The bell housing coolers look neat... but have any of you guys seen how they work?... they are a wet plate type cooler... very efficient.... but... too easy to fill with crap.... the plates are thin and you can't get between them to clean... with the tube type ...they can be removed and cleaned out... can't do that with the plate type.

I was thinking the bell housing coolers would be a pain in the butt to get to. I have thru hull pickups, to a strainer, then the raw water pump then the bell housing coolers, then into the block. Maybe the strainers keep them from getting garbage on the fins. He seemed very sure I did not need the extra coolers and that the bell housing ones would work fine.

I'm running PSI supercharged 572 c.i. 1100 hp. motors in a 1984 38' Cigarette. I'm using a 1.5" water p.u. into my strainer and then into an Eikert 3 stage water pump.
I feed 1 stage of the pump directly to the bottom of one side of the factory dual-cooler bellhousing which exits on the top into an in-line P.S. cooler, then to the inlet of the block where the stock water pump would have been. Water exits the intake manifold, on that side, and dumps into the bottom of the headers, then out thru the tailpipes. I do the same with the 2nd stage of the pump to the other bellhousing cooler, etc. foreward. Both motors have an inline transmission cooler downstream from the outlet of the "stock" oil filter side bellhousing cooler.
The 3rd. stage feeds the innercooler. To make a short story-long, I'm using both factory bellhousing coolers to cool engine oil, in series, ( plumbed with a Mercury thermostatically controled oil filter ).
I have run this system for 3 seasons with absolutely no problems. The highest oil temp. that I've seen is 230 degrees on a 20 min. 4000-5000 rpm run.

Here's where mine are going. It's a work in progress. Copied from another OSOer. I want to have access to them. Using the two holes in the back of the heads and cast iron pipe clamps. Will line the coolers with foam strips at the clamps for shock absorption. PS/oil cooler is a ditto.

Dave

Thanks for the feedback guys. Alot of good ideas and recommendations. I think I'm going to mount the coolers behind the engines as well. I've got a TIG welder, metal cutting band saw, drill press, etc in my garage so fabbing something out of aluminum or stainless is no problem, I just need to figure out what I need to do. My engines are getting installed within the next week or so, so I need to figure it out soon. I bought the coolers and billet mounting brackets from Eddie Marine. I'll probably need to wait until the engines are in place to figure out how much room I've got to work with.