That braided black line has layers:
Outside - Aramid fiber (cannot cut it with scissors)
2nd layer - Rubber
3rd layer - Stainless steel braid
Inside - rubber



http://www.jegs.com/i/JEGS+Performance+Pro...110942/10002/-1

I takes extreme effort to cut that stuff with a cutoff wheel or a bandsaw. So essentially it is steel braided line with 2 extra external layers.

Very cool, I'll be interested to hear if you headlights are still able to work and how well it cools...when you road test it.

I never intend to put headlights back into it, but the entire headlight bucket is still there. The coolers do not intrude on that space.
I had to cut the bottom of the buckets out to install the coolers, but that's it. And of course rain would not have a dedicated drain like stock.
As for cooling, The stock cooler has ~16 in^2 of cooling cross section.
By adding these two coolers, I now have ~71 in^2 of cooling crosssection.
So I have 4.4X as much cooling as stock (as long as I leave the stock cooler in place).

According to previous posts in this thread and his measurements, the headlights should work. I don't see anything blocking their operation (including if the headlight surrounds were attached).

If your running a race car the hoses can scrape something or be nicked and once the nylon is cut it unravels.

With an oil line (under pressure) the hose will burst once the nylon has unraveled. I had it happen and lost a couple of quarts before we caught the failure. And this was at an autox, not a track event where the chance of a nick starting the nylon to unravel is higher - and also catching the failure.

And mine burst right where it made a turn for my oil cooler up front, so a bunch of oil had to spray out before it leaked out on the ground.

In any event it's your choice, but still suggest putting a big low oil pressure light on the dash, to act as a warning.

I have a big red light on the dash (not as big as it could be).

However I am trying to understand what you are suggesting for the hose.
Are you suggesting that I replace the 4 layer SS braided hose with 2 layer SS braided hose?

As far as I can tell this is the best hose money can buy (at $9 a foot) unless I go to rigid lines.

Sorry, guess I wasn't clear.

When we originally put the front cooler in my car in conjunction with the big engine I insisted, over the complaints of my engine builder, to put in the lighter black nylon braided line. I wanted to save weight.

After the failure I took out all the black nylon line out and installed the SS braided line which I got from Summit or Earl's distributor in LA. I still have some of the SS braided line and will look for a part number.

Seems to me it was $10.00 a foot.

But you realize that this hose HAS a braided SS layer inside it?

So the way I see it is that this is Braided SS hose with 2 extra layers to protect it.
Still confused.

Think I also have some of the original black braided line and will check this for the under SS layer as you describe it.

He's using hydraulic oil/fluid lines, it's a lot heavier, thicker, expensive and harder to bend around corners.

I looked again and Jegs DOES have a couple of hoses that are more expensive than what I picked. The Earl's sounds exactly like this hose but is $12/ft. and Aeroquip makes a StartLite, that sounds very similar but is close to $12/ft.

My brother originally used SS braided hoses in his racecar, but we got sick of them because the tiniest fray was sharp as hell and after working on the car our hands looked like we had been thrown in a briar patch ;-)

He switched to a hose very similar to mine, but when I bought mine I got what I determined was better than what he got. I guess we'll have to see how it goes. I cant afford to replace it before the next season.

The good news is that I have zero tight bends in the whole system and I support the hose anywhere it could rub on something.
I havent installed the tie-downs yet, but I'll be careful to make sure it cant move or rub on anything.

If your stainless steel hose has any nicks or frays, it is remove and replace. The hose is now garbage, the end.

No wonder I don't race. If i did, I would be wrapping each of those hoses in 4" of duct tape.

Normally you wrap stainless braided hoses to protect everything else; they are like vibrating knives if not properly secured...

The aramid wrapped hose is very tough, but more forgiving on the things around it. In neither case will losing a couple of strands in the braid cause a properly made hose to 'unravel' (but if you have something that's cutting the braid, chances are it's not going to stop at just one strand).

Clarification: The black braided line I had used doesn't have an inter SS weave. I bought this 5 years ago, probably before the black nylon weave (SS under weave) was around.

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I just stumbled upon this thread, and thought I'd add my $0.02 worth. I ran a 914-4 in SCCA GT-3 back in the late 80's to early 90's, in Texas. Cooling was of course an issue, and our solution was to put a cooler in each front fender, with the turn signal lamps removed to duct cooling to them. I don't think I ever saw more than 210 degrees on the oil temp, even in 45-minute Nationals in August.

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