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      10-28-2014, 02:58 AM   #1
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Alekshop Oil Cooler Upgrade - Track Data Results

After spending a lot of time at the track and seeing really high oil temps on our E92 M3, we thought it's a MUST to upgrade the oil cooler as the stock one seemed really inefficient.

So we started looking into getting what was already on the market just to improve the oil cooling and reduce operating oil temperatures. A customer of ours had an oil cooler made by a company in Germany (Company A) and after seeing his temps at the track we didn't see any improvement over the stock cooler.

The next on the list was an oil cooler made by a big California company (Company B). After talking to (Company B) it seemed like they have a good product and we were assured it will reduced oil temps by ~ 20%. We ordered one, got it installed and decided to put it to test right away. During the second session at Laguna Seca race track, the car went into reduced power mode and warning was for high oil temps (nearly 300F) and the car needed to cool down before we can drive it again. By then the oil was cooked and we couldn't run anymore. So a few weeks later we decided to give it another try and hook up Solo DL for data logging to see the actual oil temps and not rely on the stock gauge which is hard to read anyways. Unfortunately we didn't see any improvement as well and oil temps were in 271F range which forced us to do cool down laps during the sessions. Not fun.

So that left us with one option - to build a cooler that will meet our specs and make a difference in oil cooling.

After taking a close look at (Company A) and (Company B) oil coolers, they had one thing in common, tall fins and the same number of oil line rows (Company A actually has one less) as the stock cooler. So we concluded this was the answer why we didn't see any improvement with these coolers over the stock one.

We decided to use a completely different core with a staggered fin design. By using this core we doubled the number of fins per row while maintaining the same distance between the fins for a perfect air flow.

Why did we want to maximize the number of the fins per oil line row? It's simple, the more fins you have the faster they can dissipate the heat from the oil lines.

Next we decided to add more oil line rows for better cooling. So we added 6 more oil line rows which came out to be 14 in total (stock is 8). We were concerned that such a tall core might impact water temps due to the heat transfer from the 6 extra oil line rows.

We also wanted to make sure our new cooler will accept factory oil lines and will bolt in the same place without making a lot of modifications to the car. After multiple test fitments, we were able to make it fit perfectly and only a bit of plastic had to be trimmed to accommodate our new cooler.

Now, the best way to find out if it works was to put it to the same test and take it to the race track and start data logging it.

The results were pretty surprising. We honestly didn't think it will make a huge difference, but we were wrong. The highest temperature that we logged that day was 239F with no negative impact on water temps. Not only that, our cooler reduced the operating oil temperature by 13% (32F), but it also maintained the same temperature during the entire section without much fluctuation. You can see in the graphs below how consistent water and oil temperatures are compared to other coolers that we used.

Below are the graphs from our testing.


Product Details:
  • Staggered fins design
  • 14 Oil line rows (stock only 8)
  • Approximately 80% larger core than stock
  • All aluminum construction
  • Engineered for maximum performance and heat transfer
  • Oil capacity increased by approximately 2qt
  • Track tested and proven 13% (32F degrees) oil temps decrease
  • 100% test rate - every single oil cooler is pressure tested
  • Lifetime warranty
  • Made in USA


Stock Oil Cooler



(Company B)



Alekshop Oil Cooler



Stock Oil Cooler



(Company B) Oil Cooler



Alekshop Oil Cooler







Alekshop Oil Cooler vs BMW Stock Oil Cooler








Note: Results may vary depending on weather conditions and driving patterns. We are using (Company A) and (Company B) abbreviations in our testing to not offend anyone with our testing results.


We really hope this new product will benefit members of m3post

Last edited by Alekshop; 10-28-2014 at 05:44 PM..
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      10-28-2014, 04:24 AM   #2
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Forgot the most important detail.... Price?
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      10-28-2014, 04:34 AM   #3
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Yeah, what's the price?

Does it require more oil? I seem to recall that company A's oil cooler requires one more litre of oil than the stock cooler...

Last edited by FazerBoy; 10-28-2014 at 04:40 AM..
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      10-28-2014, 07:05 AM   #4
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Why were you running so much slower with your cooler? Same track? What were rpms? Why did you cut off your test at 20 min? I would like to see something a little more apples to apples if possible.
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      10-28-2014, 07:08 AM   #5
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Quote:
Originally Posted by FazerBoy
Yeah, what's the price?

Does it require more oil? I seem to recall that company A's oil cooler requires one more litre of oil than the stock cooler...
Price is on his website. Yes, it will use more oil than stock. Aleks will have to answer how much.
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      10-28-2014, 07:33 AM   #6
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Quote:
Originally Posted by FazerBoy View Post
Yeah, what's the price?

Does it require more oil? I seem to recall that company A's oil cooler requires one more litre of oil than the stock cooler...
Oil capacity is increased by approximately 2qt.
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      10-28-2014, 08:11 AM   #7
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Quote:
Originally Posted by surlynkid View Post
Why were you running so much slower with your cooler? Same track? What were rpms? Why did you cut off your test at 20 min? I would like to see something a little more apples to apples if possible.
Scott,

The slower speed was due to a slower more technical track. It was a different track. The RPMs were in 8k range. Slower track tends to be harsher on the car since you don't get long high speed straights to cool it down. The sessions were a few min shorter with this club but in the first 2 graphs you can see that collected data after 19-20min mark is a cool down lap (velocity and temps are going down) where the last graph shows pretty consistent data up to the 19min mark.

I think 20min of captured data in all 3 graphs show you a decent amount of information. You can see that oil temps went above 250F right after first 5min at the track in the first 2 graphs while it's stayed below 240F in the third graph.

We surely can post RPMs if you would like.
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      10-28-2014, 08:32 AM   #8
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So what's the price? You avoided that above
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      10-28-2014, 08:41 AM   #9
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Regardless of MSRP.. You guys have a intro price or group buy on the cooler?
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      10-28-2014, 08:54 AM   #10
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Price on website is listed at $895.
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      10-28-2014, 09:20 AM   #11
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Quote:
Originally Posted by s85e90 View Post
So what's the price? You avoided that above
I didn't avoid it. We can't post pricing outside Vendor's section.
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      10-28-2014, 09:26 AM   #12
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Are any further plastic trimming modifications needed if a user has a supercharger since most require cutting anyways?

I'm definitely interested in a group buy.
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      10-28-2014, 09:34 AM   #13
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Quote:
Originally Posted by BrewRifle View Post
Are any further plastic trimming modifications needed if a user has a supercharger since most require cutting anyways?

I'm definitely interested in a group buy.
No, we fitted it on the ESS and VF supercharged cars. The fitment is very tight but it fits well.
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      10-28-2014, 09:46 AM   #14
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who's making this one for you?

Still very expensive for a small tube/fin cooler.


edit: when I mentioned you avoided it above you never addressed that you even saw the price question until you mentioned to my reply that you can't list pricing outside of teh vendor area. Sorry.
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      10-28-2014, 10:01 AM   #15
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I recently went over to Alekshop to have his oil cooler installed on my car before I went out to the Shift Sector event and then Thunderhill's 5 mile course middle of Nov. The fitment was pretty damn tight with my ESS intercooler, but no issues at all. I basically drove 150 miles to the airstrip, ran my car over and over and over again about 8 times, and immediately drove home. Basically driving anywhere from 80-90 mph on the street and up to 150mph on the airstrip, my car never really had a good break throughout almost 12 hours other than between runs. The highest oil temp I saw all day was about 226 logged by my Awron gauge. Hope this helps until I can get to the track for anyone considering it. The quality looked great and it was an easy choice for me with the blower especially given the M24 oil cooler is over double in price.
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      10-28-2014, 10:10 AM   #16
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This is a good start. Do you have the ambient temps and times for the tests? That should be in your AiM data as well.
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      10-28-2014, 10:22 AM   #17
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Quote:
Originally Posted by tlp View Post
This is a good start. Do you have the ambient temps and times for the tests? That should be in your AiM data as well.
You can find ambient temps at the bottom of each graph.

Are you interested to know when it was collected? Or lap times?
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      10-28-2014, 10:23 AM   #18
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Alekshop View Post
Scott,

The slower speed was due to a slower more technical track. It was a different track. The RPMs were in 8k range. Slower track tends to be harsher on the car since you don't get long high speed straights to cool it down. The sessions were a few min shorter with this club but in the first 2 graphs you can see that collected data after 19-20min mark is a cool down lap (velocity and temps are going down) where the last graph shows pretty consistent data up to the 19min mark.

I think 20min of captured data in all 3 graphs show you a decent amount of information. You can see that oil temps went above 250F right after first 5min at the track in the first 2 graphs while it's stayed below 240F in the third graph.

We surely can post RPMs if you would like.
What race tracks were you at for both graphs?
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      10-28-2014, 10:26 AM   #19
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Laguna Seca and Sears Point
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      10-28-2014, 10:33 AM   #20
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Quote:
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Laguna Seca and Sears Point
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      10-28-2014, 11:02 AM   #21
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Nice. This is superior to anything else currently on the market. There was another company selling an oil cooler and even their self-reported numbers were not that impressive.
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      10-28-2014, 11:16 AM   #22
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Keep up the great work Aleks!
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