Of course it's not- I was referring to Bob Barker, a reference possibly too obscure for everyday use.
I wish I could say that I agree but I've run both with and without the stock plastic bellypan and not seen much difference.

I'm not disputing the benefits of good ducting, just this specific Mazda implementation.
I often see the bellypan recommended as a cure for poor cooling performance and I wish I could see the benefit (after all, I hunted one down and chased all the mounting point threads to install it...no small task), but as yet, I haven't.

It can't hurt though, I suppose.

 

Yeah it does, it's a great thread. I haven't had the opportunity to hook one up yet. I had the taurus fan on my koyo rad and it didn't fit that well. With the factory set up it runs cooler. Plus the fan ran my battery to the ground. I have an S4 vert and I really wanna get a S5 Alternator.

So if I run the whole relay thing, is the e-fan going to run on a low speed until it has to kick on high? Because that's what I want. My 05 Mazda3 does it (I think). But I'm running 12v on my S4 alternator right now anyway, so I can't get any more onto it.

 

Has anyone tried to run one of these before? It's pricey but I wouldn't mind paying to have this if it works good!

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/DUAL-...Q5fAccessories

 

what are you logging temps with?

 

VDO electric water temp gauge.

 

lol. i decided to go without a thermostat in my new vert for the first few hundred miles.. i can't even tell it's not in there, goes right up to 1/2 on the s5 guage, and takes like 3 miles to get there..

 

My Daddy always said "If you want something done right, do it yourself." So since no one else had measured the current use of the Villiager fan, I decided to do it myself.

Background:
A couple of months ago I grew tired of the raucous single-speed Fan action of my Mighty Lincoln Mark VIII 18" fan. I switched back to my original 2-speed Taurus Fan. What a relief.

Except for a couple of nagging things. The Taurus fan was not the best fit on my Griffin Rad . The 16" Taurus fan just seemed, well, rather small. Then we all had the fun thread about freeway temperatures, leaving me with the desire for more open area in the fan, thus I felt renewed need for an 18" fan.

So I took the plunge Saturday at the local salvage and got my own End All Be All Fan.

Since my Griffin rad core is 19" x 19", the fit is purely custom. The Villager fan is +/-17.5" and has a much less aggressive fan blade than the Mark VIII. This is a good thing if you want some extra free air flow. And I do.

So a little time on the table saw, some aluminum angle crossed with the aviation snips, mixed with a little pop-rivet action yielded the perfect custom-fit fan. The fan gives me the wall-to-wall fan similar to the Mark VIII fan, adds lots of additional fan off airflow, but leaves me with the slick 2-speed action that I prefer.

Oh, yeah, the numbers. Slightly less than 10 amps on low speed, slightly less than 20 amps on high speed. I didn't take any pictures of the ammeter like I did when I measured the Taurus and the Mighty Lincoln Mark VIII fan but I measured it with the same gauge. The test yielded 5 amps less than the Taurus on both low and high speeds. 7 amps less than the Mighty Lincoln Mark VIII Fan's single embarrassingly aggressive speed. I suspect that the fan could be successfully used with a stock S5 alternator, I don't know about the S4.

How does it blow/suck compared to the Taurus and the Mark VIII? Less than either of those other fans. It is definitely powerful enough to do the trick. The large 18" fan blade has a noticeably longer spool up time compared to the Taurus and Lincoln fans. That would be expected since the motor is less powerful as evidenced by the lower amperage draw. The start up inrush amps are also lower, but last quite a bit longer.

Sorry for the crappy nightime Iphone pics.

 

Thanks for that, Jack.

I've been following all these efan discussions with interest even though I'm pretty happy with my current Taurus/Volvo setup.
It does strike me however that perhaps there are significant gains to be had by concentrating more on the shrouding and less on the fan itself.

It's important to note that the stock efans we're adapting are hardly models of efficiency.
They are squeezed down to the minimum possible thickness so they'll fit within the constraints of the engine bay packaging and airflow dynamics was sacrificed in the process.

If you cede "gold status" to the stock thermoclutch fan, the obvious main difference ( given that a Taurus two-speed and the stock fan both pull @ the same CFM) is the stock shroud, which is much more voluminous than the standard efan.

The larger Villager fan partially solves the problem simply by virtue of the larger fan opening but still leaves the four corners and the fan hub area shrouded.
Spacing the fan 4" or so off the radiator core would eliminate those dead spots and probably even reduce the sound level.

This might be a problem for you given your oddball outlet placement, but would be pretty simple for us normal folk.
I may have to look into this...

 

clokker- I cant see spacing a taurus fan 4" from the rad- the hoses will be in the way

 

The stock fan is more than 4" away from the core and the hoses clear it...

 

...and that would start to defeat the "tidy up the engine bay" aspect of this modification.

I've been looking into other aftermarket fan/shroud setups (most notably BMW) and some of those shrouds are even more agrressive (higher percentage of shroud area compared to fan area, and even closer to the rad core). Yet they don't seem to suffer from the same "at speed" temp increases. I can only imagine that ducting is the difference.

Someone also mentioned vents or flaps in the shroud as a way to allow more air flow at higher speed, perhaps one per corner and the use of the underbody tray would solve the problem.

 

you would need a stock style shroud, a shroud attached to the rad itself the hoses are in the way. most people notch the taurus shroud to clear the hoses, I heated mine to clear

 

Steve-

The distance from the core to the fan must be set up so that there is even pressure (in this case negative pressure) across the face of the core. If the fan is placed too close, some areas near the fan will have increased neg press, other places will have reduced neg pressure. The ultimate example of too close is the aftermarket 14" pusher zipped through the rad core. The key question is how far back will equalize the neg pressure, thus equalize the flow. Once the fan is far enough back to equalize, there is no advantage to moving it further back.

The minimum spacing of the fan from the core is an easy calculation. Generally, there needs to be a minimum ratio between the heat exchanger area and the free air area. That ratio is 2:1. This ratio can be used to determine the fan setback required to equalize flow. A couple of years ago when I was planning to develop a custom cooling fan for another car platform, I developed a fan shroud calculator.

You can plug in the dimensions of the core and the diameter of the fan. You will find the minimum setback from the radiator core and the percentage of fan opening to radiator area.

 

Airflow through the engine bay is an interesting subject.

We get higher pressure zone in front of the air inlet in the bumper.

We get lower pressure under the car.

We get higher pressure under the hood (fan pressurizes the engine bay)

Air flows from higher to lower pressure, ie. pressure gradients.


Turbulence disrupts airflow.


Observation:

The efan is aimed up at 45* angle towards the top of the engine bay to the hood, blowing up over the motor then down and out the openings at the lower back of the bay.

The stock fan is blowing horizontal towards the motor and mostly towards the exit of the engine bay.

Hypothesis:

Perhaps the direction of the efan flow creates enough turbulence to interfere with the total airflow through the engine bay.

Stated another way, maybe the stock fan creates a less turbulent flow through the engine bay, thus increasing its effectiveness.

Thoughts?

 

so perhaps instead of spacing it could be the angle

how do we explain the v-mount guys?

 

Oh geez, gonna get all sciencey and ****, are we now?

Having just looked at my rad in situ, angling the shroud to orient the fan at vertical would be the simplest way to do it.
Seems that most of them run extractor hoods, don't they?

 

simple answer to your question, find a modular fan core that fits just inside the stock fan shroud and screw it to the frame of the shroud. i have one just like that sitting around here somewhere that someone gave me, i haven't tested it because i have a FMIC sitting in front of my radiator versus in front of the car so space is an issue.

 

Intuitively this seems reasonable, but in practice...not so much.
Don't forget that the waterpump snout fits right up into the shroud opening, so the efan must be recessed into the shroud.

In an of itself, this is no big deal but a problem does exist in the shape of the shroud at the top. As the fan is recessed it starts to bottom out at a blank wall for a healthy section of the top.

For me at least, the stock shroud is a non-starter because it doesn't fit my Godspeed radiator anyway (endtanks instead of top/bottom).
I just returned from the junkyard...no Villager fans to be had.
Instead I got another Volvo fan (using one on the swapped FD to good effect) and will see how weird it might be to use it.

 

true, i did notice that the shroud was cut and about 2" taken off and resin was used to put it back together. that all does seem like a bit of work but it is an alternative.

 

Sciencey. I like it.

 

i dont think in this thread i read once what model and year we were pulling these fans from. my local junk yard guys dont let you wander around very easily, so it would be helpfull if we got a official year and model.

thanks

 

Mercury villager or a nissan quest late 90s
I got mines from a mercury villager 98 v6

 

From the other fan thread.

 

Okay seriously. I need to figure this out. I have an s4 vert with an s5 alternator. I pulled the rubber seal thats on the aft side of the hood, so the hot air is pulled out and runs along my windsheild (helps with defrost because it's been known to rain up here once in a while lol). I have a koyo radiator, and I want a fan(s) setup that big enough. Tourus fan didn't work that well...

 

I just got one of these at the local junk yard, for $38 to install on a buddy's FC. I was on the way out, and saw another one lying against the van already taken out so i got that one too. If someone wants it, let me know.

I was curious: the thermoswitch on all my other cars tells the fans when to kick in. The FC has a mechanical fan, soooo, why does it have a thermoswitch? What does it switch?