I have an R53 that is in dire need of more radiator room due to an engine swap. It LOOKS like I can bolt in the bumper/core support/hood from an R56 and gain significant cooling stack room. Has anyone done this before or do I get to forge new ground?

 

Please don’t. Headlights are mounted differently, a lot will have to change. What / where is the challenge you are facing. Need more detail and maybe pics.

 

The core support and headlights look like it's just going to be a couple brackets. I've already made a few brackets for this car for the engine swap.

The more I look at it, the cowl is going to be the hard part. The R53 has one and the R56 doesn't. The hood hinges are also different but that is easily dealt with.

If I space the R53 nose a little forward and cut out most of the bumper support, it looks like I can fit a 24x12" intercooler heat exchanger but it'd be nice if I can put the radiator up front too.

 

Um, nope...

 

Intercooler / turbo? Old days - Volvo 240 intercooler add on - between the Rad, and AC condenser- radiator moved closer to engine. It’s tight, but maybe ? How much depth do you need for the intercooler

 

Oh, the R53 radiator fan would be halfway into the timing belt. The original plan was a rear mounted radiator until I found that the whole R56 cooling stack sits in front of the bumper support mounts on the body, which is about where the front of the engine is. I'd rather do that than try to make a rear firewall around the roll cage.


I did say that it's an engine swap... and that I am okay with making brackets.

 

It can be done.

 

That looks like just the bumper skin, not the hood, core support, and bumper beam, though. The hood is key because, like the difference between an early and late ACVW, the hood bulges up a lot higher and forward. The alternator in this... thing... is about the same place as the turbo on an R56.

I can MAKE a 12x24 rad from Frozenboost fit in the bumper, if I cut two inches out of the radiator's height, but that still leaves having to make a rear firewall for a radiator, and if I am going to do that, I may as well run the heat exchanger radiator back there too.

 

Ah - I see better now. Is this a street car? How about moving the bumper out - making room. 12 x 24 might fit behind the bumper?

 

Yes, the retrofit bumper skin in the video above is a custom fiberglass piece to give a 1st gen the look a 2nd gen JCW. It was made by rkde with the chopped turbo R53 and is available on the Orranje website.

https://orranje.co.uk/shop-by-car/bm...mper-r56-style

https://www.northamericanmotoring.co...chop-mini.html

 

Definitely not a street car. It was destined for scrap after passing through multiple people, and all of its good suspension and drivetrain parts have found new homes to keep other R53s happy and mobile. The drivetrain and suspension donor was an extremely rusted out wreck and the only good parts we didn't use were the dealer-fitted boost gauge, and the under seat subwoofer.

But one overarching concern is that it should ideally look as unassuming as possible. Until you start it and you hear the (godawful, but eh) boxer rumble with a rotational idle. There are also some regulations we need to adhere to with respect to things like keeping the occupant(s) separated from hot fluids, and I personally have a certain aesthetic standard. Which is why I am proud that I was able to run the complete 3" turbo to tailpipe exhaust system both under the car to the bumper, and kept above the floor height so that it doesn't ever drag on anything. I hate side exhausts and through-hood exhausts are just lazy

A 12x24 will fit... but then I realized that the exchanger I wanted to use has its tanks top and bottom, so it is actually 14" tall, won't fit inside the bumper skin, and I can't shorten it.

Moving the bumper forward would have to happen regardless, as the curvature of the bumper means that a 24" wide unit would only leave three inches of depth and I need four, minimum. The photo angles are always poor but the forwardmost point is not the harmonic damper but the exhaust pipe. I have some long 8mm joiner nuts on order that I'll cut on the lathe to make deeply shanked nuts, since the studs on the body are not very long and they appear to have been friction-welded in place. I don't want to deal with trying to put something longer there.

 

Thanks for the links.