[bibby]

hey guys


I want to get rid of my stock pulley fan as with a lot of water in the NT now its the wet season i don't want it pulling through the radiator, would putting my thermo fan which is on the front of the radiator (which i never use as it dosent ever get hot enough to need it) on the side of the existing fan inside the shroud be enough to keep the engine from over heating? or would the thermo fan inside the existing shroud not be as efficient.

Sam

[jdk81]

I would put a vit/jimny viscous clutch fan on it.
Very easy to do, and works with sierra shroud.

An electric fan on the inside can still pull into the radiator unless you have a switch to turn it off, which many people forget to turn back on and then have big issues.

[Gwagensteve]

Not many people, everyone.
If you have any manual switch that can cause engine damage if switched, you will, inevitably leave it switched the wrong way at least once.

Vitara viscous fan FTW.

[Jezza86]

try to engineer out human error, as above pointed out.

[bibby]

yeah i have it on ignition with a switch but yeah i recon viiscus will have to be the way forward if i can find one

[Qthefun]

I put an after market thermofan on an ea for once had a temp sensor in it and a clutch, might be able to find this to solve the human side of the problem (can't remember brand)

[Gwagensteve]

It's not required though. Simple is always best, and there are no disadvantages when using a Vitara viscous fan.

[monley]

I run a 12" thermo with a Craig Davis thermatic switch and it does the job just fine. I run a manual overide switch if the thermatic switch fails but 12months running this setup and its still running fine. Thats a g16b with standard radiator

[henno]

Gwagensteve wrote:

Not many people, everyone.

Thinking outside the square a bit, it would be rather trivial to wire up a 'water crossing' button that was simply a 60 second (for argument's sake) pause on the fan running, after which it switches back on. If crossings were so bad/common that it warranted ditching a mechanical/viscous fan, it'd be pretty cool to be able to stupid-proof it so you just mashed a button before you did a crossing and didn't have to think about it again; it just turned itself back on after a predetermined period of time.

I am all for viscous fans though.

[Gwagensteve]

I think the better solution is a really annoying buzzer that's on whenever the switch is in "off"

But the best solution is a viscous fan.

[henno]

Gwagensteve wrote:

I think the better solution is a really annoying buzzer that's on whenever the switch is in "off"

Good idea. That would actually make for a handy alarm/failsafe if you chose to wire a manual switch in tandem with an automatic thermal one, in case it dies (read: eventually dies).

Gwagensteve wrote:

But the best solution is a viscous fan.

Definitely.

[Gwagensteve]

I don't like the idea of a timed override. If the crossing takes longer than expected, or you have to cut backwards and forwards etc you'll be stressing it's going to restart whist still submerged, and after all said and done, it's another thing to go wrong.

Having said that, SPAL had a thermo running submerged for the whole duration of the SEMA show last year. Catch was it was still, clean water and it wasn't being dunked in and out.

[frak]

I was thinking of a timed alarm. Press disable fan button. Alarm voes off in a couple of minutes. Press button again to clear it for another few minutes. Or just switch the fan on again if out of water...

If you are in water for a long time though that is a lot of additional cooling given the water air heat exchange being converted to a water water heat exchange. Danger of thermo fan switching on would only be in entry stages i would think.



Sent from my SM-G900I using Tapatalk

[jdk81]

There's about a million ways to make this more of a fuck around than it needs to be.

Vit viscous hub fan fits in the stock shroud.
You need a 10mm ring spanner and vit viscous hub fan.

4 bolts and fan is loose, 4 bolts on the shroud and then slide the shroud and fan out.
Slide new fan and shroud back in.
4 bolts for shroud, 4 bolts for fan.

The hardest part is finding and paying for a good vit viscous hub fan.

[Gwagensteve]

I've learned that regardless of how cheap, simple, effective, or completely self evident something is, someone will always choose the harder/more expensive/less reliable/less effective solution.

Tyre pressures, EL falcon alternator upgrades, air filters and cooling fans are the best examples of this.

[Qthefun]

Didn't think of water being a problem with thermos fans live and learn I guess

[shep]

All the sierras I have owned only had thermo fans, I found that in 40+ deg heat with extended periods of low revs a car with
mechanical fan would overheat. By extended I mean 2 min or more ie driving in rocky creek beds. I never had a issue with
electric fans, just buy the biggest one that fits and stick it on a temp switch to come on at around 90-95 deg and it will shut
down very quickly when the radiator cools down in a river crossing. Seen way to many cars get very hot when viscous hubs fail
and unless you are buying a new one the hub is going to be 20+ years old.

[Gwagensteve]

Viscous hubs can be locked up as a field fix and refilled with fluid for $20.

I've had no problems with the Suzuki viscous hubs. I did have to refill the hub on my gwagen, which wasn't designed to be refilled, but the Suzuki hubs refill fine.

I've had to botch up wiring in the bush to run a thermo off the headlight wiring when the switching failed.

[J--A--C--K]

viscous hub for the win, brought one new off amazon in the us , was $75 landed and as been around Aus no problems ever. That's around 5 years ago now