Re: Fan clutch appears to be the culprit (archive)

Good, glad I could help. Changing out the clutch is easy, but you will need a 32mm thin wrench (cycle stores have them for the steering nut or you can grind down a regular 32mm). The clutch is left-handed. You put the wrench on the thing and give it a sharp knock clockwise (opposite of regular nuts) and it should break free. Then you can spin it off by spinning the fan clockwise.

There were no injuries from the accident. My girlfriend was really upset at the damage to the car and I recall telling her that if she had even broken a finger the damage would have been long forgotten and that it was such a big deal because nothing important was hurt. Cheered her right up! Hey, sometimes even I do something right!

It is entirely possible your temp switch is bad if the AC runs the fan. It is also possible the coolant did not get hot enough for the fan to come on despite being hotter than normal. Put in hot water with thermometer and measure resistance across contacts to check it. They should be cheap.

Neil Deshpande
http://www.neilwerke.com

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Neal and Alex,

Thanks guys for the quick response.

Neal.- I did the newspaper test and the fan stopped immediately. However, I also ran the car idling and the auxiliary fan did not kick as the temp began to rise. It did though, when I turned the AC on (I did the AC test first).

Is it conceivable that there may be also a fault in the Aux fan system? As you mentioned the aux. fan should help keep the temp. down.

The Bentley manual states that there are two temp. switches and relays that control the Aux fan, so I am assuming that one of the switches may be bad since the aux fan does not kick in when the temp begins to rise?

BTW- Nice write up on the accident and subsequent procedures to get the car back in shape. I am glad there were no serious injuries.

Alex.- Did you do the work on the fan clutch yoursel? If so, how much of a hassle? Any tips?

Thanks again,

Armando

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