By the way the best prices and selection of radiators I have found online in an easy to pick out format has been with Speedway motors. I am usually quick to praise summit but I think for radiators Speedway has a much better selection and prices.

http://www.speedwaymotors.com/xq/aspx/parent_id.29/dept_id.34/qx/DisplayGroup.htm

Why would you go 19X22 instead of the 19X24 that you found?

Probably won't. A 24" radiator is just going to clear the inside of my framerails and I am going to mount it tilted. I thougth the 22" width would give me some more room but I can get creative with mounting so that won't be a problem.

I'm thinking of it tilted forward at the front to clear the intake and tited back in the rear to make room for a winch. The 19" height that seems to be very popular means I really have to push it way down past the frame rails. I made a cardboard mockup but I need to get a new camera for pics I'll throw up a sketch of what I mean. It's really a question of

19x24 1.25" single row or
19x24 1" double row

like this

I picked out a radiator that is going to stretch to both sides of the frame. It might make reaching the steering box hardware impossible to reach so I welded on little squares to hold the nuts. I wan't sure if you could weld the nuts directly (figured that would make them weaker or something). I also trimmed the bolts.



I needed to lengthen the steering shaft to meet the steering box. Cut the shaft and measured the gap with the slip joint compressed,then with it extended, added it togther and divided by two and came up with a 5 1/8" extension. I used .75" DOM that was around 3/16 thick. (Atleast I think it was DOM, there was no seam, got it in the drop pile.) The Isuzu steering box clamp is the exact same size as the toyota, luckily.

Here is the method I used to jig up the extension. I little piece of angle iron would have been much easier but I didn't have one. Laugh at my silly methods but the end result is perfectly straight.

Clamp a piece of steel to the shaft one way...



Then do it again the other way... And tack it.



Sand down the tacks...



Then I ran a bead on each seam.


I wasn't confident with this considering it is my steering so I reinforced it with a kind of splint with a piece of 3/4" pipe. The pipe was cut lenghtwise and I cut some out to make a gap. Tacked it then clamped it in a vise to weld.


Then I welded the little gap.


Skipped around and here is the final result. Came out nice.

If you're worried about making a strong weld, V the parts that you're joining so you have a 'gap' that you can fill. In this case you'd be starting in the middle(center) and working your way to the outter edge. Or at the very least leave yourself about a 1/8" gap between the two pieces so you get better penetration. The down side is things tend to warp more. Only reason I mentioned it is your picture of your tacks, it looks like the pieces are butted right against each other. You shouldn't have any problems with that extra bracing you did, well done and it looks good too. All that's left is paint.

I've welded in a lot of nuts and haven't had any problems *YET*. Does anybody know how much of the nuts tensile strength you lose when you weld it in?

Your little tabs are cool, and should do the job of holding the nuts so you can get the bolts out, but can you get the nuts back into position if need be without removing the radiator? I don't suppose you have room or the inclination to "cage" those nuts so you don't have to weld on them and they won't go anywhere either?

That is a good point about holding the nuts in. Maybe I will weld a 1/2" washer over the little tabs. Maybe some type of silicone sealer spread around there will just make the nuts stay put....

Have you seen these rads close up? I *really* doubt the single 1" is actually 1" thick overall. The core itself may be, but the end tanks are still gonna be 2+ inches wide though. I think you'll find that both the single and dual row use the same end tanks so the single row won't be any easier to mount a fan to.

--Dan

Just FYI, mine is not the stock 1 or 2 row radiator. It's a 3 row replacement core I had put in about 2" - 2.25" thick overall. Are you running A/C? It's good to run the biggest cooling system you can, but if you don't have A/C, it can really lessen your rad requirements.

--Dan

If you do that, you might want to put another couple of tabs on it so the nuts can't fall out the sides. 3 would have done it originally but now you need 4. Besides, the metal you're using isn't that thick so it doesn't get a big bite on the nuts. Maybe put 2 more thick tabs on each nut and weld your washer across the top of those???

Just kind of thinking out loud here...