taurus fan + griffin radiator (1 Viewer)

[jjhancock]

I searched and didn't really find quite the answer I'm looking for, so I apologize if this has been covered already.

My buddy as a 66 fj40 with a sbc that until this weekend was running the stock mechanical fan with the old and I believe original radiator. The shroud was almost non-existent, and the truck wasn't really driveable if you weren't driving on flat roads. So we decided to upgrade the radiator and install a taurus fan (pull style) and get rid of the current fan.

The radiator is a Griffin, 19" x 22", and was just too wide and not deep enough to use the stock radiator cradle. We managed to hack on the radiator cradle and make the radiator fit. The cradle is now 24" wide and when we get some aluminum brackets welded to the radiator it *should* bolt right up and fit just fine. There should be plenty of room for the fan, I believe.

My question is... how exactly do you mount the taurus fan to the radiator cradle? I seem to recall seeing a picture where it looked like the guy had chopped most of the plastic part of the fan and really just had the minimal amount of housing left on it. Is that the way to do it, or do we want as much of the plastic molding as possible because it acts as a sort of shroud being wider than the fan blade diameter itself? The radiator is obviously going to get warm, so does this mean that the fan doesn't actually touch the radiator, rather just hovers closely to it? I have no idea how much heat it would take to melt that plastic, but I also don't want to find out!

It would seem like making up some brackets to keep the fan hovering a very small distance away from the face of the radiator is the likely solution, although that would allow the fan to suck air from around the radiator and not as much through the radiator, which is what we're going for to keep temps reasonable. I'm guessing that mounting two brackets on each side of the fan housing to the cradle will suffice, but I wanted to ask here before I go making any assumptions and botch this up.

This is my first major cruiser project. What do you guys think? Thanks!

 

[cardinal fang]

Don't worry about the plastic on the fan melting. It came off a vehicle where it worked fine bolted to the radiator. The Taurus fan you got does have three wires correct? Low/off/blasting? Use as much as the fan shroud as possible. Use brackets or long steel straps across the radiator to mount it up. On my taurus fan setup I have about 1/2" gap between the shroud and the radiator which intend to cover with rubber. You can cut the plastic so what ever mounting brackets you use, can be recessed into the fan shroud. The fan your referring to that was hacked up was my pighead on the 55 forum here. He got the wrong fan, a pusher, rather than a puller, and put his fan infront of the radiator, so a shroud was of no use. Depending on how much of the fan shroud you keep, the width of the fan is about 5".
Below is a pic of my taurs fan on stock 4 core radiator, not mounted yet.

 

[jjhancock]

Thanks for the info Cardinal... the fan is a two speed, with 3 wires... I don't have it in front of me at this exact moment, but I think it's a tad bit different than the one in the pic you posted, although not much. I also measured 5" for the fan / shroud combo, and I think we've got enough room for it as is without chopping it off. It is cracked a wee bit near the edge right now and has a little piece broken off. I'm thinking we'll cut the plastic down to that point and then keep as much as we can from there... I'm guessing a half inch or so will be all we'd remove.

 

[nuclearlemon]

better make sure whoevers welding on your griffin can weld aluminum/plastic mix...i couldn't find someone in denver (didn't look that hard either though). i bolted my taurus to the cradle and got rid of the griffin. you won't be able to if you widened the cradle. yyou could run bar stock across the back and bolt the shroud to that.

 

[jjhancock]

hmm... I'm a bit confused now. The radiator is aluminum. The cradle is steel. To my understanding, one will corrode the other, which is why you put a sort of rubber motor mount in between them as padding so that they don't actually make contact. My intention was to get brackets welded to the radiator in order for it to mount to the cradle. I was then thinking that the taurus fan would mount to the cradle as well with some sort of L-shaped bracket. Ige, you said:

better make sure whoevers welding on your griffin can weld aluminum/plastic mix...i

I think what I said above makes it so that I'm not welding any aluminum and plastic together. I was planning to bolt the fan bracket to the cradle, and then to the plastic fan housing in a place where there wouldn't be any danger of getting in the fans way. Am I missing something?

 

[dustin]

about the corrosion part- from what I remember, its aluminum against stainless that causes corrosion. regular steel to aluminum is ok.

-Dustin

 

[jjhancock]

cool... nothing is stainless as of now so I should be fine there. Does anybody have some more pics of how they mounted the radiator, cradle, and the taurus fan to share?

 

[1Fine40]

Borrowed these from Texican's excellent tech writeup on P4X4 site...Looks like they were made for a stock size radiator! Drop Butch a line for more data.

 

[nuclearlemon]

hmm... I'm a bit confused now. The radiator is aluminum. The cradle is steel. To my understanding, one will corrode the other, which is why you put a sort of rubber motor mount in between them as padding so that they don't actually make contact. My intention was to get brackets welded to the radiator in order for it to mount to the cradle. I was then thinking that the taurus fan would mount to the cradle as well with some sort of L-shaped bracket. Ige, you said:

better make sure whoevers welding on your griffin can weld aluminum/plastic mix...i

I think what I said above makes it so that I'm not welding any aluminum and plastic together. I was planning to bolt the fan bracket to the cradle, and then to the plastic fan housing in a place where there wouldn't be any danger of getting in the fans way. Am I missing something?

the aluminum that griffin uses is a plastic aluminum mix kinda stuff... a radiator shop can explain it better. harder to weld to than regular aluminum

 

[jjhancock]

Wow, I had no idea it was anything but aluminum. Thanks for the info, Ige. I'm going to start calling around tomorrow and see who I can find that can weld with that plastic aluminum combo. A guy I know told me that he had heard some bad things about a recent run of the be cools, and that griffin was the way to go.

Does anybody have any idea what I should be looking to have to pay to get some brackets welded to this?