Electric fan swap
 

Sorry I’ve been asking a lot lately it’s my first diesel trying to feel out the difference and I haven’t really worked on cars in about ten years this has been a good refresher and some things I’ve never dealt with but has anyone converted clutch fan to electric I think I want twin electric fans Instead of the single clutch fans

With out to much machine work

.........
Why?

Never had electric fans go out

If you just drive around and make noise, electrics work. Those of us that actually tow heavy and tried electrics found they don't cool like the original.

Ok good to know I don’t tow heavy about 1000lbs of tools on a daily basis

x2

I've heard this before. FWIW, I recently swapped a Jegs electric fan kit into my f250 sclb 6.9l IDI and it BARELY keeps up. It cools marginally better than my stock fan with a failing clutch. :eek:

If you tow regularly I suggest you stick with the OE fan and clutch. I have an electric fan from a mid 90s :oval Taurus with a 3.8l v6 that I plan on swapping into my truck. I will let everyone know how it does. :-X22

Personally I've had great luck with the mechanical fans, most people that go electric have the opposite luck for whatever reason, or there mechanical goes out and they don't feel like dropping the dough for a name brand fan that will last another 10-20 years and ends up having trouble out of the cheap ones.

I'd hit up the local junkyards and see if you can't find a mechanical one that's still in good shape. I've picked up a spare or two with the blade and everything (cuz you never know) for 20-40 a pop.

Those big OE blades move a LOT of air. I was cleaning my windshield one morning with the engine idling and there's about a 6" far edge between the cowl and hood where the rubber seal doesn't cover and I was surprised how much air was blowing out of that small gap from the fan.

No comparison in flow or reliability, I'd forget about electrics. I considered this when I did a 12v Cummins swap in one of my trucks. IIRC, the largest electric fan CFM I could find at any price topped out in the 5000-6000 CFM range and was dual fans fitting the diesel radiator core size. I found a spec sheet for the shrouded Dodge fan used in their trucks with the same engine. It pulled about 10,000 or more CFM. I use it with an OBS PSD radiator and shroud, in which it is slightly offset to the driver side in the shroud, not the best for pulling air across radiator, condenser, and intercooler. Even with that beast of a fan in a sub-optimal shroud(it still moves TONS of air), it will let temps reach 190F w/ 180F t-stat when pulling ~17k lbs in the Texas summer, A/C blasting. At this point it is in as full of a lock as it can get with a new clutch and I highly doubt that any electric stands a chance at keeping up with that, just based on the sheer noise it produces.

Ive had half a dozen garbo fan clutches. Put windstar fans on. Shocker, it still overheats. I dont think efans are any worse than the mechanical. That said, ive got a mechanical on there now that doesnt unlock and she still gets warm soo.... fighting my own battles. Moral of the story, if your clutch is shot, and it only gets warm when pulling, put efans on and you will probably be just fine.

That's good to know. The Jegs electric fan I have on my 86 f250 now is definitely wimpy. I've heard though that the :oval Windstar fan assembly is one of the best electrics available (along with the fans from the :oval Taurus and :oval Contour). Hopefully I will be ok since I don't tow, but it's definitely scary livin' on the edge. :'(

I'm running two contour fan assembly's... it's in a Cummins swap that's in progress but does pull 7000cfm. Still a little less than the mechanical fan but more efficient and more cfm than the Taurus single fan. With a pwm controller it should pull 5000cfm at 30 amps... and 7000cfm at a crazy 70amps... definitely not the answer if your alt isn't upgraded.

no question the mechanical fan is best for towing...

https://cimg8.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.for...9b45bd875d.jpg

Those look like some nice fans for sure, but holy electrical load! I could definitely see doing this if I ever get a bull nose, single cab, 4x4, IDI truck that I want as a toy. That PWM controller is another failure point IMO, depending on quality of manufacture. Hopefully it has some sort of failure mode that still allows them to run if it lets the smoke out.

I was really worried about exactly what your thoughts are...

The controller is from dccontroll (Brian Baskin) he's a one man show and although he's slow and sometimes grumpy his controller, from my research is one of the best and highly regarded. He's been making them for over a decade...

Talking with him about it and doing my own research its probably not going to draw more than the 30amps... and will for the most part be in the 2 to 10 amps range during normal day to day driving.

At 2 amps it'll pull 2200cfm

At 35 amps or 50% it'll pull 5500cfm

He's done a lot of testing and it shows:

power cfm noise

100% 100% 0db
50% 79.4% -5db
25% 63.0% -10db
12.5% 50.0% -15db
6.25% 39.7% -20db
3.125% 31.5% -25db

The contour fans are a low impedance motor and having 4 of them increases their efficiency... to a point. That's why I go from 2 amps at 2300cfm to 70 amps and 7000cfm. The efficiency goes down dramatically after 50% power and 5500cfm.

The controller I bought from him is rated for 90amps and is protected from shorts and thermal overload.

I'm pretty excited about trying it and think if it works its probably the best solution if you have the ability to drive it at full output... even knowing that you may never need it.

Should add that the fans are cheap at a 100 bucks for one assembly (2 fans)

The controller... not so cheap lol