Rear View Mirror

The rear view mirror is a wide rectangular mirror that you (the driver) use to view anything behind the car. You don't have to take your eyes off the road to turn your head around. On most cars, the rear view mirror has a "day/night" selection switch that tilts the mirror inside its glass housing without tilting the exterior glass housing itself. The switch tilts the mirror upward, about five degrees, to divert the majority of the light striking the mirror up on to the headliner of the car. The light that you see when the mirror is on the "night" setting is actually bouncing off the glass housing (a good reason to keep it clean). The percentage of light reflected into your eyes in the night position, is very small compared to the amount that would normally be reflected into your eyes in its normal position.


Radial Tyres

In radials tyres the ply or ply cords are alligned at 90 degrees to the circumference. While radials improve performance the fact is that they are not very good for bad roads and overloading. The suspension of a vehicle has, also, to be modified to accept radials. Radials offer much better grip of the road especially on surfaces which offer poor wheel traction like wet of slippery roads.


Radiator

The radiator is used to dissipate the heat that the coolant has absorbed from the engine. It is constructed to hold a large amount of water in tubes or passages which provide a large area in contact with the atmosphere. It generally consists of a radiator core, with its water-carrying tubes and large cooling area, which are connected to a receiving tank (end cap) at the top and to a dispensing tank at the bottom. Side flow radiators have their "end caps" on the sides, which allows a lower hood line. While in operation, water is pumped from the engine to the top (receiving) tank, where it spreads over the tops of the tubes. As the water passes down through the tubes, it loses its heat to the airstream, which passes around the outside of the tubes. To help spread the heated water over the top of all the tubes, a baffle plate is often placed in the upper tank, directly under the inlet hose from the engine. Sooner or later, almost everyone has to deal with an overheating car. Since water is readily available, it is not beyond the ability of most people to add some to their radiator if it's low.


Radiator Cap (Pressure Cap)

The radiator cap is more than a cap for your radiator; it keeps your engine cool by sealing and pressurizing the coolant inside it. It is designed to hold the coolant in the radiator under a predetermined amount of pressure. If it was not kept under pressure, it would begin to boil, and soon all the coolant would have boiled away. However, the radiator (or pressure) cap prevents this from happening by exerting enough pressure to keep the coolant from boiling. If your cooling system is under too much pressure, it can "blow its top"! To prevent this, the radiator cap has a pressure relief valve. The valve has a preset rating that allows it to take just up to a certain amount of pressure. When you turn the cap on the filler neck of the radiator, you seal the upper and lower sealing surfaces of the filler neck. The pressure relief valve spring is compressed against the lower seal when you lock the cap. The radiator filler neck has an overflow tube right between the two sealing surfaces. If the pressure in the cooling system exceeds the preset rating of your cap, its pressure relief valve allows the lower seal to be lifted from its seat. Then the excess pressure (coolant, air) can squish through the overflow tube to the ground or the coolant reservoir. Once enough pressure has been released (the caps preset rating), the pressure relief valve is again closed by the spring. The pressure cap can be tested with a cooling system pressure tester, using an adapter, to make certain that it is living up to its pressure rating. It should be replaced if it fails the test. It should be noted that most radiator pressure caps are not meant to be removed, and that the coolant should always be added through the expansion (overflow) tank. If you happen to remove the radiator cap from a hot engine, the pressure can cause steam to shoot out and seriously burn you.

Radiator Grille

The radiator grille is the part of the body shell on the front of your car that covers the area where the air enters. The radiator grille can also be part of the bumper on some cars. The radiator is connected to the shroud for the radiator, which directs the air that comes in through the radiator grille to the radiator only. This prevents the air from escaping around the radiator and failing to cool the engine. On newer cars, the radiator grille has been lowered to take advantage of lower hood lines, brought about by an effort to increase fuel efficiency. Older cars had massive grilles, whereas the cars now produced have smaller more aerodynamic grilles.


Radiator Shroud

The radiator shroud prevents the recirculation of air around the fan. It is usually a plastic hood that encloses the fan to guide the air through the core, and stop it from coming back around and through the fan again. It also protects you from the fan blades!

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