Heat rises... PERIOD.... look at a hot air balloon

Dude,,, the whole world runs trans fluid IN the top of the radiator and OUT of the bottom of the radiator... MOPAR and some Ford uses the COOLER side of the radiator ( bottom tank).. I don't really CARE what or where HEAT is DIRECTED,, the PROPER WAY is to PUT IT IN THE TOP and TAKE IT OUT OF THE BOTTOM.... Whatever way DETROIT ENGINEERING has a theory,,, the IN AT THE TOP and OUT at the BOTTOM is correct on MILLIONS OF AUTOMOBILES !!!! If you think they're wrong and YOUR IDEA IS RIGHT,, you're SADLY MISTAKEN ....

In my eyes it comes out of the bottom of the radiator because it acts as a sump..can't pump water from the top of the radiator, if there is any air in there......and a cooler should be pushed from the bottom so the entire cooler will be used instead of dropping the fluid into the cooler from the top.

you're not dropping the fluid into the cooler.. the cooler actually has to SLOW DOWN the fluid and has to keep a pressure at the TOP OF THE COOLER because it takes some time for the heat to be removed from the fluid. the SLOWER the fluid goes through the cooler,, the BETTER !!! The HOT fluid comes from the pump/ convertor and the cooled fluid goes into the pan....

the cooled fluid goes into the pan....

well not exactly, on a TF the cooled fluid first goes to the rear support, output shaft, the rear drum, planets and sun gear before returning to the pan.
But that is if you want to be technical. LOL

on a side note I spent almost 30 years in the transmission industry, I have run every kind of cooler and line set up you could imagine, had temp gauges on all kinds of vehicles and cant say I seen any real difference in temps 1 way or the other based on line position.
That's just my

That is correct. I'd like to know how the cooler slowes the fluid down. My cooler has, i beleive, has 5/8" tubes, no orfice in the lines. Wonder how that happens?

Wow, this thread became a bit bumpy, I am surprised by the topic, that it got a little heated (lol)

The fluid slows down at the entry and through the cooler because of line size, the 5/8" tube takes twice the amount of fluid volume for any given distance as the 5/16 line.

Think of it like squeezing a garden hose, with x amount of pressure water flows smooth, make the outlet smaller makes more pressure less volume.

when you squeeze more volume into a smaller line the pressure increases.

In my opinion the differences in temp from top/bottom -in/out are negligible.

If you are adding a cooler to a stock system, it is important to run the front line into the radiator first then to the auxiliary cooler and back into the rear line. If you are using only an auxiliary cooler, in and out doesn't matter as much as size and cooling fan capabilities.

my Street/Strip Coronet front line into the lower cooler inlet.

So yea before this got out of hand as to whose house is heated better. You run the front line out of the transmission to the bottom of the cooler?

Any more we mount the cooler under the car so that air flows all around it.On coolers with fans we have mounted them to the rear of the car also.Some of the best coolers like for street driving(street rods)are mounted on the frame rails.

The BIG 3 ( Ford, GM and Chrysler) ALL plumb the FRONT ( fluid output) side to the TOP of the radiator trans cooler and the BOTTOM ( return) goes back to the transmission REAR inlet.. THEY ALL DO IT THAT WAY !!! Theory all you want,,, that's how the DETROIT engineering people FIGURED IT OUT !!!.

and we all know that engineers are perfect and there way is the only way it will work.

The op never mentioned if he was going to use the rad cooler or not. That would make a difference.

I just gotta get in to this little debate. Not only does hot air rise but heat rises. Those overhead LP gas heater reflect the heat. Little different and not good for an example.

An old tractor or truly antique car. No water pump. How does it work. The hot water rises in the block. The hot water cools in the radiator and flows right out the bottom back into the block. No pump just heat or loss of heat making the water flow.

Leon

You guys are confusing issues here...

First of all heat DOES NOT RISE. There is nothing special in "heat" that makes it defy gravity.

The reason a hot air baloon rises is because when the air is heated, it expands and becomes less dense. The lower density air "floats" on the high density air. So the hot air goes "up".

Same thing happens in fluids. The hot fluid expands and is less dense, and therefore rises.

Heat through a solid body does not cause any change in density. Solid fins on a trans cooler do not change position. Nothing is "flowing" like happens in air or fluid.

The reason that radiators flow trans fluid from bottom is because of a principal called counter current heat exchange. This is because the hottest water can cool the very hot trans fluid effectively. The trans fluid can only be as cool as the last point of coolant temperature that it exits. It's more effective if it exits at the lower point where it's coldest.

The question at hand about trans fluid through a normal (non-coolant heater exhange like a radiator) does not apply to "heat rises" or "the OEM did it like this."

The direction on a finned fluid to air cooler does not matter at all.