can i plug OFH inlet/outlet?

[ercp98]

hi,
i have a 90 style OFH with an after market oil cooler.
my problem is that the oil cooler at the moment has a severe leak. not 100% sure if it is the braided lines or the an fitting is leaking.
but the leak is so bad that 5 quarts of oil is dumped in a matter of seconds.

my question is, can i plug the outlet and inlet for the oil cooler lines on the OFH and drive the car like that for the mean time?
or will this result to a absurdly high oil pressure situation because the route to the oil cooler has been plugged.

i just need to drive the car to work.

thanks in advance for everyones help.

 

[LIV4PSI]

I have driven with mine like that, I hope to not find out it was a horrific idea. Just around town without any boost.

 

[rdomeck]

Not certain, but this seems like a bad idea! I think that all the oil is pump from the pan into the housing and then through the cooler before returning to the engine. Plugging this would result in no oil pumped? I don't have a 90 housing yet, but that's the way most oil coolers work unless they have an oil cooler thermostat!

 

[donkeylips]

I think I've heard that it's ok but I can't say for certain. I've primed the engine with them plugged, and oil gets to the head with no problem.
I've found myself in your situation but ended up finding the stock oil cooler setup from a '90 DSM in my garage.
Would it be possible for you to loop the lines?

 

[LIV4PSI]

Quoting rdomeck:
Not certain, but this seems like a bad idea! I think that all the oil is pump from the pan into the housing and then through the cooler before returning to the engine. Plugging this would result in no oil pumped? I don't have a 90 housing yet, but that's the way most oil coolers work unless they have an oil cooler thermostat!



That can't be what happens. We installed a 90 OFH, and find out the cooler was from a car with a spun bearing, so we just plugged them. The car was driven a decent amount after that. If there was no oil, the engine would of failed almost immediately.

We only thought about the oil temps being high, and treated the car nicely.

 

[ercp98]

this OFH i believe has a thermostat that opens at a certain temp and then sends the oil to the external cooler.
this is actually what worries me. the oil will get to temp and the thermosat will open but the oil will have no place to go to
and result to very high oil pressure.

i also thought of having really high oil temp.

 

[LIV4PSI]

If its plugged, wouldn't the oil take the same path as if the thermostat had never opened?

 

[iceman69510]

Quoting ercp98:
this OFH i believe has a thermostat that opens at a certain temp and then sends the oil to the external cooler.
this is actually what worries me. the oil will get to temp and the thermosat will open but the oil will have no place to go to
and result to very high oil pressure.

i also thought of having really high oil temp.



This is correct, as I just looked into this a few weeks ago. You will have no supply to the engine. The thermostatically controlled passage does not open, it CLOSES when warm to force the oil to the cooler. You will likely have no flow and everything will dump back to the pan.

 

[LIV4PSI]

The oil still makes it through the system. I will post of pic of how my OFH came on my GVR4. We drove with it plugged 3 hours one way to the Shootout, and it was daily driven for a few months like that. I won't say it was the best idea, but the oil still circulates.

 

[ercp98]

thanks for the replies.
i guess i have to find another transpo
for work until i figure out where or how oil is leaking.

 

[DynastyLCD]

i know a few people that have driven countless miles with the 90 style OFH with plugged cooler outlets.

i did this personally, as i dont have another oil cooler, and i had an engine spit up a rod bearing. i didnt want to run the oil cooler again, even after flushing it, for concerns of re-introducing metal to the system.

also, if it was as seriously detrimental as some have claimed, i dont think that STM would sell these.