Oh Bother... and a query

[John R Dombey <John.R.Dombey@domain.elided>]

Gents,

I got a call late Friday night from my daughter, who had driven the Stag
to work.  She allowed that it made a funny sound when she started it up,
so she shut it down (good kid, that), got out for a peek, and heard a
gurgling sound.  Coolant, all over the ground.  It seems that the fan
and the radiator have decided to merge in a serious way.  I'm not sure
if the fan clutch allowed the fan to wobble enough to catch the radiator
strap (mine has vertical metal straps, I'm not sure why) or if maybe one
of the engine mounts allowed things to move too much.  Either way, the
rad is trash.  On to the query:

I know this has been beaten to death on these pages, but before I shell
out my hard-earned cash, what's the optimal radiator configuration?  I
seem to recall reading that a 5-row core was not great, but that some
form or other of 4-row was better?  Or maybe modified flow?  (BTW, what
exactly does that mean?).  

The fan is toast too (and I suspect that the clutch isn't too happy
either, although I haven't had a chance to disassemble things yet), so
I'll probably just replace them with an electric fan with thermostatic
control.  Any comments?

It's been a tough week so far...

jd



____________________________________
John Dombey
john.r.dombey@domain.elided

'69 TR6, '73 Stag, '81 TR8, '86 XJ6  -  yeah, I got it bad...