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E-fan conversion


I have been kinda wanting to do this to my truck, but I am kinda iffy about all the wiring and stuff like that, it just makes me kinda nervous.

At first it kind of seems overwhelming, because I had little to no idea what I was doing when I ordered the stuff.

But really it was VERY EASY. Hardest part was mounting the relay block.

I tried to be as descriptive as I could just for people who are like you, unsure of what they're doing before they lay put the cash. I hope this helped in some form or another.
 
I'm kind of curious, what is the benefit of a pusher? Mine can be easily turned into a pusher if need be...

So when you have this:

105_0654.jpg


You can do this:

100_2935.jpg


I am swapping in a shorter beltdrive (out of an Explorer) right now, hoping to get some sort of a fan on the backside (hopefully mechanical) and leave the pusher up front for backup at low speed/rpm. If not... it did ok last summer. Pullers (what you have) are more effecient than a pusher. I am tempted to see if just leaving the shroud would cause a venturi effect and speed up airflow at speed too... if nothing else it would increase airflow around the engine itself.

My current fan is a beast, I think it is rated like 2500cfm... sounds cool when it is running. I wish it was reversable, I did the same thing you did assuming black was ground... it really don't move much air running backwards. :icon_thumby:

BTW the extra brackets if you have a way to mount them takes the stress off your radiator tubes. Mine are the Flex-a-lite ones, I think they were like $7 at Summit. You could probably do the same with the stuff from the hardware store but I think the aluminum is easier to work with.
 
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Well here's the thing, all of the weight is being but on the lower clips that used to support the fan shroud up. really the only stress that the top plastic quick connect thingys are doing are keeping the top part of the fan flush with the radiator.
 
Yea I'm looking to maybe do this over the summer. Would like to know how it fares when it's A/C weather for ya. I don't run mine a whole lot, but there gets to be a point...

Anyway, can you give me the part# or link to your wiring harness? I tried doing this on my old F-150 years ago, though I was installing duals, and I burned up the wires 3 times b/c I didn't know what I was doing. When it failed the third time, I aborted the mission and put the stock fan back on. That was probably a good almost 9 years ago now (geesh!). I think me burning up my wires was more due to where I spliced in at, and didn't have a high enough gauge wire either, but...part of the wrong gauge problem was the harness I bought didn't include any "extra" wire for my manual override switch (remember this was a dual set up so one would run always and the second was a thermostat activated or switch override). Anyway the wiring diagram that came with the kit wasn't the greatest so I vowed to pay for a decent wiring harness.

I know wiring up a single should be much easier. But still, I want something pretty straight forward.
 
Yea I'm looking to maybe do this over the summer. Would like to know how it fares when it's A/C weather for ya. I don't run mine a whole lot, but there gets to be a point...

Anyway, can you give me the part# or link to your wiring harness? I tried doing this on my old F-150 years ago, though I was installing duals, and I burned up the wires 3 times b/c I didn't know what I was doing. When it failed the third time, I aborted the mission and put the stock fan back on. That was probably a good almost 9 years ago now (geesh!). I think me burning up my wires was more due to where I spliced in at, and didn't have a high enough gauge wire either, but...part of the wrong gauge problem was the harness I bought didn't include any "extra" wire for my manual override switch (remember this was a dual set up so one would run always and the second was a thermostat activated or switch override). Anyway the wiring diagram that came with the kit wasn't the greatest so I vowed to pay for a decent wiring harness.

I know wiring up a single should be much easier. But still, I want something pretty straight forward.

I already posted links at the beginning of the thread.
smiley_coffee.gif


Click these.

 
ahh...didn't realize those were links...

sorry + thanks at the same time.
 
chasing a e-fan from an abandoned XJ project on craigslist for $10...
 
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I even had to notch the fan housing for the crank pulley but it's pathetic! There is a pusher on the front of the open space.

Spent to much effort getting the FOX front dress and the Vortech brackets to fit so I'm moving the radiator to the outside of the support and putting a Taurus fan where the radiator is now.

If you decide to go electric use OEM fans if at all possible. Most of the aftermarket fans are junk. I had a '77 F100 and used a Buick V6 fan inside the OEM shroud and it worked just fine. There are several inexpensive aftermarket controllers available. Several under $20.
 
Nice supercharger!

So jelly right now.
 
There are several inexpensive aftermarket controllers available. Several under $20.

Mine was a Painless one, it was $60. Nice quality and has what wire goes where printed on the wire... basically a screw in temp switch, relay, relay pigtail, bunch of wiring and a diagram.

With a little thought, it would be really easy to just buy a temp switch, relay, relay pigtail and make your own...

I have ran my Flex-a-lite pusher for a year now, still works perfect. I am really hoping to go mechanical though.
 
Alright guys I did an E-fan conversion today. Took me about 3 hours from the time I lifted the hood to the time I parked the Ranger in the drive way after the test drive.

Alright first thing is first, the parts I used.

Summit 16" 2010 CFM electric fan

Wiring Kit w/ adj. thermostat

And here's what I did:

-Alright to start off, disconnect the positive terminal from the battery, duh.
-Do the wiring first, because if something comes up halfway through the install, then you just have some loose wires under the hood than can be quickly taped off. If you did the fan and THEN the wiring, well if you have to go somewhere you'll have a non-working fan in there. That's not good.
-Find a place to mount the wiring block relay thing. The screw that holds the support up for the little cluster of wires next to where the negative (-) battery terminal grounds to the chassis is where I chose to stick it. That puts you right next to a ground, and right next to the location where your probe is supposed to go. It's also helpful because it's a breeze to adjust the dial for the turn-on temperature.

scaled.php


-Black goes to the ground, great! the ground is right next to the block.
-The (pink-ish) red goes to the power, great! the battery is right there.
-Green goes to the A/C compressor for the A/C turn on. If you have a compressor with a two-wire harness like me, then the black wire with the yellow stripe is the one you want to splice into (the splice is included w/ the kit)
-Yellow goes to the ignition. The wire is just long enough to reach the power box so I just rednecked that thing in there with the fuse for the fuel pump, a line that's only active when the car is on (do you really want your fan running with your truck off?).
-Orange has the fuse built in, you are going to use this wire to send the power to your fan. You will connect it to the BLACK wire of the fan.
-The blue wire goes to a secondary fan, if you were to choose one. I just taped it off and put it to the side.
-The probe is to be mounted in the radiator as close to the coolant tube as possible. It cannot stick all the way through the radiator. I used a Phillips screw driver to create a little hole for it. Mount it how the included instructions tell you do it and it will be fine.

Alright now for the fan.

Getting the clutch fan out:

-Undo the two (10mm) bolts right there on top that holds up the fan shroud.
-Pull up on the shroud, undoing the two clips on the bottom that hold up the shroud down low. Keep those clips on there, don't lose them. You'll see why later.
-Rotate the shroud 45* so you can work your hands in there nice and good and stuff.
-Undo the four (10mm) bolts holding the fan to the fan clutch.
-Take out the fan.
-Rotate the pesky shroud back to its original position and then drop it as low as the fan clutch will let it go. This will give you MUCH easier access to the bolts that hold the fan clutch to the pulley.
-Undo the four (10mm) bolts that hold the clutch to the pully using a wrench. Don't think about trying to fit a socket in there, it won't fit... trust me. The only way to do this is the old-fashioned way, quarter turn, take off wrench, refit, quarter turn, ect. Thankfully these bolts will be able to be unscrewed by hand relatively quickly.
-With all four bolts off, pull the clutch out towards the radiator, and then it's out. Now be careful, that pulley is just sitting there unsecured with the belt's tension still on it.
-Take the shroud out. Don't try anything fancy, just wiggle it out straight up. You will rub the coolant tube more than you'll like but if done carefully enough then you'll have no worries.
-Now look at all that free space!!!

Look at the junk :icon_twisted:

scaled.php


Installing the fan:

-Tighten up the four bolts on that pulley like you would if you were putting a tire on a compact car with four lug nuts. Snug 'em up 1-3-2-4 and then tighten them up using the same sequence. If one of these bolts is loose, you'll feel it when you fire up the truck.
-SPin the pulley to make sure that that bolts do not hit anything. If you fire up your engine and here something very loud and displeasurable, this might be your culprit.
-This part rocks, remember those two clips at the bottom of the radiator that held up the fan shroud? It turns out that they are PERFECT for mounting the fan on. I had a big ol' grin on my face when I saw that I had two less holes i need to poke through the radiator.
-Summit gives you instructions on how to mount the fan using the clips provided, go by that and you'll be all good.

Wiring the fan to the kit:
-Contrary to just about every electronic in the world the BLACK wire is NOT the negative (-) (ground) wire. The black is in fact the POSITIVE (+) wire and you will connect that to the orange wire from the kit.
-Ground the BLUE wire.
-There will be a little bit of excess wire, so to save it from getting caught in something (your belt IS right there, you know) I just used the included zip-tie and tied it to the grill of the fan. It will not interfere with the fan blades.

DONE!!! :icon_thumby:

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so one major problem with this setup. you have a 16" cooled circle, and hotspots in the rad now. you also want to run the stock shroud, and run waterproof relays as those will become corroded and fail at a inconvenient time.

Another problem is your probe is on the outlet for the rad. meaning the fan isnt going to turn on at the right temp as outside temps will vary the coolant temp before it hits the prode drastically.you need to run as close to the inlet as possible, so you get a consistant on and off temp from the probe. so if your probe is set for 190 turn on, and 175 off, and your coolant comes through at 190, but is 187 by the time it hits the exit, the fan wont turn on. Thus running the coolant at a higher temp until it goes over what you want, and the outlet to the motor is at 190. at this point the motor could be overheating from lack of cooling when the thermostat opens.

the concept is there, but thats going to be far from efficient. to keep your truck cool, that fan is going to be running often. thus adding strain to your alternator and in turn drawing the same amount of power the clutch fan drew. make the fan pull through your stock shroud, it will run less and be more effective. also move your temp probe to the inlet side of your rad, it will also help you out.

hope this info helps ya and newcomers to the E-fan craze. i know i love mine!

example of fan in factory shroud.
8c34242e.jpg



EDIT: i see your a 4cyl, disregard my probe comment. ill keep it there for other to read in case they dont realize. a little waterproofing and a shroud, your good to go!
 
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I found a formula for figuring out how much cfm it takes to keep a 300+ cu.in. engine cool.....................2100 cfm (just guessing that more cfm needed for 90*+ summer temps)
 
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so one major problem with this setup. you have a 16" cooled circle, and hotspots in the rad now. you also want to run the stock shroud, and run waterproof relays as those will become corroded and fail at a inconvenient time.

Another problem is your probe is on the outlet for the rad. meaning the fan isnt going to turn on at the right temp as outside temps will vary the coolant temp before it hits the prode drastically.you need to run as close to the inlet as possible, so you get a consistant on and off temp from the probe. so if your probe is set for 190 turn on, and 175 off, and your coolant comes through at 190, but is 187 by the time it hits the exit, the fan wont turn on. Thus running the coolant at a higher temp until it goes over what you want, and the outlet to the motor is at 190. at this point the motor could be overheating from lack of cooling when the thermostat opens.

the concept is there, but thats going to be far from efficient. to keep your truck cool, that fan is going to be running often. thus adding strain to your alternator and in turn drawing the same amount of power the clutch fan drew. make the fan pull through your stock shroud, it will run less and be more effective. also move your temp probe to the inlet side of your rad, it will also help you out.

hope this info helps ya and newcomers to the E-fan craze. i know i love mine!

example of fan in factory shroud.
8c34242e.jpg



EDIT: i see your a 4cyl, disregard my probe comment. ill keep it there for other to read in case they dont realize. a little waterproofing and a shroud, your good to go!

But, that shroud won't do you as much good as it could if you didn't have a shroud built into your fan. You fan is still only going to pull the air in that is right in front of it and shove it back through the hole in the shroud. For as shallow as that shroud is at low speeds or a stop to the fan it will not exist, the fan is about as deep as it is. A mechanical fan makes a much better attempt at pulling evenly through the radiator with no cowling around it, usually they are farther away from the radiator as well.

What I do wonder though (I may have mentioned this before) is if the shroud speeds up airflow through the radiator at speed. If nothing else it should help by increasing the airflow over the engine itself.

The radiator probe setups to me just feel/smell/sound kind of cheesy. If you note in my first pic you can see my switch in my thermostat housing, I like that setup better... if you have an extra port.

I found a formula for figuring out how much cfm it takes to keep a 300+ cu.in. engine cool.....................2100 cfm (just guessing that more cfm needed for 90*+ summer temps)

The more the merryier is for sure the rule with CFM's on a non-stock application.

This is what is in the library for V8 swaps:

You should use a fan rated at least 1200 CFM. Advance Adapters suggests a minimum of 950 CFM.

No referance to A/C though. I do know without A/C I wouldn't go much smaller than 2500 for a pusher :icon_thumby:
 
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