So, summer’s here again, and with it comes the crazy temperatures on the blacktop. It’s bad enough sitting in traffic in winter in the van - the temps slowly creep up then, with the engine-mounted fan barely pulling enough air through the radiator to keep it from boiling over. This year it’s even hotter even earlier than last year, so driving to work along the highway with massive amounts of air pushing through the front of the van is enough to make the temp gauge climb.
Coming off the highway, or even slowing down for a slow car in the daytime brings a noticeable increase in temperatures now - enough to be dangerous to the long-term wellbeing of the engine. This is bad! I work in the city! Stopping for morons and traffic signals is a way of life!
I had two choices, get a radiator shroud and a better engine-mounted fan, or install an electric fan on the radiator itself. Being the lover of electronics that I am, I decided that an electric fan would be better, along with the fact that when I’m sitting at the lights it’ll still be burning along at hair-dryer speeds, pushing those coolant temps down to a useful temp.
$60 got me a 12″ fan, along with all the mounting gubbins from Super-Cheap Auto, that always-lovable cheap car part supplier. I installed it tonight, hanging a switch under the dash so I can turn it on and off at will. It came with a fat relay, and a fuse block so that’ll protect it from any dodgy shorts or if the wiring rubs through on a sharp piece of bodywork if it happens. It’s nice and fast, and blows shitloads more air than the stock fan, so that should be good. It only has to last as long as it takes me to get the gemini on the road, then the fan will probably get installed on it for good measure.
It’ll get a really good workout on the weekend when we drive up to Positronic, and it’ll be good to be able to stop and have the engine get some decent airflow, rather than stop and have it heat up - we’ll see how it goes 😉