[Bucs01]

I have a dual Spal 11" electric fan in my car. For some reason (I'm wierd?) it makes me nervous when my fan runs longer then 10-15 minutes at a time. I guess my question is- On a hot day (85-95 degrees outside) is it normal and OK for my fans to be running 30-60 minutes at a time if it needs to be?

I have a on at 195 off at 175 Spal thermostat hooked to the fan and a 185 thermostat in the water neck housing.
I am running a 100 amp alternator, NO air, radio, head lights or electic water or fuel pump.

The car does not run hot or anything. no problems other then me feeling like the fan motors are running too much and will get burned out......

 

[72Orange]

I wired in an OFF overide switch into my set up so that if I'm cruising on the highway I can turn the fans off if I want to.

Other than that, unless I misunderstand thermostats with a 185* thermostat you might not see 175* once the car gets up to temp. Because even if your cooling system can cool down your cooland below 185* the thermostat will close bringing the temps back up before it gets down to the temp required to turn the fans off. That's the way I think about it anyway, does that sound right?

 

[Bucs01]

72orange- You are right. What I ended up doing is I wired one wire to run off the 195/175 thermostat. This works fine as long as it not above 75 degrees or so outside.
For HOT days (85 degrees hor hotter) I ran another wire from my toggle switch out to the other wire hooked up to the thermostat. On a hot day I just remove the wire from the thermostat and then connect the toggle switch wire to that wire that was on the thermostat. Connecting these two together allows me to run my fan via my toggle switch, only. As you mentioned, this allows me to manually turn the fan on/off in town as well as on the hiway as the temp normally does not drop down to 175 in order for the thermostat to shut it off. I feel find with my car running 200 before my fans kick on but sure the heck don't need to run till it cools down to 175! I shut it off around 180-185. My thermostat sensing unit is mounted right next to the thermostat housing so I am getting reading from there opposed to the heads. I have read many of articles stating the thermostat area is the best place to run it.

My fans are always wired LIVE to a switched 12v system so all the fan needs is a grounded connection to turn on/off.

 

[72Orange]

Maybe pick up an on at 200* and off at 185* sender? That's what I switched to when I felt like you do. That and a 180* thermostat should increase the on/off action of your fans, it did on mine anyway.

http://store.summitracing.com/partd...924500+4294815584+4294772940+115&autoview=sku

 

[Real McCoy]

The wife has had several cars and I have had two trucks and a motorhome with electric fans for total cooling or as an aux source. With the A/C on, towing and heat over 100 degrees these fans seem to run constantly with no ill effects. Not sure why you want to shut them off if they want to run. If you have the temp switch why not allow it to do the job? RM

 

[strtlegal]

are both fans supposed to come on? if so you can wire one off temp and the other off a toggle..but if its not draining anything i wouldnt worry about it

 

[Mike Goble]

I have a dual Spal 11" electric fan in my car. For some reason (I'm wierd?) it makes me nervous when my fan runs longer then 10-15 minutes at a time. I guess my question is- On a hot day (85-95 degrees outside) is it normal and OK for my fans to be running 30-60 minutes at a time if it needs to be?

I have a on at 195 off at 175 Spal thermostat hooked to the fan and a 185 thermostat in the water neck housing.
I am running a 100 amp alternator, NO air, radio, head lights or electic water or fuel pump.

The car does not run hot or anything. no problems other then me feeling like the fan motors are running too much and will get burned out......

With a 185° thermostat, are you surprised that the engine doesn't get down to the 175° necessary to turn the fan off? I would raise the off setting of the fan control to something above 185°.

 

[BPeer1]

Isn't it better for the electric motor to have the fan run steady than to have it cycle on and off? Also, what is suppose to regulate the coolant temperature? The thermostat or the fan and radiator? I run a 160 deg. thermostat and my fan contoller adjusts the fan speed just fast enough to keep the coolant around 180 deg. Is this too cool?
BP

 

[Bucs01]

Well I am no expert, but from articles I have read I hear the target range is
185-195?

I actually pulled my thermostat the other night and I am running a 165 thermostat in my water neck with (2) small holes drilled in the outer lip.
My fan thermostat mounted up by the water neck is on at 195 off at 175.
On a hot day it pretty much runs all the time.

I am thinking about buying Painless Wirings on at 200 off at 185 just to play around with it.

 

[BPeer1]

Bucs01,
I think I read in one of David Vizard's books that 170 deg. was ideal. Maybe that's just for making HP. Check out this website if you haven't already. I'm using one of their fan controllers and I really like it. www.dccontrol.com
BP

 

[Bucs01]

Thanks for the link and info!