Radiator and charge air cooler replacement

[8Birds]

Hi Gang. Up in Junction City getting some work done at Kevin Waite’s shop. Kevin says that I should consider replacing the radiator and charge air cooler. It's a mater of time.

My radiator, charge air cooler failure questions for the world are —

1) About how long do radiators and charge air coolers last?

2) How do they normally fail? Two units together? Catastrophic blowouts? Slow-to-larger leaks that can be seen?

3) Can radiator and charge air coolers be accurately monitored for failure? And if so, where to failures most often appear? Edges? Centers? Top? Bottom?All over?

4) Is there a fix or workaround emergency repair possible for a radiator, and if so, what are these?

5) I have a 2005 CC Allure 470 with 98K miles from FL. Have spent about 35-large on repairs this year and may have another 10K to go. Be happy to share my thoughts on any of the following repairs done to my coach. Email me.

• Air-bag replacement, how to avoid price rip-offs.

• Front wheel bearing replacement, what to watch for.

• Slide-out leaks and rebuilding/refinishing alternatives.

• Dash A/C repair, what not to do.

• Hydro-Hot System. Wonderful! How and what it does.

• Power cord replacement on a Glendenning “Cablemaster RLC” RV Power Cable Storage System. Easy, reasonable, but the newer cable is just as difficult to retract. What a poor machine.

• Opinion on glass balance-beads in tires. They work no matter what.

• Opinion on Toyo 295/80 r22.5 tires. Excellent.

• New Batteries: Lifeline House Batteries, Omega start batteries. Found good, reliable, small Lifeline place in TX that ships, no tax. Try Amazon for the Omega batteries. Replacements are a breeze thru Amazon Prime!

• Repair shop to avoid like a coral reef…Fountain RV.

• Replacement of the HWH electronic module. What to know. If you own a CC, HWH affects your life big-time.

• Replacement of washer/dryer. Easy.

• Main sofa removal. Not easy. What to do.

• Oil changes, engine and gen service. Get this done at Cummins or a truck center. Know the cost before the change. Fountain RV charged me $1,200 for an annual $450 engine/gen service.

• Key to finding parts for CC: part numbers & Internet.

• LED interior lamp replacement.

• How good is winter living in a CC? Comfy at 20° but sadly must dribble water all night to keep my large softener, filter and waterlines from icing. The Hydro-Hot hot water system works great. Simple. Effective. But consumes diesel.

Thanks, guys. I look forward to your feedback. This is a wonderful site! If I overlooked anything in your old files on the question of useful lives and replacement of radiator and charge air cooling system replacements, I'd appreciate knowing how to view these posts.

Fast, smooth, truck-free, and pretty, roads for all.

[2 Stroker]

Kevin Waite great guy. I have never been to his shop but have ordered parts from him.
I got my coach on consignment at Country Coach 5 years ago and it already had a new radiator, Copper-Brass & Steel and it came from https://radiatorsupplyhouse.com/products/motorhomes-rv/
installed at Quinn Cat in California with only 14,000mi on it. From the paper work it just started leaking, bad for them good for me. That saved me $5400 plus they did a coolant flush and installed Cat EC-1 coolant. Just sent a sample into Peterson Cat and said it is good.
2 stroker

[phays]

CAC leaking can be detected if you monitor your boost pressure while driving up hills where the added boost is needed to help you get over the top. If you don't have a boost gage consider a Silver Leaf VMSpc setup. You can monitor lots of engine parameters with the VMSpc.

My CAC was leaking when I purchased the coach and would only generate about 8 or 9 psi. The engine as tested by CAT is capable of 26 psi boost with a good CAC. I run the Silver Leaf VMSpc on my coach and and after replacing the CAC I now see boost pressures up near 26 psi.

[smlranger]

IMO, all radiators eventually leak. Age finally takes its toll. My 2007 Allure has one of the original suspect radiators but it is still holding up. I have 74K miles and I may be proactive and do the radiator/CAC replacement in the next year or so. Kevin told me 3 years ago to expect to pay $5,000 - $8,000 for the job. Fortunately I have a local shop who can do the work.

As for the sofa/s, we had Countryside RV Interiors replace both of our sofas when we were in Junction City 4 years ago. We replaced the sleeper sofa (the one with the inflatable mattress) with a nice leather reclining theater love seat. We replaced the granny fabric covered jack knife sofa with a Flexsteel ultra leather jack knife sofa. Countryside did the work in about half a day.

These are surely expensive beasts to keep. I will likely be needing to replace my house batteries (I have six AGM Full River GC224's) in the coming year. I think my DPF is getting clogged so it may need to be replaced (north of $2,600) plus labor.

[pumper9x9]

If you have one of the funky radiators and you're out in the middle of no where with antifreeze all over the ground and your engine overheating you'll be saying "Why didn't I listen to Kevin?" You may also have your DW standing there putting in her $.02 worth, repeatedly. After 8 yrs of "Most Timing" (10-11 months/yr) I've found the following to be true. If you're still RVing you're just between breakdowns. The corollary to that is, When it does break, it will be on a Friday afternoon before a holiday weekend in a place where they can't even spell RV.

[mike brez]

What would you not do to your dash a/c? Mine was working the stopped I was going to look into it once the weather breaks.

[Fredward]

I highly recommend Kevin in terms of responsiveness and helpful getting parts and knowledgeable about the CC rigs. I've never had him do any work for me because I live in Minnesota.

When we bought our used 2000 Magna it only built 8-9 psi making around 330 HP. OK for flat land but no good for any hills. Our CAC had a huge crack visible looking through the grill. All side radiator CC's of that vintage are prone to cracked CAC because of how they were built at the time. Kevin sourced a new one built in a different way that shouldn't ever crack. He was less expensive than ordering from CC in JC. I installed it myself and now it will build 25ish psi and 393 HP and 1400 ft lbs of torque. Huge difference on hills and mountain passes.

Still have the original radiator. I inspected it and blew it out with the pressure washer when I changed the CAC. Engine never runs over 204 degrees. It will need to be repaired/replaced one of these days but in my experience, most radiator failures are not catastrophic but rather they start leaking and pretty soon you have a real mess. On an earlier coach we had a leaky radiator and we would just stop and fill it back up from the onboard fresh water tank. I removed and had it rebuilt when we got home.

Fred

[DOGHOUSE26]

I just replaced the CAC in my 2006 36' Inspire with the C-9 Cat along with my Boost Sensor as there were intermittent drops in my boost pressure which grew more frequent over the past year. Towing my JK up steep California grades I would see my boost pressure get locked on 12.5 pounds going up or down the grade which would cause the transmission to drop to a lower gear than normal then bounce back up as high as 31 pounds on the next grade and charge right up the hill. I'm curious as to what you all are paying for your replacement Charge Air Coolers. They said mine came from the Country Coach factory at a cost of $3275. I have a little over 50,000 miles on my coach now; the previous owner replaced the original cracked radiator after one year @ 7,000 miles. When I bought the coach @ 9,000 miles I had to replace the fan controller on my first trip but haven't had a cooling problem since. We just replaced the original coolant with the Caterpillar EC-1 Coolant so hopefully I'll be set for awhile.

[BRex45]

I did not know that Kevin Waite had his own shop. Were you at Brian Schack's shop on Noraton Road?

Both are good guys and Brian is a good steady worker with lots of tech training in his head.

[walt2137]

A few yrs a go i was washing my CAC and radiator on our Dynasty (side radiator) and started the coach up to warm it up to pull the soap into the CAC and radiator with the coach idling on fast idle i noticed bubles at the end tanks of CAC. MY son and i pulled the CAC out of the coach ( in about 2 hrs) without removing the radiator and had it re cored at a truck radiator shop that had good ratings for under $1000 reinstall in a little over 1 hr.
I would think a good radiator shop should be able to handle both jobs a lot cheaper than new and proble a better radiator and CAC. That radiator will be a bear to remove , extreamly heavy.

[Fredward]

I figured I could get my CAC repaired also but then did a little more research and learned that the Country Coachs with side radiators in the 2000 vintage used a CAC design that failed regularly because of the twisting that takes place in that location. So I figured if I went to the trouble of removing it and repairing it only to have it fail again sometime I might as well get a new one. And Kevin Waite sourced the new one from a place in Junction City that makes new and improved CACs that are built differently and less prone to cracking.

It was a lot of money but I didn’t want to have to do that project again and I didn’t want it to fail in the middle of and Epic trip.

Fred