TR2/3/3A Reproduction TR3A Grille

[CJD]

David...you have your car on the road but haven't posted pics of the finished girl!?! Let's see her!

 

[TR3driver]

So that says your gauge does read kind of high. 190F at the bulb on a hot day sounds entirely reasonable to me, as does slightly less than that on a cooler day.

I think your only problem is your cheap repro gauge.

Hello Randall

Sorry should have included that piece of info.

It was on the line between 185 and 230.

Davd

 

[sp53]

sounds like it

 

[DavidApp]

It may be a repro but it was not cheap. It is better than the gauge that came with the car kit. That was a mismatched electric gauge.

David

So that says your gauge does read kind of high. 190F at the bulb on a hot day sounds entirely reasonable to me, as does slightly less than that on a cooler day.

I think your only problem is your cheap repro gauge.

 

[DavidApp]

Sorry for that omission.

I had intended to post some photos but dd not have any with my good camera,

David
If they are not enlarged and centered it is because it did not work this evening.

David...you have your car on the road but haven't posted pics of the finished girl!?! Let's see her!

 

[sp53]

David the car looks great and very original. I must be in a controversial spirit and suggest trying a different gauge. It could easily be gauge. I bought a bordon gas tub gauge a few years ago at the corner auto parts store, and I will bet they are line that fit in the dash and the bulb fit into the housing. The gauge was right on, so I guess a second opinion is what I am saying.

 

[TomMull]

Perhaps off base but I had a bit of temp gauge creeping up in hotter weather, never a problem but a little unsettling. I found an original bellows thermostat on line and installed it, not so much as a cure but simply because I had the thermostat. It still has the original 60 year old gauge. Problem was reduced to the point that I almost never look at the gauge. Of course I did other stuff also, changed coolant, hoses and backyard radiator flush too. So the thermostat might not have been responsible for the improvement.
Tom

 

[mt10flyer]

I work at an elevation of 4400' and live at 6000' in the Sierra's. Stirring up a kerfluffle here I know, but these cars were NOT designed for this service. Going home up the mountain was not fun. Everything I tried with the original equipment failed. Whether or not the gauge was accurate was immaterial, because the car lets you know it is running hot. It gets a certain smell and feel.

I installed the below and have had no problems since. Just sayin.'

https://wizardcooling.com/1953-1965-triumph-tr2-tr3-aluminum-radiator-with-11-fan/?gclid=CN2GydCa5tMCFY22wAod9AoHTg

 

[Geo Hahn]

I work at an elevation of 4400' and live at 6000' in the Sierra's... these cars were NOT designed for this service...

That has not been my experience. I routinely drove my TR3A back and forth between Tucson (2700') and Mt Lemmon (9000') w/o any cooling issues. I still drive my TR4 that route at least once a week including tomorrow when it will be 100°+. The TR3 had a re-cored radiator with the crank hole, the TR4 has its original radiator.

 

[TR3driver]

Not really relevant, but I had to share this photo of my late friend Fred Thomas. Fred's home was roughly 20' above MSL

 

[GilsTR]

The Wizard Aluminum Radiator solved my overheating issues
on the 100+ degree Summer days. The other day while driving
up the hill towards the coast I got stuck behind a big rig....
and the temp gauge climbed from 185.... to 190.
Happy Camper!

Gil. NoCal

 

[Geo Hahn]

Not really relevant, but I had to share this photo of my late friend Fred Thomas...

I love mountan pass photos (and photos with Fred). So if Fred's diff had leaked it would go to the Atlantic and if the radiator leaked it was bound for the Pacific?

 

[DavidApp]

Iconic profile.

David

 

[Jim_Stevens]

You might also try looking for an original AMCO aftermarket "Vista Grille", which has a reputation for flowing air well because of having round tubes that are spaced well apart from each other. The Vista Grille looks non-stock, however - and some prefer its appearance to the cheap-ish factory stamped aluminum grille.

That’s what I did! They only occasionally show up on eBay. There is a guy making new ones, but they’re not quite the same as the AMCOs.

 

[Jim_Stevens]

Not really relevant, but I had to share this photo of my late friend Fred Thomas. Fred's home was roughly 20' above MSL

Boy, that was one cherry car. He opened his garage up to me when I just bought the car, and now mine has a few of his bits in it!

 

[DavidApp]

Having bought an electric temp gauge to see what the actual temperature is against my mechanical gauge I thought I better verify the new gauge is accurate first. So I wired the gauge up out of the car and got a pot of hot water and my oven thermometer as a comparison. There was 20 degrees difference so I got my grill thermometer to add to the mix. and got a third temperature.
So I put a pot of water on the stove and set it to boil. Should be 212 degrees right?. My oven thermometer showed 238 degrees and my grill thermometer had 212.
I am going to get the bulb out of the thermostat housing in the morning and test it along side the grill thermometer to see how far out the gauge is in the car.

The electric gauge is going on the tractor. That has not had a working gauge in 30 years so a few degrees off will not matter.

Who would have thought an oven thermometer would be so far off?

David

 

[TR3driver]

Having 3 thermometers is kind of like having 3 watches; you never know which one is right!

212F is pure water at sea level, but what you get out of the faucet isn't pure, and relatively few people live at sea level. Where I am at the moment (about 900ft above MSL), it boils at about 210.3F. I always thought water from an reverse-osmosis water filter was pretty good, until I tried using it in my CPAP humidifer and discovered how much crud it left behind.

 

[NutmegCT]

Last summer I bought three digital thermometers, similar to:



You guessed it. Each gave a slightly different reading (two or three degrees difference) when placed at the same time into one glass of hot water. Even gave different readings when placed side by side on the living room carpet.

And just for fun, your car coolant's temperature gauge reading is probably just an "average" of the varying temps of the coolant as it passes by.

ποταμοῖσι τοῖσιν αὐτοῖσιν ἐμβαίνουσιν, ἕτερα καὶ ἕτερα ὕδατα ἐπιρρεῖ.

Or words to that effect ...

OK - back to my cave.
Tom M.

 

[TomMull]

I'd say your test will work fine. Around Macon the correction for altitude will most likely be less than a degree F and the correction for cruddy water couldn't be much more than that and neither discernible on your dash gauge. Tom

 

[sp53]

Yeh establishing a data point or base line is what you want; that way you can calibrate the off gauge by memory. I was thinking you might be able to just loosen the bulb on the car gauge and lower it down some rather pulling it out of the car, and get a pot or old can you could bend a little and put your grill thermometer if it portable along with some hot water about 208F, and see what the 2 gauges say together.