I need to cleanout my lockhart oil cooler of metal shaving from a bearing gone bad and it has an internal thermostat. Any ideas for flushing the cooler out before returning it to surface on the rebuilt engine? Thanks for any help.


Bob

 

Disconnect hoses and blow out with air. Wouldn't hurt to do a 50 mile oil change also.

 

Remove the cooler from the bike and disassemble as much as you can (fittings, clamps,hoses ect.)
go find a auto repair shop to use the stoddard solvent parts cleaning tank. the stoddard solvent will break down the oil and allow you to rinse out the chips,shavings stuck to the oil in the cooler passages. If you can't remove the thermostat you can get a pot of hot water, (Hot enough to open the thermostat) place the cooler in the hot water and use something to grip it and swirl it around to break free any remaining pieces then before it cools down,(and thermostat re-closes) blow compressed air through the tubes to complete the job. that's just me, good luck explaining to the old lady why you want to borrow her canning kettle.

R.

 

I`ll tell you what we do when an aircraft engine puts metal shavings into the oil system, we send it out to be disassembled and physically cleaned out just like the old radiator shops used to do.

You will never get all the debris out, at least thats the way it was taught to me in airframe and powerplant school. I would sooner run without a cooler than one that has gone through an engine failure.

 

I would say to be on the safe side, replace the oil cooler, why take chances when that much money, time and effort is involved.

 

 

Just like Razerman and Dan89FLSTC said.
Clean the crap out of it, all spotless n stuff.
Then buy a new one like 1skrewsloose said.
Then send the old one to me so I can put it on my scoot.
LOL just kiddin...(not really)...LOL
If you can tear it down far enough to get the crap out of it I would use it.
Then like nocarb said, an early oil change wouldn't hurt.
Beer me

 

As a mechanic of 10 plus years i have rebuilt a few engines. That said any engine that was rebuilt that had an oil cooler got a new one. Dont even mess around for what it costs,