I'm just wondering if the rubber oil cooler shrouds are absolutely neccessary to help direct flow to keep things cool? I realise this may be a strange question, but Ill be installing an aftermarket front bumper and it looks odd with them on... Will temperatures rise significantly? or at all?

 

i'd say not that important. if you have an MS bumper and foglights, you pretty much have to cut those oil cooler ducts that come with it to bits

 

to my knowledge it is bad to remove them. IIRC... the mazdaspeed bumper has ducts built in to direct air flow to the coolers.

Just rip them off and go to home depot and get 4 sheets of aluminum and make your own ducts to fit the hole of the new bumper.

 

^ i'm speaking from actual experience, not conjecture

 

i dont have the ms front but when I removed my shrouds--my oil temp went up.

 

you are right, hey take them off. Mazda put them there for no reason, they just like to add random stuff to our car that serves no purpose.

Air goes to the path of least resistance. without the duct the air would simply go around the oil cooler thus raising temps. It doesnt take someone collecting hard data to find out this happens, though oldragger has satisfied this. If you go on rx7club.. the first mod they do after installing the 99 spec front end is to fabricate oil cooler ducts to direct air to the cooler, not around the cooler.

 

silly Mazda!

 

talking about how silly mazda is... the AWS system... accelerated wear system heh

 

ok, perhaps you should go back and read what i actually SAID.

i said if you have the ms bumper AND you have foglights, the instructions provided by "silly Mazda" specifically call for hacking the hell out of those oil coolers. ie, chopping off 2/3 of it and throwing it away.

and again, unlike you, i'm not guessing or playing armchair physics or supplying anecdotal evidence.

draw your own conclusions.