He has an Alfa 159 2.4jtd. Garage said oil cooler fecked and quoted >£1000 for a new one, instead they offered to bypass the cooler using a copper pipe wedged into the cut hose and 2 jubilee clips
Unsurprisingly this failed and a car following behind went off the road as the Alfa dumped it's oil (well 3 cars passed through ok first so may or may not be the cause of the accident).
The garage recovered the car and fixed the bodge by pushing the copper pipe in further, through the wall of the oil hose and causing another leak
Since this fail it has been repaired with a braided hose, bypassing the oil cooler. Oil temp etc seems to be ok but my question would be regarding oil pressure. Would bypassing the oil cooler reduce back pressure and therefore oil pressure? If this occurred would it be a sufficient drop in pressure to prevent oil getting to everywhere it needed? Or would the reduction in circulating volume but same volume of oil compensate for this?
I've found genuine new Alfa oil coolers for £225 and the correct hose for £77 but would a Mocal universal cooler, of a similar volume be an option?
http://www.demon-tweeks.co.uk/motorspor ... il-coolers
I should add that despite the problems the garage seems to have been very decent and handled his complaints well, they seem as keen to fix this as he is and are obviously concerned about any possible implications from the accident.
Slightly odd request for SE but thanks in advance for any opinions.