2012 Boss 302 Grille Options

[PeteInCT]

The Pope just called. You're officially excommunicated !!! ;D

Happy New Year !!!

 

[VoodooBoss]

I've got the Saleen grill sitting in an un-opened box in the basement that I bought for the GT but didn't install it. Its very open so should increase airflow, but we lose the Boss look.

Since you already have the Saleen I'd use it for the track and not mess with any other grill.

 

[2012YellowBoss]

I went with the 302S grille with the far left ans right sides also cut out. I like the original look and will give up 1 or 2 CFM by keeping the pony emblem ;D Personally, I'm not a big fan of the full billet look. My assumption is that the differneces between all of these 'high airflow' grills will be minimal. I agree that the vented hood is a logical next step, albeit a big ticket item. Since I only run HPDE's and will start some TT's this season I don't need the additional '4 seconds', she's more than quick enough for me. My next step will be the oil cooler when FRPP makes it available. If for some reason that isn't enough I'll probably choose the 302R radiator as a final step.

With my mods, water wetter (doubt that did anything) the 302S style grille (modified a Boss grille), removing the rear hood weatherstrip and removing the foam covers from the intake, I am down 20-28 degrees. This is while running harder then I was before but the temps have also cooled off some from mid-summer. I do not see the hood making that big of a difference, the heat is internal, it may help a little but I doubt it is good for more then 2-3 degrees. That is about the same Mark told me taking the foam off the engine would help but a much cheaper mod.

I left the right side bars in place on the grille after Mark told me they do not help at all, I also asked about cutting the pony out and he said it would not make a big difference. As far as I know taking the grille out solves the problem even with the stock hood but I have not tried that, I would rather run with a grille and one that looks like a Boss. The only other mod I plan for the future is the oil cooler if I see the temps rise into the mid 230's again. For now I went from 246+ to an average of 218 to the hottest of 224 since I did my mods.

It would be interesting to see the results of taking a car to the track and swapping the hoods on the same day, same temps and same driver to see the difference. Until that I would not spend the money for one for cooling. Still it looks cool and that would be a plus, just not in the cards right now.

 

[drano38]

Since you already have the Saleen I'd use it for the track and not mess with any other grill.

Well, I'd like to keep the Boss look.
Lots of options out there.
And at this point, I'm not pushing above 230 degrees, so not a crisis yet. Either I've got a cool car, or I'm not driving hard enough! ;D

 

[cloud9]

and removing the foam covers from the intake, I am down 20-28 degrees.That is about the same Mark told me taking the foam off the engine would help but a much cheaper mod.

Do you have any pics of this Scott? ;D I'm not sure what foam you are talking about by the intake. Do you mean the black foam over the coil covers?

 

[2012YellowBoss]

Do you have any pics of this Scott? ;D I'm not sure what foam you are talking about by the intake. Do you mean the black foam over the coil covers?

Yep, they are very thick. Also I yanked the one inside the intake up front and I am going to get to the rear one. There was a wire going through it and I did not get a chance to work on it yet. The car has been in the shop for the clutch issue but I pulled it out for a track day, taking longer then expected to get that done.

 

[2012YellowBoss]

Pulling the blue coil cover would not hurt either I am guessing. I may do it just to see next summer, they are only for looks anyway. I have not because I was told it would not help with cooling, however I think the sum of several thing may make a difference.

 

[cloud9]

Pulling the blue coil cover would not hurt either I am guessing. I may do it just to see next summer, they are only for looks anyway. I have not because I was told it would not help with cooling, however I think the sum of several thing may make a difference.

What's the purpose of the foam? NVH reduction? Mark said it will help with cooling if you remove them? How is that, do they act as insulation trapping heat in the engine?

 

[2012YellowBoss]

I believe the foam is for noise reduction and maybe looks. It is 4 inches thick and will trap heat for sure but is it trapping the heat in a place that matters? IDK. The problems we have are internal temp from a restrictive grille compounded by an oil cooler tapping into an overburdened system with that restrictive grille. Removing the foam will help heat dissipate to the outer edges of the motor faster but if we do not get internal cooling issues corrected it may be too little too late.

What I have found is that the grille made a big difference (I know you have seen different). The other mods like removing the rear weatherstrip to possibly allow more airflow across the radiator and the foam insulation have helped. I am not sure the weatherstrip mod is helping cooling by airflow across the external engine but maybe it allows more airflow through the radiator with a different escape point, after-all there is plenty of open space below the engine.

Mark did not tell me to remove the foam, I told him that I did and he said it would not help a lot "maybe two or three degrees". I figured if I was running 246 before that 2 or 3 degrees starts to sound a lot better.

 

[cf6mech]

Im with Smitty.....dont think there is much to gain on the grill mods....how fast and easily the air flows through the radiator (i.e.vented hood) .....not just to it....is going to give you the most gains.

 

[steveespo]

Guys
I am really puzzled about the overheating issues on the Boss cars. Scott are you at high altitude? As you know my Coyote based clone car runs all boss intake and oil/water cooling system, Boss grille with the Gary mod, Steeda CAI, Brenspeed 93 octane tune and now ARH full length headers with catted x pipe. Haven't dyno'd with headers but before in June car made 407 rwhp and 359 ft lbs torque. I told Ron (Roketman) at Lime Rock that removing the foam injector/intake valley covers would help cooling as they are there so you don't hear injector tick and piston slap etc.
Ron said he wasn't having heating trouble and didn't think it would help, I disagree as airflow and just radiated heat from the center valley has to help cooling at least a little. I ran 7 HPDE this season with ambient temps running from 50 degrees in April to 92 degrees in July and my car never ran hotter than 214 degrees (Watkins Glen July). I am usually at 195 on track, run Motorcraft coolant, Mocool water additive from Motul, Mobil 1 0W-40 Euro Formula oil and a 7400 rpm redline. My temps are sourced from an Auto Meter Ultra lite gauge with tell tale with the sender mounted in the drivers side front freeze plug, consider it very accurate. Has anyone gotten any feedback from Ford about why the Road Runner runs so hot other than grille restriction. It seems that Ford has tried to address this on the '13 with the ugly Shelby nose and the nice hood vents. We know Gary has the S hood on, I also will have mine on for next season looking for downforce more than cooling but getting that hot air through the engine bay up and out has to help radiator efficiency. Also Kendall and the cooltech team are hopefully still working on the air to air oil cooler system that may help take some load off of the water system. Sorry to be long winded but these technical problems really interest me and I hate that you guys are having this issue.
Steve

Just as an aside that I thought of, the Track key programming is said to really lean out A/F ratios at higher rpm, don't know if that is rumor or backed up by wide band O2 data but my Coyote likes to be fat up top 12.3:1 or so. Lean mixtures at high rpm is a recipe for high cylinder head temps, detonation and ring/piston damage.
Steve

 

[BLAZN BOSS]

I can't contribute on the cooling problem cause i don't track my car but you stated something that i question. The foam quiets "piston slap"?..........Is that what you really ment to say?............

 

[VoodooBoss]

Im with Smitty.....dont think there is much to gain on the grill mods....how fast and easily the air flows through the radiator (i.e.vented hood) .....not just to it....is going to give you the most gains.

You should experiment for us then. Buy the hood and run the stock grill and see how that works.

Not sure why there's any doubt here. It's already been proven by Ford and many owners that the first step in getting the cars to run cooler is to get more air into the radiator hence this thread.

Steve, while I'm new to the CHT used on the Coyote and Roadrunner engines I would think the CHT would read higher than the water temp so I question if they are an apples to apples comparison. And isn't the CHT a more accurate indication of how hot the engine is compared to water temp?

 

[cloud9]

Im with Smitty.....dont think there is much to gain on the grill mods....how fast and easily the air flows through the radiator (i.e.vented hood) .....not just to it....is going to give you the most gains.

Just one question for you then. How do you explain the 25 degree drop in ECT (CHT) by simply removing the factory grille? Several of us with temp gauges have done this and all have had the same results.

 

[cloud9]

Guys
I am really puzzled about the overheating issues on the Boss cars. Scott are you at high altitude? As you know my Coyote based clone car runs all boss intake and oil/water cooling system, Boss grille with the Gary mod, Steeda CAI, Brenspeed 93 octane tune and now ARH full length headers with catted x pipe. Haven't dyno'd with headers but before in June car made 407 rwhp and 359 ft lbs torque. I told Ron (Roketman) at Lime Rock that removing the foam injector/intake valley covers would help cooling as they are there so you don't hear injector tick and piston slap etc.
Ron said he wasn't having heating trouble and didn't think it would help, I disagree as airflow and just radiated heat from the center valley has to help cooling at least a little. I ran 7 HPDE this season with ambient temps running from 50 degrees in April to 92 degrees in July and my car never ran hotter than 214 degrees (Watkins Glen July). I am usually at 195 on track, run Motorcraft coolant, Mocool water additive from Motul, Mobil 1 0W-40 Euro Formula oil and a 7400 rpm redline. My temps are sourced from an Auto Meter Ultra lite gauge with tell tale with the sender mounted in the drivers side front freeze plug, consider it very accurate. Has anyone gotten any feedback from Ford about why the Road Runner runs so hot other than grille restriction. It seems that Ford has tried to address this on the '13 with the ugly Shelby nose and the nice hood vents. We know Gary has the S hood on, I also will have mine on for next season looking for downforce more than cooling but getting that hot air through the engine bay up and out has to help radiator efficiency. Also Kendall and the cooltech team are hopefully still working on the air to air oil cooler system that may help take some load off of the water system. Sorry to be long winded but these technical problems really interest me and I hate that you guys are having this issue.
Steve

Just as an aside that I thought of, the Track key programming is said to really lean out A/F ratios at higher rpm, don't know if that is rumor or backed up by wide band O2 data but my Coyote likes to be fat up top 12.3:1 or so. Lean mixtures at high rpm is a recipe for high cylinder head temps, detonation and ring/piston damage.
Steve

Altitude has definitely been shown to impact it. The MMP cars and our friends in CO are having the biggest issues. I have more trouble at MPH and MAM (1650 ft) than I do at BIR (1100 ft) in the same ambient temps. Driving style is also a huge factor. Guys that are out pushing, but not to the edge are not having as much of an issue as guys that drive with their hair on fire (like me) trying to improve their best lap time by another tenth.

Ford clearly recognized the issue by modifying the '13 as indicated above. They also updated the track prep supplement advising owners to remove their grille if they are experiencing high engine temps.

As far as TK leaning out, I'm not aware of any data on that. My dyno charts didn't indicate any notable differences in peak hp,tq or a/f. I think the factory calibrations are already aggressive (thank you Ford!) and I doubt they were going to push TK too much further and still maintain warranty.

Wouldn't your long tubes help lower engine temps by freeing up the flow of exhaust gases?

 

[steveespo]

I can't contribute on the cooling problem cause i don't track my car but you stated something that i question. The foam quiets "piston slap"?..........Is that what you really ment to say?............

Maybe piston slap is too strong of a description, but there are many mechanical noises on any engine that are normal but consumers find objectionable and the NVH guys try their hardest to stop. Thats the reason for the foam, injector ticking, VCT cycling, A/C compressor cycling, cam chain slap, and yes piston skirt slap (forged pistons more so than hypereutectic) are all normal engine noises that come and go based on temperature, rpm and load on the engine.

As far as Cylinder head temp vs engine coolant temp they should be very close, I do have to check the Coyote/RoadRunner to be sure, but most engines circulate coolant to the cylinder heads first to absorb as much heat as possible from the combustion chamber, specifically the exhaust valve side and then flow down around the cylinder jackets and back to the radiator, the hottest flowing coolant should be after the heads. Now I don't know where Ford has their coolant sensor so maybe someone can show us, I know plenty of forum members in the Mustang community that have been looking for places to tap for after market gauges. I am guessing Gary and Pete in CT are getting their readings form an Aeroforce or the the LS gauge pod which both get data from the ECU. My concern with the high coolant temps is Oil temperature as well, 225-235 for oil is okay with synthetics as modern engines do well controlling ring seal at this range, but at 250 the oil starts to shear down and accelerate the breakdown of the additives and viscosity. High RPM makes this process worse and that is why I will go only 2 track hours on my oil plus the travel milage back and forth to Lime Rock about 600 miles. (Have to get a Blackstone analysis done). I am changing my pan to the Boss pan which I welded a temp port in for an engine oil temp gauge, will have that done as part of 'winter mods'.

I do have the hood coming, but once again that is an extreme solution(partial) to this issue for most people but looking at that wind tunnel video it has to help, this is exactly the configuration that the GT40's and Daytona Coupes' have had since 1964 and it does add down force as well. This really is a tough topic to bring to Ford as they have no warranty obligation to correct if this doesn't happen on the street. Imagine talking to the service advisor and telling him that the car goes into limp mode after I run it at 6500-7500 rpm for 20 minutes. He'll say "let's try and replicate it on a test drive, oh 7500 rpm is 15 mile per hour above the speed limit in 1st gear on local streets and 15 over in 2nd gear so we couldn't make it happen" being a wiseguy but you know what I mean. So it is up to us track rats to figure it out to help each other.
Will keep pushing my car to the normally aspirated limit and keep you posted.
Steve

 

[steveespo]

Gary,
You are right about the grille, I can't argue that but personally I really love the Boss grille look and hate to see us have to butcher the car to solve this. (The Roush guys do run their grille on the Grand Am car though right?) As far as air/fuel ratio with TK, I saw a post on TMS forum referencing leaner mixture than with black key. May or may not be true, your dyno graph is the best info for your tuning. Altitude definitely has an impact, my high altitude track was Monticello Motor Park at 900 ft., it was in October and was 65 degrees so no doomsday scenario there.

Per my last post do you know where Ford picks up coolant temp from? Also the coolant flow direction in the engine? I think 5.0 magazine had a cutaway with blue to orange to red arrows showing the flow in the article they did on the 5.0 and Boss engines, will look for it.

I like you push hard every lap, although I am running PZeros vs your Hoosiers so you probably carry a little more RPM a little longer each lap, but I don't know how much that would impact it.
The long tubes should have a positive cooling effect as they do get the gases out faster and they have more surface area to radiate the heat away from the heads, also even though catted, the cats are 14" farther away from the engine which has to help. I haven't tracked the car with them yet since I just finished them 2 weeks ago but will report dyno and peak speed changes from my last year events.
Steve

 

[cloud9]

Gary,
You are right about the grille, I can't argue that but personally I really love the Boss grille look and hate to see us have to butcher the car to solve this. (The Roush guys do run their grille on the Grand Am car though right?) As far as air/fuel ratio with TK, I saw a post on TMS forum referencing leaner mixture than with black key. May or may not be true, your dyno graph is the best info for your tuning. Altitude definitely has an impact, my high altitude track was Monticello Motor Park at 900 ft., it was in October and was 65 degrees so no doomsday scenario there.

Per my last post do you know where Ford picks up coolant temp from? Also the coolant flow direction in the engine? I think 5.0 magazine had a cutaway with blue to orange to red arrows showing the flow in the article they did on the 5.0 and Boss engines, will look for it.

I like you push hard every lap, although I am running PZeros vs your Hoosiers so you probably carry a little more RPM a little longer each lap, but I don't know how much that would impact it.
The long tubes should have a positive cooling effect as they do get the gases out faster and they have more surface area to radiate the heat away from the heads, also even though catted, the cats are 14" farther away from the engine which has to help. I haven't tracked the car with them yet since I just finished them 2 weeks ago but will report dyno and peak speed changes from my last year events.
Steve

I agree on preferring the Boss grille "look" which is why I kept the 302S grille and added the Tiger Hood to hopefully solve the problem. The Roush billet grille has been proven to work as effectively as removing the grille completely as proven by my friend in his 5.0 and Drew (ArizonaGT) in his Boss. For whatever reason, it flows better than the Boss grille with the larger plastic bars even with more room between them than the billet.

You are correct I'm using the Aeroforce gauge to read ECT. Talking to Ford it sounds like it's really reading CHT and there's some discussion on whether it reads high relative to ECT or not. That said, if it does, it doesn't explain the time I went into limp mode at 250+ CHT and on a few occasions boiled the rerservoir to the brim. I've also popped the rad cap at least once, although without significant fluid expulsion. I found it doing a routine inspection. They are one time caps for anyone that doesn't know and a must have spare part at the track. They're $8 from my dealer.

The temp drops by removing the grille are consistent regardless of whether it's measuring CHT or true ECT. A friend of mine who also has the Aeroforce gauge, installed a water temp gauge in the heater block port so you should be able to use that. He found ECT tracked very close to CHT with those gauges. He also had a consistent drop from the mid 240sF down to the 220s with the Roush billet grille under track conditions. It looks really good on his car in black being a grabber blue GT.

 

[steveespo]

Thanks Gary
I was mistaken about the TK programming leaning the car out, it richens the mixture. See this post by 06 GT; http://forums.themustangsource.com/f813/black-key-vs-trackey-dyno-comparison-501949/

I do have my coolant gauge in the freeze plug location that ford uses for the block heater tracks pretty true to the display given when you set the info screen into engineering mode, +/- 3 degrees.
Hopefully you will solve the issue and enjoy the season.
Steve

 

[cloud9]

Thanks Gary
I was mistaken about the TK programming leaning the car out, it richens the mixture. See this post by 06 GT; http://forums.themustangsource.com/f813/black-key-vs-trackey-dyno-comparison-501949/

I do have my coolant gauge in the freeze plug location that ford uses for the block heater tracks pretty true to the display given when you set the info screen into engineering mode, +/- 3 degrees.
Hopefully you will solve the issue and enjoy the season.
Steve

Thanks Steve. I don't want to overplay this issue. I ran 18 track days last year in the Boss, and since on the worst days I could pull my grille and keep running, it wasn't a show stopper. I have been nothing but blown away by what Ford gave us and you made a really good point that it's something us track rats only encounter because we're pushing the car to the limit. I am 99% confident the hood is going to give me the extra little bit of cooling help to make this a non-issue for me. It's not like I'm that far from having it solved. It's really just at the edge of being a problem.