oil cooler question

[tmontague]

Quick question that I couldn't find answered anywhere on the internet.

How does an aftermarket oil cooler have oil flow through it if a sandwich plate is use to access the oil?

Both holes in the adapter would be equal pressure so would the oil not just fill the oil cooler and then stay stationary? From my understanding one side would have to have higher pressure then the other for the oil to continuously flow through and for it to be effective.

[nortonfb]

A different diameter hole will effect pressure. I'm not sure how oil coolers work.
At one time I did pressure testing, trouble shooting for regulators using propane and methane. The pressure may not make a functional difference if the volume
is close.
Maybe one of the ME's can shed some light on this.

[invader166]

Interesting...i never studied much about these sandwich plates...

However, to answer your question, tmontague, it's important to understand what pressure is to begin with. This is something that many people don't seem to understand all that well. Pressure is nothing more than resistance to flow!

Whenever a fluid travels through a hose or a pipe, there is an inherent resistance to its flow, because of the friction that's created when the fluid contacts the inner walls of the tube or pipe, the force of gravity, and other forces that are at work.

Pressure and flow are directly related to each other. If you were to increase the flow rate of a fluid through a pipe or tube, you'll notice that the pressure will also increase. Likewise if you reduce the flow, you'll have lower pressure. Just like horsepower cannot exist without torque, neither can pressure exist without flow.

You heard right. Normally, the oil cooler inlet pressure would be higher than the outlet, because of the resistance created by the oil cooler. In your case you mentioned however, if the inlet and outlet pressures of the cooler are the same, that means there is still oil flowing through the cooler, but the cooler has a very small internal resistance, which is not good since the less time the oil spends in the cooler, the less it will be cooled.

nortonfb is also right in saying that a different diameter hole will affect pressure because the larger diameter would reduce the resistance to flow.

Hope that clears things up a bit. :smile:

[tmontague]

thanks for the responses.

I definitely have a thorough understanding of fluid dynamics in relation to pressure and resistance. My question was more aimed at the oil going back into the sandwich plate from the aftermarket oil cooler.

The sandwich plate will have oil at a specific pressure based on engine rpm's. So the oil will enter into the oil cooler through the line that come from the sandwich plate due to the pressure of the oil in that plate. But when the oil fills the cooler and then comes back on the return line it will meet oil in the plate of the same pressure.

How does this not lead to the oil then staying stationary and therefore not circulating from the cooler back into the sandwich plate? The only thing I can think of is what norton said and that was that one of the holes in the plate is purposely smaller diameter and would therefore be labelled as a specific direction (likely exit point from plate)

However, even with one of the holes being slightly smaller and therefore increasing the resistance and pressure the return oil from the cooler is meeting oil in the plate that is propelled under the same pressure originally.

I'm sure the answer is fairly simple but it doesn't seem to be adding up.