Radiator woes

The radiator on my bike started leaking last week. Took it off and to a
repair shop. They fixed it with sort sort of resin, cleaned it, tested it
and charged me £15. This I thought was pretty reasonable until it started to
leak again after about ten miles.

Question is, is it worth getting them to have another go at it. What I
looking for here is stories of people who have had radiators fixed which
then lasted another 100k.

 

A proper radiator specialist will make you one up from scratch for a
fraction of the HonYamSuzKaw price.

--

Dave

GS 850 x2 / SE 6a
SbS#6 DIAABTCOD#16 APOSTLE#6 FUB#3
FUB KotL OSOS#12? UKRMMA#19

 

Two years ago this lot

Radicool Fabrications
6 Barrington Court
Ward Rd
Buckingham Rd Ind Est
Brackley
Northamptonshire
NN13 7LE
Tel: 01280 701350

fixed a leak on the SO's CB500 and it hasn't leaked yet. They were
recommended by MacSport

As an aside: When they showed me around their premises they had some
pretty flashy looking rads for a Jaguar (XK8 IIRC).

 

Serck are good. They can recore radiators, used to be part of Unipart
IIRC

http://www.serckservices.co.uk/contactus.htm#

 

I've no doubt there are specialist radiator makers who have become known
for custom builds among the rally/race car/bike folk but you would, of
course, pay something like the 5/4ths you mention.

I'm thinking along the lines of the small radiator builder who will
quite happily knock up a small radiator for a small amount of small
money. Smallishly.

--

Dave

GS 850 x2 / SE 6a
SbS#6 DIAABTCOD#16 APOSTLE#6 FUB#3
FUB KotL OSOS#12? UKRMMA#19

 

You're obviously better informed than me. The only radiators I've
seen made in the UK have been for race bikes, and have cost 6~700 quid
minimum. Given that the only difference between a standard one and a
race one is size (ok, the shape might be a bit more complex), I can't
see how even a pattern to the original can be handmade for much less
than that.

 

Serck Canterbury did a re build for me at silly small money.
A rad for a Rover SD1 German spec auto. New and exchange was silly large
money. The guy at Serck just "disassembled" it in front of me, pulled
the offending bits out, reassembled it and pressure tested the thing in
less than 30 minutes.

They had cores and header tanks and bases to make up anything.

 

Thanks for the replies. Took it back to the shop today. Guy in charge
reckoned previous repair was a bodge job and it needed the "baked on resin".
Picking it up again tomorrow.

 

It really pays to shop around in the radiator market. Some race folk
will happily pay sponsors' money for peace of mind from a builder who
has a good name for reliability; but there are lots of other rad
builders who can do just as good a job for much less.
Not to say the unknown bloke will make a crap radiator, but he's not
known. For a road bike or car, there's simply no way I would pay
anything like 6-700 quid even for a custom rad.

--

Dave

GS 850 x2 / SE 6a
SbS#6 DIAABTCOD#16 APOSTLE#6 FUB#3
FUB KotL OSOS#12? UKRMMA#19

 

In

paid £70 for one specially built for a BMW 5 series I had years ago. Was a
lovely thing too, all brass header tanks and stuff


--
Pete M

Alfa 164 TS,
Mercedes 500 SEL,
Jaguar XJ-S 3.6

Scouse Git extraordinaire.
Liverpool, Great Britain

 

In case anyone was still worried, it seems fine now so you can all shuffle
back from the edge of your seats.