Driving without a fan

OM605

OM605

Joined
Jan 3, 2020
Messages
1,002
Location
Brittany
Had to replace belt, tensioner and pulley. Of course i had to remove the clutch/fan as well as the shroud which was already damaged and just broke in half when i took it off. I decided to drive the car without the fan and shroud and deal with this issue later.

Got lazy and never looked for a shroud so far. It's been a month now and temps are almost identical as before. The only difference being on a 35c day (almost 100f). I had to sit in traffic with AC on and i had a small trailer behind the car. It reached 95c. Seems like the 2 electric pusher fans are there for the AC but also kick in when coolant reaches a certain temps (around 95c i guess).

I live in the country and have to deal with traffic two times a year max. Coolant temp is exactly the same as before, 80c as long as the car is moving, even on a hot day. I am tempted to keep driving the car like that with the added benefit of less noise, less drag on the engine and mostly, a far better access to the front of the engine.

Has anyone been driving a car with the fan clutch removed for any length of time? Maybe mine doesn't really need it because of the driving conditions but also because the cooling system is clean and has zero corrosion.
 
If it has big electric fans you're probably fine. My aunt bought a car from a friend who lived in the country in Utah, where he drove 20 minutes to work every day and only had one or two stop signs between his house and his job. She brought the car down to the city in Arizona and it had all kinds of overheating problems. The little electric cooling fan didn't work and so the car would overheat sitting in traffic. Since the previous owner never had any traffic to sit in, I don't know how long the fan was dead before my aunt bought it. This car only had one cooling fan though, so once it died there was no backup.
 
I drove a Ford Ranger with 3.0L V6 for several years without a fan at all. Got about 2 miles/ gallon better without it. Never had issues with it getting hot unless stopped in traffic, I live in the country and usually moving at 45mph or more.
 
I have a 3.9L dakota that I took the clutch and fan off of. It has an electric pusher that runs when AC is on or coolant reaches 212F.

If I did any city driving or traffic with that vehicle I would put the clutch fan back on. The factory clutch went bad and ALL aftermarket and dealer replacement clutches are J.U.N.K! Tried them all.
 
Did it with my Volvo 940 in the winter after I fixed the water pump. The new pump didn't come with studs for the fan and for whatever reason I couldn't use the old ones. Car, being an over-engineered Swedish brick, had an electric fan as well.

After a couple weeks without any drama whatsoever I cut the heads off some (6mm?) bolts and rigged the fan back up.
 
OM605 said:
Had to replace belt, tensioner and pulley. Of course i had to remove the clutch/fan as well as the shroud which was already damaged and just broke in half when i took it off. I decided to drive the car without the fan and shroud and deal with this issue later.

Got lazy and never looked for a shroud so far. It's been a month now and temps are almost identical as before. The only difference being on a 35c day (almost 100f). I had to sit in traffic with AC on and i had a small trailer behind the car. It reached 95c. Seems like the 2 electric pusher fans are there for the AC but also kick in when coolant reaches a certain temps (around 95c i guess).

I live in the country and have to deal with traffic two times a year max. Coolant temp is exactly the same as before, 80c as long as the car is moving, even on a hot day. I am tempted to keep driving the car like that with the added benefit of less noise, less drag on the engine and mostly, a far better access to the front of the engine.

Has anyone been driving a car with the fan clutch removed for any length of time? Maybe mine doesn't really need it because of the driving conditions but also because the cooling system is clean and has zero corrosion.
Click to expand...
shoot, I lived in SFLA and was driving an old Hyundai beater with an inoperative electric cooling fan.. if the temp gage maxed out in traffic I shut it off until I was able to move again, whereupon it would cool right down. I drove that car for 3 years like that, never did fix it. :)
 
Being a diesel, my car probably generates less heat at idle/low load than a gas engine. I didn't really notice a difference in mpg since the clutch is out of fluid and just freewheels. On my previous MB when i got the visco clutch back in working order, throttle response was greatly impacted and i didn't bother comparing numbers but noticed a drop in mpg. And i drive with an egg under the foot.
 
The e fan was out in my Jeep for a few days until I could fix it. Noticed it when I was waiting in line at a car wash and the gauge was creeping up. I want to say this was late summer.

Seemed fine, but I didn’t hit any stopped traffic either though. I fixed the e fan and it failed again within the year and finally went to the mechanical fan.
 
I wouldn't be surprised if you eventually overheated in a bumper to bumper standstill somewhere. Briefly stopping at a light may not be enough to really test your cooling system. I remember watching my temperature gauge really going up in stopped traffic when my fan clutch was bad.
 
Decided to pull the radiator and give it a good clean while the access is easy. There was a fair amount of a solid mixture of dirt and dead insects obstructing a third of the surface between the AC condenser and radiator. It may work even better now. I'll keep you posted.
 
atikovi said:
You're lucky the pressure didn't get too high and blow a hose or the condenser.
Click to expand...

R134a systems, from what I've seen, always have a high pressure cutoff switch. Probably an EPA regulation. The old R12 systems often didn't, their way of handling excessive pressure was something like a blow-off valve on the compressor.
 
brianl703 said:
R134a systems, from what I've seen, always have a high pressure cutoff switch. Probably an EPA regulation. The old R12 systems often didn't, their way of handling excessive pressure was something like a blow-off valve on the compressor.
Click to expand...
On a car with 25 year old hoses and condenser, they are more likely to blow out before the pressure reaches the cutoff switch rating.
 
Not sure what the issue was, but once my fan wasn’t working. I was stuck in bumper to bumper traffic on a freeway and it was a very hot day - maybe 85°F for the area. The temp needle kept on going up past normal and past the red warning level. But if there was any time I was able to move, it would go down and rather quickly. I think just 10 MPH and it was down to normal temps. But I figured it wasn’t a good thing so I turned off the A/C and turned up the heater to maximum. And even stopped, the temps went down to below the red warning, but not quite to normal. But it was freaking hot, although opening the windows helped.

Never saw that issue again after that day.
 
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