Running Hot... Fan placement an issue?

[EagleTalonTim]

This is a strange question, but... I have a slim fan from autozone which fits perfectly against the coils of the stock 1g radiator with very little gaps at the top and bottom of the fan. I used to have another smaller one that ran with it but the wires got melted right where they went into the electric motor from the heat of the turbo. The smaller one use to sit directly in front of the turbo and the larger one sits to the left of the turbo.

Since I have only 1 fan running all the time now, should that fan be sitting in front of the turbo instead of to the left of the turbo? What could I use to prevent the wires from being melted again? Maybe the heat coming off of the turbo is actually heating up the radiator. I cannot fit 2 of the large fans on the radiator since the width is too big and I am limited on money right now, so buying another fan is not an option at the moment.

 

[TSIturbo91]

It sounds like unless the new fan is moving twice as much air you need the two. They're designed to have a certain amount of air run through the radiator and your starving it now.

 

[EagleTalonTim]

I bought the second one since the temp at the time was over 100 degrees outside which was causing the engine to get hotter than normal on long drives. It helped until it died. Now, the temp outside is ranging from 50 to 70 and it is overheating with easy driving. I have to turn the heater on in the car to cool it back down.

I have replaced the water pump, radiator, hoses (all even then heater core hoses), thermostat, and radiator cap with no changes in temp. I am wondering if the turbo could be heating up the radiator causing all my problems. Putting the fan in front of the turbo will push the heat away from the radiator. I just worry about putting it in front of the turbo since the last fan got toasted as said in the first post.

 

[TSIturbo91]

Is the heat shield removed? And if so I know it looks better but it wreaks hovac on the temp and cooling system. So I would get a new one or replace te old one. And that shoul help. But two fans is better than one.

And I know pretty well what fixin a DSM on a tight budget is like. That's my situation right now. So heat shield it if it's not and see if that will get it down some more.

 

[teamdsm95]

The one to left of the turbo kicks on with temp switch. The other one in front of turbo is for a/c and only come on when a/c is turned on. I had mine running just the one oem for a while then put the slim in and had no issues. it ran normal in temps up to around 80. Now I have both wired, so when one comes on the does. That seems to help more but I just put the ac fan on yesterday. I really hope it doesnt melt mine because I dont have healt sheild either.

 

[turboglenn]

I can't tell you how many hundreds of dollars i spent on slim fans because i chose to remove the OEM ones when i installed the T3/T4 turbo years ago..I spent more money than i care to count and spent 3-4 years chasing overheating issues before i went back to an OEM fan..

Really it all boils down to slim fans not being properly shrouded to pull airfromacross the entire radiator, they only pull fromthat one circle that they cover. They also usually run at slower speeds and pull less CFM than an OEM fan

It wasn't until i re-built all my FMIC piping to make room for the OEM fans that i was able to get the car stable enough to even think about running my AC on the 100*+F nebraska summer days. I have the main one wired to run on speed #3 (oem mitsu fans have 3 actual speeds, there's a "high winding" , "low winding" and then there's both of them running together which the ECU picks which speed to use unless you eliminate the ECU and hardwire the fans on through a relay and switch of your own)

the only way aside from the OEM fans to solve this is to have a sheet metal shop fab you up a shroud that holds 2 fans and pulls air from the ENTIRE radiator face... plain and simple as said above you're starving the radiator of the amount of air being pulled across it's face, as well as not pulling from the entire face which is the most important, those 4 corners and the space between the 2 slim fans does a lot more than most people think in the grand scheme of things

 

[TSIturbo91]

I can't tell you how many hundreds of dollars i spent on slim fans because i chose to remove the OEM ones when i installed the T3/T4 turbo years ago..I spent more money than i care to count and spent 3-4 years chasing overheating issues before i went back to an OEM fan..

Really it all boils down to slim fans not being properly shrouded to pull airfromacross the entire radiator, they only pull fromthat one circle that they cover. They also usually run at slower speeds and pull less CFM than an OEM fan

It wasn't until i re-built all my FMIC piping to make room for the OEM fans that i was able to get the car stable enough to even think about running my AC on the 100*+F nebraska summer days. I have the main one wired to run on speed #3 (oem mitsu fans have 3 actual speeds, there's a "high winding" , "low winding" and then there's both of them running together which the ECU picks which speed to use unless you eliminate the ECU and hardwire the fans on through a relay and switch of your own)

the only way aside from the OEM fans to solve this is to have a sheet metal shop fab you up a shroud that holds 2 fans and pulls air from the ENTIRE radiator face... plain and simple as said above you're starving the radiator of the amount of air being pulled across it's face, as well as not pulling from the entire face which is the most important, those 4 corners and the space between the 2 slim fans does a lot more than most people think in the grand scheme of things

Good advice, and just to reenforce it. If you have a gap only 1/2 inch all the way around the shroud it will add up. I don't know perfect specs but for argument sake lets say the radiator is 30"x18" that .5" gap will equal a loss of 8"x6". That's a big whole when every bit counts ya know.

 

[j_biggz]

One less expensive route for in a pinch is header tape. You can tape up everything to drop your temps but I would suggest getting your cooling fans worked out and use the header tape as a bonus. I had to tape up my dump tube because it was frying my alternator. Just a thought

 

[laserspeeddemon]

I can't tell you how many hundreds of dollars i spent on slim fans because i chose to remove the OEM ones when i installed the T3/T4 turbo years ago..I spent more money than i care to count and spent 3-4 years chasing overheating issues before i went back to an OEM fan..

Really it all boils down to slim fans not being properly shrouded to pull airfromacross the entire radiator, they only pull fromthat one circle that they cover. They also usually run at slower speeds and pull less CFM than an OEM fan

It wasn't until i re-built all my FMIC piping to make room for the OEM fans that i was able to get the car stable enough to even think about running my AC on the 100*+F nebraska summer days. I have the main one wired to run on speed #3 (oem mitsu fans have 3 actual speeds, there's a "high winding" , "low winding" and then there's both of them running together which the ECU picks which speed to use unless you eliminate the ECU and hardwire the fans on through a relay and switch of your own)

the only way aside from the OEM fans to solve this is to have a sheet metal shop fab you up a shroud that holds 2 fans and pulls air from the ENTIRE radiator face... plain and simple as said above you're starving the radiator of the amount of air being pulled across it's face, as well as not pulling from the entire face which is the most important, those 4 corners and the space between the 2 slim fans does a lot more than most people think in the grand scheme of things

That's odd, my temps were within tolerable ranges with a single slim fan on my setup. Then again, I was running a 16g. What tempatures are you considering too high?

 

[CrashGNX]

How big of a turbo are you running now? I have a Evo III 16g on mine with a stainless header and o2 housing. I have the stock fans still and havent had any problems yet. Im running a sidemount IC though, how is your FMIC routed?

 

[EagleTalonTim]

I have an Evo 3 16G as well with the stock 02 housing right now. The FMIC is mounted by brackets behind the bumper, then routed beside both sides of the radiator. The turbo is connected to the drivers side pipe via a J-Pipe, and the intake pipe is connected on the passenger side and is routed over the transmission. I have had that setup for 3 years. After I installed the FMIC, the temps were fine through the entire summer, and winter. After replacing the oil pump, rod / main bearings, timing belt, and doing the BS removal, the overheating started. I thought maybe it was something with the head gasket so I replaced it with an OEM one. Still no fix. The engine is now blown with a stripped timing belt. Rebuilding it now. Timing was set correctly when the timing belt was replaced. It was double, triple, and quadrupal checked due to the over heating issue.