Radiator
 

Hi all I (My 16 year old son) have a 1987 XJ 4.0. The radiator is leaking so I pulled it. After looking online I found them from $100 and up. I know the tanks a plastic on the cheep ones. What are the down falls of this is he going to spring a leak on the trail?
My son have very little cash and needs to keep it as close to $100 as possible. Thanks

Broccoli2

Hi try this link for some good deals...Tj
Go for the better one now so you will not be sorry later.
http://www.radiatorbarn.com/
http://www.dpgoff-road.com/site/radiators.htm

The cheap rads are made in, guess where, China!

Reason enough to try and get a quality replacement. If thats not in the cards can you fix the old unit? Have a local rad shop take a look at it and see what they say. Then you can save for a decent (CSF) 2 core all metal unit.

Virtually all modern (last 15+ years) OEM rads have plastic tanks and aluminum cores.......plastic must not be too bad. Stay away from any all metal replacement rads that use epoxy to attach the tanks/cores.

$100 will get you a budget OEM style radiator.

They aren't the best of quality, but I just replaced the OEM style on my 99 and that lasted 12 years and 135K.

If you want to step up, it will cost you more $$$ You decide.

I have used 1-800 Radiator on a few cars now with no issues. I also know ebay has some deals if you can wait it out a few days.

Thanks to all for your help, I went with Radiator barn today. I'll let you know the out come

I just put in a rad from the radiator barn today and it works like a charm. Put the all aluminum 3 core in only cost 163 bucks. Thanks to everyone who answers questions on here you helped me out quite a bit. especially with the trans cooler lines!