Electric Fan Kit?

[superj]

and i am surprised you aren' adding an electric fan to help your ac cool better. it looks like you are in central, or maybe east texas, so i know you have bad humidity too. i am in south texas

 

[Shran]

If any of y'all get an electric fan, spend the money on a good relay/wiring kit... I've had two electric fans in my truck for 15 years now and have burned up several relay kits. The most recent one was a 25 amp Derale single relay thing that was supposed to be good for two fans... it lasted maybe 7 or 8 years before the wiring connector melted. The previous kit, don't recall the brand, but the same thing happened plus the fuse holder melted.

I got my latest one from American Autowire and it's WAY better quality than any of the previous ones. Dual 40 amp relays and dual 30 amp fuses. I'm sure Painless and some other brands have good ones too but the AA kit I bought was excellent. https://www.summitracing.com/parts/aww-510001

 

[nickname23]

and i am surprised you aren' adding an electric fan to help your ac cool better. it looks like you are in central, or maybe east texas, so i know you have bad humidity too. i am in south texas

Ok yes I live near Mansfield it was 109 yesterday and my AC works to the point I'm shivering.
I'll give another example in my old 4.0 I didn't even realize my fan clutch went out until months later it finally started to overheat.
There were questions as to why Ford ran a hydraulic fan and still does, it's just my opinion that you could save mpg by just slowing down and when that electric fan dies it's more detrimental to your rig than a hydraulic fan.
Do electric fans work, yes I just personally don't see the pros outweighing the cons if they fail that's all.
It's your truck at the end of the day, be happy with your truck and run whatever.

 

[nickname23]

If anything an electric fan is a cheaper part to me than a hydraulic one the pros being if the hydraulic fails the fan STILL MOVES, I don't see an electric fan doing this it's not attached to the drive!
Like damn I'm not hating on it just answering questions!

 

[bhgl]

I'm pretty happy with running an electric fan so far. It's been 4 months and around 10 000KMs later and I haven't had any issues except for a loose ground which was my fault anyways. When in motion, the fan basically never activates since ambient air temps are enough to keep the truck running cool, on the highway the thermostat is actually doing most of the work keeping the truck from over-cooling itself.

We had a few 95 fahrenheit days here recently and I had no issues keeping the truck cool, and the power and fuel economy benefits have been worth it. Plus when I knew I was going to be stuck in traffic, I set the fan to run constantly regardless of temp, and I've never had colder AC in my entire life! We actually had to turn the fan down in order to not create a ton of condensation on the outside of the vehicle.

The only time I would be worried about a failure of the fan system is if the fan motor itself breaks, if a relay dies, or a fuse pops I can replace or bypass and get myself home. If everything but the fan motor dies, I can still just wire the thing directly to my battery for a short period of time to get me out of harm's way. plus, it's a hell of a lot easier to work on the front of the engine now even when it's running without the clutch fan blades in the way.

It's 2024 now and the technology around electric motors, relays, and temps sensors has been pretty well sorted out. For under 100$ I'm happy with the benefits from doing the e-fan conversion hand over fist.

If you live in a desert and are out in the middle of nowhere all the time, there's definitely an argument to be made for keeping the clutch fan, but frankly if I'm dealing with 100F+ temperatures, I'd rather have both.

 

[superj]

I found my old electric fans that i thought got thrown away 7 or 8 years ago. I am going to mount them to the front of the condensor to oush air through to help the ac.

I have two 14 or 16 inch fans. No idea on the brand or cfm but they sure move some air when i tested them in the bmw battery

 

[bhgl]

I found my old electric fans that i thought got thrown away 7 or 8 years ago. I am going to mount them to the front of the condensor to oush air through to help the ac.

I have two 14 or 16 inch fans. No idea on the brand or cfm but they sure move some air when i tested them in the bmw battery

If you only want them to come on when the AC is on, you could relay them with a signal wire coming from the AC Clutch signal relay. They won't stay on the whole time your AC is on, but they'll activate when the AC clutch does.

That's what I've got going on for my e-fan right now. Most of the time the e-fan isn't running but it'll pulse in time with the AC clutch regardless of temp.

 

[superj]

I read that in a post somewhere. It said you can also use the pressure switch so it doesn't keep switching on and off. It will be on when the button is on for ac and off when the button is turned off.

I also found a frw old bmw relays in a 5 gallin bucket so i need to look uo there ratings. Since the even have the harness attached, hopefully one is good enough to use for powering the fan/fans

 

[bhgl]

I read that in a post somewhere. It said you can also use the pressure switch so it doesn't keep switching on and off. It will be on when the button is on for ac and off when the button is turned off.

I also found a frw old bmw relays in a 5 gallin bucket so i need to look uo there ratings. Since the even have the harness attached, hopefully one is good enough to use for powering the fan/fans

That's probably the better way of going about it. Not sure what the AMP draw is for your fans, but I would highly recommend at least a 50-60 amp setup with thick enough wires turns out e-fans are HUNGRY at 12 volts.

 

[nickname23]

Having both is a good idea but I don't really have room for it to be honest, Texas heat is known to melt electrical parts so that's why I'm really hesitant to rely on an electric only.
Had a guy who did that and decided to remove the hydraulic one and his truck blew up when the electric one failed.
There ain't much room for a bigger battra so I don't think it's possible for my rig.
He was running his truck way to hard though tried to warn em but he kept thinking it was better yeah he lost a good truck doin that.

 

[Shran]

I would prefer a mechanical fan over an electric one any day. You always have air moving and even if the clutch fails, it *usually* fails with the clutch stuck on and moving a lot of air (but not in some rare occasions.)

The two electric ones I have in my crawler are my only option that physically fits unless I found an Explorer front dress for my 302... as it is, the water pump pulley is uncomfortably close to the inner fan and I had to clearance the grill to make the outer one fit. It still gets hot on occasion even with two fans. Works well enough that it's not worth reinventing it but I sure wish I had a mechanical fan with one electric pusher on the the outside....