THIS is why you should ALWAYS run a proper fan and shroud people!

EPIC "FAIL"

At "cruising" speed you might get away with this kind of a set-up due to "ram-air" effect... but that's it.

 

cobbed???
thats what it looks like to me...

 

overheated big time... blew the tank clean off... badly!

hopefully we'll have a tank or a used radiator to pirate a tank from out in the "antiques" house...

 

Damn!

 

I would think the cap would have been at full blow off and the hoses would have failed before that happened. Your sure it never froze up at one point and weakened it up? JC

 

Temp gauge working?

 

Probably more from a faulty cap or one with too high of pressure rating.

 

I cannot read the exact numbers but it looks a lot like a 49 Chevy radiator.
I have NEVER understood wanting to use a electric fan.
When a properly engineered mechanical fan does such a great job. They are easy to engineer.

 

crappy soldering.

 

That is kind of an odd configuration for the fans that might have been a factor.

 

In some cases there just isn't any room for a stock mechanical fan.

 

Wow!!! Who would have thought that would blow before the hose.

 

"original" solder on the lower tank... the top tank held on just fine... we do good work here.

 

It's missing 3 or 4 more smaller electric fans to fill in the voids. "contact....we have lift-off

 

Maybe if your trying to fit a small block in a pedal car or shopping cart.



-Jason

 

There's a lot of surface area on the tank for pressure to work against.That's why lower pressure radiator caps are used in the older, 30's cars with huge tanks. It takes a lot less pressure to balloon one of those. It's all about the surface area. My 38 Chevy has a HUGE top tank. So, I run a 6lb (or is it 4lb) cap

 

I grew up working in Dad's radiator shop and I say it's obvious that radiator would have blown with 2 dozen fans on it!

 

I never could either...99.9 % of the cars built before the late 70's had mechanical fans...and the engines all ran perfectly fine...no need for a "modern" solution when it's not necessary...

If there's "no room" for one, then you're in the wrong hobby.

R-

 

good eye... it is in fact a '49 Chevy

you are 100% correct... if "possible" you always want a direct drive fan and properly fitted shroud... and not some cheap p.o.s. flex fan either... steel bladed with the proper blade pitch.

electric fans can work well too... but only as long as the shroud matches and covers the radiator's core tightly and it is drawing enough air through the radiators core to cool it. one catch though... electric fans only run one speed. stock cars from as far back as the 70's have used electric fans with proper shrouds... the reason was... the engines are mounted transversly so there is no way to use an engine driven fan. on rear wheel drive trucks they still use an engine driven fan. on cars like a camaro, vette, mustang, etc. they don't because they simply don't have the room... but they are designed and engineered to work properly with the engine's operating temp ranges and the radiator is appropriately sized for the application... in hot-rods... this typically isn't the scenario.

 

There's a couple of really good reasons for off topic cars. Personally if the car has sufficient charging capacity, I'm all about electric fan conversion.

Ever have a car that whooshes like a damn street sweeper due to the mechanical fan? Me too, listen to 3 decades of chevy truck. Electrics are generally much quieter at an equivalent flow level. There are operational points where they're louder, but all and all, quieter

Fan shroud? What's that? I just gained 3 cubic feet of underhood workspace and reduced the unpleasant risk of working on a running engine.

Super cooldown. With an override switch on the fan you can do powered cooldowns when you need to touch the engine in 15 minutes and it's still clicking & pinging. You wouldn't believe how fast hedders cool down with a little airflow. Or how often you'll use the feature once you got it.

Belt load. Just taking the fan's WOT load off the pulleys often solves belt throwing problems without resorting to deep groove pulleys, etc.

Horsepower. Yeah there's no free lunch with energy, but in a sense it's free peak power. Any mechanical fan that's worth a damn is also costing 10 horse or more WOT.

Sure not traditional, but hard to deny the hot-rodderness of what they can bring.

 

Well said. Plus, my mechanical fan doesn't cool well on a hot day idleing in traffic.

 

Me too on the lower pressure caps.
I run a 7# on the 32.

That will open the cap at 234* approx.
More than likely I'll have the engine shut down before it gets there.

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Far as electric fans go, I'd use one if there was no other way to get the job done or I was dealing with a drag race car.

Regardless, you can almost always get a mechanical fan in with a little re-engineering where necessary.

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The one that drives me crazy are the noobs who've decided the electric fans are 'official' hot rod stuff and pull a perfectly sound mechanical fan setup so they can install an electric.

 

Well said Shifty, that's a realy good list. I'm looking for a good puller for my '51 Merc which has no shroud and a mechanical fan. I'd love to fit a dual fan setup like a OT 2000 Camaro but it would be too wide. They had a high and low speed fan, I've used them for low 9 second cars they work so good.

I see Speedway has some puller fans.

 

I agree. Not using an electric fan is like not using an electric fuel pump, rack and pinion, disc brakes, etc on philosophical grounds.

Looks to me like more than an overheat happened there, Looks like way overpressurized. I failed a couple '40s radiators until I learned to lower the pressure cap.

 

From plenty of experience seeing and dealing with other people's poor cooling system designs, it is better to use a mechanical fan. There is no reason not to run one if you have the room, and if you don't, try to make the room, as it will benefit you in the long run. As far as losing horsepower at WOT/high rpm and the such, a fan clutch is the perfect solution and is readily available from junk cars to the autoparts store, so that is no excuse either. If your car cannot sit at idle in the heat with a mechanical fan for a substantial period of time, it is not the engine's fault, or the fan's fault, it is your fault for improperly designing the system; start over and do it right. Having an auxiliary electric fan for peace of mind or manual cool down with the engine off is just fine, but don't place all your hope in it to cool the engine on its own.

Mike

 

We don't have to be smart asses. If you want to leave a firewall bone stock and un altered, in my case my 8BA wouldn't allow a stock fan in my 36 with a stock radiator - in its stock original location.

 

a few comments...

if your mechanical fan isn't cooling well enough... the fan itself is not the issue my friend and you may want to dig deeper.

for every pound of pressure you add to your radiator cap you increase your boiling point 2 degrees... this is important

as to the "advantages" of an electric set-up... sure there are a few good one's... but for a normal street driven car... they're pointless i.m.o. can you really tell a 5-10hp loss when your driving on the highway or cruising town? i also think electric fans for the most part look totally stupid in a classic car. as added insurance a pusher fan on the front of the radiator/condenser is helpful for increased heat loads... but they are usually not sufficent to actually cool the radiator on it's own... and aside from being on a Cobra they also look stupid.

some people still think running without a thermostat will help them... complete fallacy

some people think running a lower temp stat will make thier car run cooler... another fallacy

the more air you can suck through your radiators core... the better it will cool... the longer coolant can stay in the radiator for a reasonable period of time... the better it will cool... period.

 

I had a bone stock '63 Chevy with 283 and automatic blow the top tank completely off the radiator one time.

 

Pro Stock John
Senior Member




Join Date: Feb 2008
Location: Chicago, IL
Posts: 1,027
Re: THIS is why you should ALWAYS run a proper fan and shroud people!

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Well said Shifty, that's a realy good list. I'm looking for a good puller for my '51 Merc which has no shroud and a mechanical fan. I'd love to fit a dual fan setup like a OT 2000 Camaro but it would be too wide. They had a high and low speed fan, I've used them for low 9 second cars they work so good.

I see Speedway has some puller fans.

get or make a shroud to fit... and run a blade if you can... if not... make certain whatever you decide to use fits the core and it is tight (practically sealed) to draw air across all of the tubes and fins from side to side... top to bottom. when the fan kicks in it should create a venturi effect and you should be able to feel air being drawn (sucked) through the entire front of the radiator in any and all positions... if not... then it's not going to work properly.