Oil cooler for an internal combustion engine

Claim 1

An oil cooler for an internal combustion engine comprising: a housing having an axis; an axially disposed center fixing tube extending through said housing; a plurality of plate-like oil chambers within said housing, each said oil chamber being formed by a pair of oppositely profiled cooling plates and being spaced apart axially along said fixing tube, the space between said oil chambers forming cooling channels for a coolant; oil inlet means extending parallel to said fixing tube for supplying oil directly to all said oil chambers; oil outlet means extending parallel to said fixing tube for discharging oil directly from all said oil chambers, wherein said oil inlet means and said oil outlet means, in cross-section, lie along radii from the central axis of said fixing tube which are at a first acute angle relative to one another; partition means in said oil chambers extending radially in the acute angular space between said oil inlet means and said oil outlet means for directing oil supplied to said oil cooler tangentially around said fixing tube toward said outlet means; coolant inflow means for introducing a coolant through a first opening in said housing into the cooling channels between said oil chambers; and coolant outflow means for exhausting coolant through a second opening in said housing, said outflow means being offset axially relative to said coolant inflow means, wherein said first and second openings lie along radii from said central axis which are at a second acute angle relative to one another for causing coolant introduced into said housing to flow through said cooling channels tangentially, and wherein said coolant inflow and outflow means and said oil inlet and outlet means are arranged relative to each other for causing oil and coolant introduced into said oil cooler to flow in opposite directions.