Thermostatic sandwich plate

  Hi, im looking into having a radiator made with a built in oil cooler to fit in my mk1 16vg60.  My intercooler takes up too much space to fit a standard mocal oil cooler.  Ive been looking into using a thermostatic sandwich plate.  The engine is a 9a and i wondered if id be able to mount the oil filter in the usual position, under the sandwich plate as ive read there can be issues doing this in a mk1.  Can anyone say if this is/isnt possible or am i going to have to relocate the filter if i use one of these sandwich plates?

Throw away the thermostatic plate and fit a Mocal non temperature controlled one. Then plumb that to a Laminova water/oil cooler - you get hide it away as it does not require airflow.
My oil filter is fitted under a Mocal sandwich plate with no issues.

  So no radiator style oil cooler is necessary?  I thought that might have been the best way to go.  The system your using sounds similar to whats already in place on the 9a/kr engine then, is that right?  Just a water cooled jacket circulating around the oil filter housing?.

if you have an early type block you can use a mk1 oil filter housing which has a built in thermostat, but have to ask yourself is one even needed?

you could use a mk2 type water/oil cooler and just use a slightly larger rad. unless you plan to properly rag the car round the track this will most likely be more than enough for your needs.

alternatively if you get one without a thermostat just block the rad up with card when you're driving the car normally/in the winter then unblock it when you unleash the fury on a track

 Its a 9a block so not sure if id get away with the mk1 filter housing? Good idea if it would work though. ive been told ill need an oil cooler as these 16vg60 need plenty of cooling especially with lots of abuse which im sure it will be getting. My intercooler set up means I have no space left at the front for an oil cooler, my plan therefore was to have a custom radiator made up with a built in oil cooler, ran from a thermostatic sandwich plate. If possible id like to retain my water\oil cooler also. Interested to know what people think of this idea?. Not sure how tight it would be doing that but I know people run shorter filters in some cars.

fair enough! 2x sandwich plates may be pushing it especialy with all the other gubbins you have to fit! as you say there is a shorter oil filter off a Polo GTI IIRC that works? maybe even bog std smallblock one would do. the alternative is remote mount the filter seen that done as well

the difference on the later filter housing is easy to check, if the top bolt is offset to the side then you have a later one:

Great thanks ill check that out.  Space is definately running out thats for sure.  I might just try and fit it all in and see how i get on as id like to keep it all.  I should imagine once ive used a smaller filter there wouldnt be too much difference.  I wonder if the water/oil jacket would fit on the mk1 golf oil filter housing then?

yeah it'll fit fine

Ah good to know indeed.  I may well have one in the parts bin .  This conversion is certainly testing my patience/wallet/skills.