SixtySixFury3
New Member
I'll have my 165A one-wire Powermaster here by Tuesday. When I install it, I'll bypass the ammeter and fire it up. I am very confident that it will do the trick.Greetings, I too, am going through this nightmare. I have read everyone's posts and they all seem to be spot on. I had read somewhere that when you have a high volume water pump, you also need a high volume T-Stat otherwise the "stock" restriction and flow will remain the same. So, I got a high volume T-Stat and it got me down from 205 deg. to 190 deg. (FlowKooler #330-180) or a modified version of this from SpeedWay Motors. Speedway 180 Degree High Flow Thermostat . They somehow "go over" the FlowKooler T-Stat and make sure it works. (see their website). As for the alternator, DEFINITELY go with a Powermaster alternator. (made in the once great USA in Illinois) I have an 125 amp but I think you can choose other amperage versions. Now that fall kicked in swiftly in the Midwest, I cannot put all this stuff to the "test" of a 95 deg. summer day. (Oh well). I also spoke with the owner of GlenRay Radiators (very cool guy) who told me not to "re-invent the wheel" and do what Mother Mopar originally did and that was a correct stock radiator application with a mechanical fan and shroud. In essence, I CANNOT find a stock 62-65 OEM Mopar radiator for my '62 Polara eventhough the 2 piece steel shrouds are re-popped and are available. So, I'm like you with an aluminum radiator and had a welder "fit" an aluminum shroud on it. I have a single 16" Spale fan on mine and I probably have a 1/8" clearance between the fan and the water pump pulley bolts. I COULD have used some mushroom head bolts for more clearance but didn't think about it until afterwards. BTW, My 16" fan has a 10 AMP fuse. What are yours? THAT way you can guesstimate how many amps the fans are drawing when running to help you figure out what higher alternator you need or have that info and call Powermaster and have a talk. Good luck, It's been very frustrating with this problem. My car was down for 3 months and I missed a lot of car shows. Zzzzzzzzz.
I ran it this weekend, it was definitely hot out here. I disconnected the amps to my stereo to see what would happen, and sure enough, the car never budged past 200, that tells me that the only thing pulling current were the the fans and the ignition system.
The current alternator was just enough to handle the load so the fans were running full speed, they seemed louder too.
This is it idling in my shop.