Has Anyone Installed An Electric Fan on Stage One?

Technical questions and answers
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firemanshort
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Joined: Fri Feb 10, 2006 2:42 pm
Location: Loudoun County, VA - near Wash DC

Has Anyone Installed An Electric Fan on Stage One?

Post by firemanshort »

Has anyone installed an electric fan on a standard Stage One grill / radiator?

I assume the common install is to mount a pusher fan between the front grill and the radiator - but how / where is the fan mounted? What size fan (10"?)
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Firemanshort
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harry potter
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Re: Has Anyone Installed An Electric Fan on Stage One?

Post by harry potter »

Yes, I have.

I mounted a puller fan and fitted it inside the existing cowl (with some cutting) space is tight between the pully.
I also fitted a XEng thermostat kit to the lower hose with a 3 way switch on the dash for switching the fan off whilst wading. the Thermostat was a dual temp so the switch can be set to low or high (l keep it on high). Relays and inline fuses were also installed.
At work at the mo but l can post some pictures of how it fits during the week. below is the link to XEng. I do not work for them but have a few of their products - quality is good.
http://foundry4x4.co.uk/index.php?route ... th=65_1760

The fan was a basic push pull ebay unit - un branded. would pull a small child through the grill at working speeds. I cannot rememeber how big it was - internal size of cowl so it sits slightly above the top of the rad. thought bigger was better. will measure

My set up works a treat, the engine hasnt over heated and kicks in when needed.
my reason for fitting the electric fan - the replacement range rover v8 engine did not have the same fittings for the viscous fan of the old engine nor did l have the tools to remove the fan. plus l wanted the option to switch the fan off if l ever went near water.

Regards
Harry
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firemanshort
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Re: Has Anyone Installed An Electric Fan on Stage One?

Post by firemanshort »

So Potter installed a puller. Anybody do a pusher - to augment the belt driven fan?
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disco2hse
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Re: Has Anyone Installed An Electric Fan on Stage One?

Post by disco2hse »

A mate here put one on the front of his Stage 1. He needed two in the end. His motor still overheated on long hill climbs.
Alan

1983 ex-army FFR 109 Stage 1
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noexitroad
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Re: Has Anyone Installed An Electric Fan on Stage One?

Post by noexitroad »

i have had to install electric fans as i have dropped a 3.9 motor into mine, and the viscous fan was hitting the chassis cross member. i started by shortening the viscous fan blades, but it overheated. i did not - and should have made a proper shroud and tried that again. (i did not want to cut the cross member).i then bought a couple of 10 inch aftermarket fans and mounted them close to the radiator by screwing some flat steel strips vertically onto the radiator, and mounting the fans to these. they were pulling air through. still no shroud and the viscous fan was mangled and thrown into the corner of the shed by now.it still overheated. i then just happened to be trolling through the interweb and found a twin fan setup with shroud which just happened to be exactly the same size as my radiator! i purchased and installed and have had no problems ever since. i think that aftermarket fans don't pull or push enough air and the shroud is also very important so don't ignore it.
TriniAndy
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Re: Has Anyone Installed An Electric Fan on Stage One?

Post by TriniAndy »

A former owner of my 88 did. See picture. But my car has a 4 cylinder diesel in it, which
leaves more room for the fan. Standard after market fan or some japanese thingy.
Works great though ;-)
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Glen
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Re: Has Anyone Installed An Electric Fan on Stage One?

Post by Glen »

TriniAndy wrote:A former owner of my 88 did. See picture. But my car has a 4 cylinder diesel in it, which
leaves more room for the fan. Standard after market fan or some japanese thingy.
Works great though ;-)
You might as well take that viscous fan off there, without the ducting (any ducting off a pre 300Tdi 90/110 should fit fairly easilly if you want it) it'll be very inefectave at drawing from the rad (rather than around the axle) and as its a thermal clutch it might not get enough heat onto it to engage when needed anyway - just makes a nice finger trap (though when its just free spinning it shouldn't put up much of a fight).

The original viscous setup is a 16 in fan. As the clutch is hollow and lacks the curly spring bit in the middle I don't think they are thermal, so once loosened up (they can take a while on a cold day, thets why they roar) they are probubly designed to spin with a fairly low max speed, which they will do prittymuch throughout the working rev range (a direct drive fan would eather over cool at high speeds or undercool at low speeds depending on its flow rate as its speed would be directly related to engine speed).
Later V8's use thermal viscous fans, they are the ones with the 32 mm nut on the engine side of the clutch (they use a left hand M24 thread) and a curly bimetalic spring in the middle of the face. 2.5D(HD)/2.5TD/200Tdi use a simular fan which has slightly less blade pitch and a slightly weeker clutch so its performance should be slightly less than the proper V8 version. Those are all 7 blade fans, there is a HD fan for the 2.5TD which is 11 blade and probubly the meatyest 16 in viscous fan avalable (I have one on a 2,25 diesel, much louder than the diesel engine when its engaged!). 300Tdi engines and most EFI V8s run 17 in fans so they shouldn't fit in the cowl though you may be able to modify a later cowl to fit (LR probubly did something anoying like move the waterpump a bit so the hole won't line up). Serpintine V8's (ie 4.0, 4.6 and 3.9 interim - anything from about 1994) have a fan which spins the other way and the clutch uses a right hand M30 thread - don't fit these blades to an M24 clutch! You should be able to fit an M24 clutch pritty easilly to an early hollow clutch or direct drive engine by changing the waterpump pulley/flange (or just the whole pump) for a later one with the threaded end, a corectly working viscous fan should be much more powerful than any electric setup making it pointless to have or need both - if it overheats and its the fans fault just replace the clutch. A thermal clutch is probubly an upgrade over the original setup as they will spin a bit slower when they aren't needed thus improving efficently by a marginal degree. If you need a new clutch M24 units are much cheeper than the hollow ones which may pay for the conversion parts but avoid the £30 britpart clutches as they seem to not like engaging even after your engines gone well into the red.

I can see the advantage of an electric setup if you don't need the mega cooling capacity (UK use without heavy towing) and like driving in water. Having seen vereous Kenlowe type products my conclusion is the aftermarket brands are much cheeper (to make) and weedyer than the stuff factory fitted to large front wheel drive turbo diesel cars (which tend to be 500...1000 W) so your best bet is to save a good £100 and buy a used one from a scrap yard, something will have a simular shape rad to a stage 1. Suckers are better than blowers providing you have the space to fit them. Remember big fans will need some sereous wiring to feed them and little fans aren't worth fitting, the original viscous setup when working corectly should match the performance of a 1 kW electric setup when the engine's above idle.
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