stop and go rush hours, etc. An external cooler in-line downstream of the water to oil cooler with an electric fan (a-la Aldive) would be a more productive choice IMHO.

-Joe

Neat concept though.
-Joe

Joe, it's going to have an external cooler with fan also. In my earlier posts I posted other co.s that make the same type. Granted sitting still it's not doing much. But when driving and that's when this is going to really come on. All that air passing thru that will pick up a lot of heat. It's the same principle as air blowing thru your hearter core. And the majority of time this DD/trail rig will be moving. When I run exhaust from headers I'll try to route pipe away from pan, including wrapping. But the test will be hard core measurments. If it does no more then a few degrees i'll be happy. If your outside and driving in 80 dergree air and this pan has an unobstuctive air coming thru it at 65 mph that is a lot of BTUs that is going to pass on to the exiting air. Imagine in winter time.

Joe, I like your idea about the wind tunnel. Being I used to be in HVAC, I have a remote temp ga. Think I'll take some temps of entering air verses exit air. Be simple , just drill hole in floorboard and put probe at exit of pan. Then read temp. on digital screen while keeping track of MPH. I could probably come up with the BTUs removed once I got some other factors like volume of air, static pressure and so on. Getting a little carried away, but sounds like fun.

Just curious, While sitting still doesn the tranny still pump fluid thru aux. cooler? Or directly proportional to rpms?

http://www.partshp.com/Pans.htm

This site here has the same pan and says that it lowers 20 to 50 deg. It's sheet metal not cast like the other ones. This will relate to more heat conduction to tubes. But again hard core temp readings. I could talk a good thing all day

 

[gijoecam]

Joe, it's going to have an external cooler with fan also. In my earlier posts I posted other co.s that make the same type. Granted sitting still it's not doing much. But when driving and that's when this is going to really come on. All that air passing thru that will pick up a lot of heat. It's the same principle as air blowing thru your hearter core. And the majority of time this DD/trail rig will be moving. When I run exhaust from headers I'll try to route pipe away from pan, including wrapping. But the test will be hard core measurments. If it does no more then a few degrees i'll be happy. If your outside and driving in 80 dergree air and this pan has an unobstuctive air coming thru it at 65 mph that is a lot of BTUs that is going to pass on to the exiting air. Imagine in winter time.

Joe, I like your idea about the wind tunnel. Being I used to be in HVAC, I have a remote temp ga. Think I'll take some temps of entering air verses exit air. Be simple , just drill hole in floorboard and put probe at exit of pan. Then read temp. on digital screen while keeping track of MPH. I could probably come up with the BTUs removed once I got some other factors like volume of air, static pressure and so on. Getting a little carried away, but sounds like fun.

Just curious, While sitting still doesn the tranny still pump fluid thru aux. cooler? Or directly proportional to rpms?

Oh, don't get me wrong, I'm not saying it wouldn't do anything, I'm just thinking that it won't be as efficient as you would think because of the lack of airflow through it. Yes, you've increased the surface area that can conduct heat away from the oil, but that heat rejection is based on the assumption that there will be air flow through it. That may not be the case, especially given the fact that the exhaust pipe is right in front of it. If you could simultaneously measure the air flow velocity, you could calculate the mass flow rate (assuming the velocity would be the same for all of the tubes), once you have the mass flow rate, multiply it by the specific heat of the air, and the change in temperature to find out the number of BTUs per hr it's radiating... (It scares me that I actually remember something from that class... 8 years ago!!)

Basically, I'd just like to see how much air velocity there is in that area. I'm suspecting that it's not 65mph because it's tucked-up behind the pipe, and up inside the engine bay behind the cross members and such. You'd be surprised how many stagnant air pockets there are in a vehicle. (That's a big part of why the transmission tunnel gets hot)

Yes, while sitting still, the tranny still pumps the fluid, but if there's no air flow to radiate the heat through, it's going to get just as hot as it did with the original pan on it. On a furnace, that would be the equivalent of running the burner without the fan. The burner will still generate the same number of BTUs, but there's no airflow to dissipate that heat from the heat exchanger. Make sense? I suspect that's a part of the reason why all automatics incorporate a cooler integrated into the radiator: The assumption is that if the engine is running, there's one guaranteed way to dissipate the heat generarted by the transmission.

-Joe

 

[rookieshooter]

8 years, I'm impressed. Were thinking the same now. I agree to get the max effienecy out of this thing it will be to get as much unobstructive ambiant air (not generated engine heat)thru this and at a fast as possible. On paper it would work fine. I think one of the main keys for this to work is the placement of that exhaust including wrapping it. I'll check and see if I can somehow run that driver side exhaust a different route. Hey, I'm not even against welding a small air dam about an inch wide along bottom to direct air up into holes.
I have researched these pans on other sites and that is what got me started looking for one. Some say they don't even bother putting an Aux. cooler because they work so good. But talk is cheap.

Your 100% right on the heat exhanger and no fan running. Better hope your high limit switch works. That reminds me, I have to take the rug off the cold air return grill, supposes to get in the 40s tomorrow night. Don't want the furnace to kick on and have no air across exhanger. LOL