Scirocco-Heaven: New Radiator for Scirocco

Tuesday 7 July 2015

New Radiator for Scirocco

One day I looked under the bonnet to discover I had no water, "hmmm, that's not ideal"

It didn't take long to track down the culprit, I found water spewing out from the radiator and when I pulled it out to inspect further I could see it was past its best.

"bugger" I thought, a new radiator is going to cost me bomb? Well yet again the rocco was about to surprise me with its well priced spares. A brand new radiator on eBay for only £20 plus delivery!

While I was at it, I changed the fan switch which screws into the rad itself. I would recommend changing your thermostat as well, assuming it hasn't been done recently.

The new rad looks lovely, and after cleaning the fan cover I was ready to re-install. I had a little trouble getting a water tight seal between the bottom rad hose and the right angled flange on the water pump but I got there in the end.

Not only dose it look better but cooling has improved dramatically, before, the temp gauge would run over 3/4 now it never really goes past the half way point.

Another thing you could change while the water is out is the temperature gauge sensor which is on the underside of the big water hose/flange coming from the block at the front. Its cheap enough and is easy to fit, the aftermarket ones are a slightly different size but come with a new o-ring. I used some instant gasket aswell, just to be safe.

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The Scirocco Heaven Blog is under construction

This is my Scirocco GT, I took this photo not long after buyer her, you can see my Escort Si behind.

After searching online for a rocco for what seemed like ages, I found one just round the corner from my Nans house. It looked green in the photos and I could see it had been in the wars. The passenger wing had suffered a hit and 180k on the clock was putting me off.

£750 the guy wanted, got him down to £400 but still had to think about it for a couple weeks. In the end I went against my better judgment and bought it. My head was telling me "no" but I was like a kid in a sweet shop, I couldn't wait, I wanted to get stuck in to world of rocco.

At first I couldn't decide if I liked the car or not. It felt so antiquated, the gear stick was like a spoon in a bowl of custard, the engine was in a bad way, oil was on the manifold which smoked. The lifters were making so much noise, the carb was drowning in oil. One rear brake cylinder was dropping fluid all over the place.

Dam, this thing was starting to look like a real pain in the arse. I thought it was meant to be, round the corner from my nans when others were 100s of miles away. Dam it!

There were some good points though, the dash hadn't cracked and the clock was working fine, yes that's all. Oh, I liked the colour, Helios Blue.

I decided I would give the rocco a go and went to scap my Escort, at the breakers while filling in the forms, I mentioned the rocco and was told the guy had just got one in. My luck was starting to look up! I found a silver scala with 1.8 EX engine, set of alloys with 3 new tyres, loads of bits.

Finally it was starting to look like it was meant to be, even the alloy wheels were blue, although they had been painted silver.

Ever since, I've been working on the old girl, with ups and downs but on a sunny day on a country road the love is there, the rocco is the only car I want.