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The test for our new oil cooler setup was to be the final MotoIQ Performance Tuner Car Championship races at Buttonwillow Raceway Park. Uncharacteristically hot ambient temperatures for a late October race weekend put the oil cooler through its paces. The sprint race format puts the car through a 30 minute race, so proper cooling is a must. Throughout the weekend, temperatures were in the 90-95 degree range. In such conditions, the previous setup would see a peak oil temp of about 265 degree F, with the first 10-15 minutes of the race around 255. Not a dangerously high temperature range, especially when using a good synthetic engine oil like Motul 300V. But, in hotter, +100 degree races, the temp would get closer to 275. This is warmer than I'd like the engine to operate at, especially being a high revving Honda motor.
Project EF ready for a weekend of tight racing. Throughout the event, we were looking forward to seeing how the oil cooler would perform under various conditions and ambient temperatures. 
Morning warm-up session was relatively easy to keep the oil temp under control. The cool morning air and short 15 minute intervals never even had the oil over 200 degrees. This was a nice start, but not much of a test. 
Between warm-up and qualifying, we made sure there were no oil leaks at any of the fittings and that the lines were not rubbing after the car saw time on track. 
Qualifying was about 10-15 degrees hotter in ambient temperature at about 85 degrees compared to the morning warm-up session. Even though the higher temps would give the cooler a bit more work to do, minimal laps are ran during qualifying as to preserve the car and tires for the race. So, with only 3 hot laps for the session, oil still didn't see anything over 210.
With all parts of the Earl's cooler functioning correctly and leak free, I was able to focus on the chassis setup without worrying about engine reliability. The high quality parts of the Earl's setup allowed peace of mind leading up to the day's race. 
With the sprint race in the afternoon, ambient temperatures peaked at 95+. But throughout the race, even when in close proximity to other cars, which can compromise airflow through the grill opening, oil temperatures looked fantastic- never getting over 235 degrees F. Oil pressure drop through loaded sweepers was never an issue either. Also, when backing off on certain laps to conserve tires, the oil cooler's effectiveness proved exceptional, pulling 10 degrees out of the oil temp within a few corners. A positive side effect of the improved oil cooling was the engine water also ran at a lower temperature, both from the overall lower oil temperature and the air coming off the back of the cooler not reaching as high temps before passing through the left side of the radiator core.Sunday's race showed similar results as the previous day's, which was great to see repeatable data and reliability. Overall, the oil cooler setup from Earl's performance went above and beyond my expectations during extremely demanding race conditions. With Earl's high variety of core shapes, fittings designs, and line construction, there is a configuration for any car and task.
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