Taurus fan on Champion radiator

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71duster06

71duster06

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Good morning everyone,

A few years back i installed a 3-core champion radiator for my 340. Since the old design did not allow use of the original fan shrough and fan i installed a generic 16" electric fan with no shroud. Overall that worked fine and would run at just over 190 when it was in the 90's.

I picked up a fan/shroud from a 93' Taurus to further improve this setup and so far its turning out nice. After the perimeter tabs are cut off and a little trimming the shroud fits perfect on the radiator. Still in progress so i will add pictures of the clearance to the water pump pully soon.

Here is what it looks like so far...
 

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A few more pics of the fan shroud install.

I ended up just removing the radiator to flush it and will be easier to install the mounting brackets. should have those on tonight...

The spacing from the water pump pulley is about 5/8" to the side of the electric motor but it gets close to the fan shroud directly in front of the pulley. I am actually shifting the entire radiator to the drivers side about a 1/4" too since it wasnt exactly center when i first installed it. upon that and the final mounting i will have about 1/2" spacing from the shroud. Looks like this is going to work out very nice...

Also this is just a single speed fan motor
 

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What size radiator is that your using 22' or 26' or something else. I'm shopping for a Rad/Fan combo for my 70 duster 360 and leaning towards the champion 22 inch 3 core rad, and would like to use the taurus fan if possible.

BTW nice work.
 
I installed the fan and shroud yesterday and took it out for a drive (wires are now hidden and cleaned up unlike the picture). Just like before while moving the car stays right at 180 so nothing changed there. now when the car was running in the driveway i let it creep up to 205ish and then turned the fan on. after 10-15 seconds i could see the temp guage dropping again and after sitting for 2 min it was down to 185 again while sitting.

Overall pretty happy. Now i have an unrelated charging issue. Hope this helps with others looking for a cheap solution for a fan/shroud combo. as you can see it has plenty of room from the water pump pulley too.

FYI... this is the 22" 3-core champion radiator.
 

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Just make sure you get the one for the 3.8 liter engine. The 3.0 is different and has a void down in the lower corner. It looks to me like they are the same for 90-95 years and shared by Taurus, Sable and Continentals with the 3.8 (according to my own research anyways).
Hoping to score one soon for myself!
 
MobileCustoms said:
Just make sure you get the one for the 3.8 liter engine. The 3.0 is different and has a void down in the lower corner. It looks to me like they are the same for 90-95 years and shared by Taurus, Sable and Continentals with the 3.8 (according to my own research anyways).
Hoping to score one soon for myself!
Click to expand...

Correct. The shroud perimeter is very close to 22" x 17".
 
I don't mean to generate worry but I have to share what I know. That fan in the Taurus would randomly fail to start. Fault is typical for every electric motor on a Ford, power window motors included. A touch/bump/smack will get them to run on and off again until they take a notion to fail again. So if this is the 21 year old fan assembly from a donor, I'm sure its not a OEM motor. I would buy a new motor for it today.
 
Could you please take some close up shots of how the electric fan is mounted to the radiator? I am running the exact same radiator on my 70 Dart. How did you wire it?
 
The 90-95 Taurus cars are getting harder and harder to find in the local yards, so yesterday afternoon spent some time looking at other cars at the local u-pull-it.
I found the identical fan assembly on a 99 Ford Contour as pictured in this thread and scored it for $16.00. It just has different mounting tabs but they get cut off anyways.
Looks like a perfect fit on my Champion 22" radiator! Once the outer edge of the shroud is trimmed down a little it will be a total thickness of about 3 1/4 inch where the engine pulley would sit, which gives it clearance on my Barracuda at least.


Looks like they are the same for '95-'99 4 cylinder Contours. That provides a lot more chances to find one on the cheap!
The 6 cyl. car uses a different dual fan setup.

Hope this helps some others.

-Doug
 

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Pretty sure the Taurus fan draws about 40 amps on full tilt boogie. Your stock alternator probably had a stroke trying to keep up!

I hope you are using Relay's and pulling power straight from the battery. If you are going through the bulkhead you are asking for major problems.
 
Mad Dart said:
Pretty sure the Taurus fan draws about 40 amps on full tilt boogie. Your stock alternator probably had a stroke trying to keep up!

I hope you are using Relay's and pulling power straight from the battery. If you are going through the bulkhead you are asking for major problems.
Click to expand...


True... but I think the fan actually draws more like 25-30 steady amps once it is running. I have an upgraded charging system along with the bulkhead/ammeter bypass/upgrade. I also converted the old amp gauge to a volt meter.

I noticed while pulling the electric fan assembly out of the Contour that it had a 70 amp relay that it used.
 
MobileCustoms said:
True... but I think the fan actually draws more like 25-30 steady amps once it is running. I have an upgraded charging system along with the bulkhead/ammeter bypass/upgrade. I also converted the old amp gauge to a volt meter.

I noticed while pulling the electric fan assembly out of the Contour that it had a 70 amp relay that it used.
Click to expand...

Add an electric fuel pump, other accessories and a stock alternator is done, especially at Idle. I know this for sure. I just put a 100amp alt on my scamp, big difference in how the fuel pump sounds at idle too!

Mine too has the bypass and wiring mods. I had the stereo, Fuel Pump, NOS Fuel Pump, Headlights on and my Volt gauge was showing 8-10V. Put the blinkers on and it bounced under 8v to 10v..... With new 100amp alt I am showing right at 13.8v at idle with everything full tilt boogie.

There is an amp draw chart somewhere on the net that shows all of the factory fans amp and CFM calculations. I will try to find it and post it here.
 
My Taurus fan is steady @ 18-20 amps while running. I also have the electric fuel pump, stereo etc but i did upgrade the wiring to the ammeter and also have the same guage wire going directly from the alt. to the starter relay with a fusable link. still shows a reading one the ammeter but isnt forcing all of the draw through the meter.

Also i updated my 60 amp alt to the 78 amp from NAPA for the 1985 and up LA motors.... works awesome. Noticable improvement at idle... http://www.napaonline.com/Catalog/C...ernator-Remfd-78-Amp/_/R-BSAAL579X_0416309161
 
71duster06 said:
My Taurus fan is steady @ 18-20 amps while running. I also have the electric fuel pump, stereo etc but i did upgrade the wiring to the ammeter and also have the same guage wire going directly from the alt. to the starter relay with a fusable link. still shows a reading one the ammeter but isnt forcing all of the draw through the meter.

Also i updated my 60 amp alt to the 78 amp from NAPA for the 1985 and up LA motors.... works awesome. Noticable improvement at idle... http://www.napaonline.com/Catalog/C...ernator-Remfd-78-Amp/_/R-BSAAL579X_0416309161
Click to expand...

So that's what the single speed fan draws, good info. Pretty sure the 2 speed pulls almost double that, but again it flows 4800CFM or so, lots of air!

Those fans sure look like they were made for that champion radiator after mounting them for damn sure!!
 
Is this how your shroud looked before you trimmed it down? Came from a 94 Taurus.
 

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I downloaded original fan/shroud pic so I can zoom in and noticed my fan is not even close to the same lol anyways I can return it no problem.
 
That fan definitely fits on the Champion better than the radiator I have. I still have a few inches of the radiator that aren't covered by the shroud. With the electric pump, I had to cut away the shroud to fit and shift the fan way to the driver's side. There's about 1/4" between the blades and pump. The fan is quiet and keeps my car decently cool even on the low setting.



 
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