MTFCA Forum

My '15 radiator rod receiver has been slightly bent upwards from a previous owner, and before I do anything I wanted to ask the pros about strength of this part? What is the best way to bent this down ever so slightly to accept the radiator rod without sripping nor doing damage, or breaking the solder?

In the pic it looks almost straight, but it is indeed bent upwards a little.

Thanks,
Jim

There are no guarantees in life...
But if it were mine, I would find a bolt 6" long, thereabouts and gently push down on the bolt while tapping with a rubber mallet, just below the mount.
Good luck

Short answer is there should be enough strength there to allow for a little movement. The rod on my 14 needed a little "adjustment" also, but I decided to try a combination process. After bending the threaded boss a bit and getting it closer to right, I then adjusted mostly the rod itself Be sure to keep checking hood alignment and fit during the process. As you tighten things up you will notice the gap between hood and radiator or will change.
Terry

The original receivers were an iron casting. There is a chance it may have rusted thin, and a chance of it breaking if levering is somewhat enthusiastically. Reproduction radiators/parts I have seen are brass castings and will be more resilient to being bent around. Properly installed, you are more likely to distort the brasswork in the tank than bend the cast receiver. Either way, that washer/plate around the back of the receiver may end up with a cracked solder joint. It's an easy fix once you have the receiver aligned.

Allan from down under.

Allan, the radiator is a reproduction from Brassworks.

I may get pummeled for this...but here goes...

Been there done that on a bunch of ways

First time I tried nudging the threaded hole a bit and split an otherwise 'good enough' radiator...so was able to buy one from a guy in St. Charles Il junk pile for 25 bucks that looked good...but was still a little bent....grrr.

So for that one, I left the firewall nut loose, and warped the rod with each half turn until the hood set good and only then tightented up the firewall. No problem, for about 15 years and then when I went to take that apart the rod thread had apparently fretted against the sleeve thread and the sleeve coupling wanted to turn with they rod even after using good mojo juice...so put a small pipe wrench with a cheater on it and vice grips on the rod. On;y thing that got me was a sheared rod thread at the coupling edge...


Then I bought a car that had a honeycomb in place with a really wierd rod mounting. Didn't look like the honeycomb had been reworked so presummed that this rod came with the honeycomb. Decided to change that one out for a new Bergs radiator and while nothing wrong with the Bergs the rod was now too short. So not having one around sent for a new repo and it came in long, too long and I didn't have a die that fit. Thought I could horse it together, but the radiator mount was a pad type, not spring thimbles and that turned difficult...


Sooo...in desperation, I had an idea to get through this as the Hack was going to be a runner and was made up of many year parts I didn't care about purity and not a trailer queen. I'd take the rod and the 'clip' from the honeycomb..and use it with the Bergs! It not only got me through, it was the simplest 'hack' ever to get things parallel and true. I'm not close enough for pix...but here is a sketch. Like I said, it does make hood alignment a breeze...maybe a good aftermarket option...lol

One way to get the correct alignment between the radiator and firewall is to elongate the hole in the firewall. Unless the alignment is really far off you you could elongate the hole either up or down to get it to line up. I did that to my 21 Touring with a recorded radiator.
You can’t tell that the firewall was elongated downward.
It works OK and the rod I’d straight.

See, this is what I mean when I tell folks that half the battle with Model T's the support and creative help from other owners- thanks to all for the superb ideas and support!

You guys are the best!
Thanks,
Jim