Best Electric Fan Setup for 1st Gen?

[Maniak]

Well, y'all have convinced me. I'm about to pull the trigger on the Hayden Severe Duty fan clutch. Maniak's link goes to a Hayden 2793, which looks right. However, in the Rock Auto specs, the description includes "reverse rotation." I'm confused by that. Is this the right clutch for my 1993 4.0 with auto and AC? The parts catalog says so.

Yup, thats the right one.. Most (I can't say all) serpentine belt driven water pumps are reverse rotation.

As tbars4 said, this fan will be obnoxious but its a small price to pay for max cooling cooling.

~Mark

 

[Anime]

Which "OEM" fan clutch are you using? Ford discontinued the fan clutch for the automatics long ago, now all you can get is the YB463 Motorcraft fan clutch, which is really only the correct clutch for those with a 5-speed manual. Combine that light-duty clutch with a 195 degree thermostat in 110+ degree heat, and yeah, it'll get hot real quick with the load the A/C puts on the engine.

The 180 degree Stant Superstat (~$5) and the Hayden severe duty fan clutch make for a really good cooling combo in hot hot HOT climates, especially with the 11-blade fan.

If the temps climb past the L in NORMAL at idle even with this combo, there's some other issue either inhibiting coolant flow or putting a strain on the engine. A/C compressor clutch, the A/C system low on lubricant, gunked up coolant passages in the engine from mixing too many different types of coolant, etc.

You may want to do a full cooling system drain, filling with distilled water, and doing the drain/refill/air purge several times until the system is just pure distilled water, THEN draining and refilling with a gallon of good coolant (Zerex G-05 is good stuff), and topping off with distilled water for a 50/50 mix (system is ~2 gal so mixing in a gallon of coolant and the rest distilled water makes it easy). Using tap water with minerals and other contaminants, along with several types of mixed coolant in the sytem, can lead to deposits, buildup, and blockage, making for poor coolant flow and heat transfer.

 

[msmith65]

I put the Hayden on. Temps promptly dropped, and I can tell it's working because of the roar. Also gas mileage fell 2 MPG immediately. Ah well - better than a burned up engine and a stranded wife.

I also switched from R134a to Freeze 12 because of the latter's higher conductivity. AC vent temp fell 15 degrees! This is a much better way to utilize the limited airflow through an old Explorer condenser.

 

[pkn]

I see "new radiator since 2004" in your signature... but it's since 2004. If your radiator is 5+ years old, what I would do I would replace the radiator first thing.

Reasoning: radiators have bad habit of losing efficiency of thermal exchange because of hard deposits inside the channels. The deposits are virtually impossible to remove, and, since radiators are (relatively) cheap and (relatively) easy to replace, I would replace it.

On one of my other cars, 1985 Nissan 300ZX, overheating stopped only after I had replaced the radiator - and I tried everything, including electric fan. I'm in Houston, TX, so idleing with full AC is what I do too.

 

[pkn]

I also switched from R134a to Freeze 12 because of the latter's higher conductivity. AC vent temp fell 15 degrees!

15 degrees - that's really impressive!

I have recently (in the beginning of this long, hot summer) redone the AC in '92 XLT, replaced absolutely everything with all new parts - even the compressor was brand new, not rebuild, I was lucky to find it not much more expensive than rebuild ones - charged it with R134A... and... and... and it's kinda sorta disappointing. A little.

Yeah, it's working... but when I drive locally in traffic, after 15-20 minutes I start dreaming about the highway speed with it's powerful airflow - only on highway my AC gets really cold.

So right now I'm babying two projects about it: one is electric fan to work in sync with AC, and another one - more efficient freon. Glad to hear first hand experience that Freeze 12 actually works in our old, R12-designed systems!