[Healeys] Fan

BJ8Healeys sbyers at ec.rr.com
Wed Dec 31 10:48:21 MST 2014


Roger the Texas Kooler is an all-plastic fan.
The Moss Chinese 6-blade fan may have had the blades riveted to the hub, but
I sent the failed fan and blades to Moss at their request, and then I
removed the intact second fan and sent it to them for financial
consideration in accordance with their bulletin so I have no record of how
it was constructed.  It may or may not have been riveted.  A riveted
construction would be the logical way to assemble a multiblade metal fan,
rather than casting or forming the blades integral with the hub.
I do not see any characteristic paint chips on your fan that would indicate
the beginning of fatigue cracks, but it's hard to tell in the photograph.
If my data is any valid measure, the Moss fan could progress to failure in
only 2500 miles of operation from new.  Of course, Moss should and may have
fixed that problem by now.  I would recommend that you inspect your fan
carefully to be sure there are no paint chips in the roots of the blades
(below where the blades are riveted), and if you find them you should
inspect the fan for actual cracks pretty frequently until you replace it.
If you don't find any paint chips in the roots, I would say that the fan is
O.K.

I think your temp gauge will move toward 230 pretty quickly without any fan
at all.  Eventually, you're going to hit traffic or a congested area and
will need some kind of fan.  Some people add an electric fan as a booster
that they can turn on when needed, but it does provide some resistance to
air flow when it's not operating.

My experience and my opinion is that if your car tends to overheat in hot
weather no fan alone is going to fix it.  What it really needs (assuming the
engine coolant passages aren't gunked up with sediment) is a radiator with a
modern core.

Steve Byers
HBJ8L/36666
BJ8 Registry
AHCA Delegate at Large
Havelock, NC USA

-----Original Message-----
From: Roger Grace [mailto:roggrace at telus.net] 
Sent: Wednesday, December 31, 2014 12:09 PM
To: BJ8Healeys; healeys at autox.team.net
Subject: Re: [Healeys] Fan

Steve,
Thank you - you have good history and records.
I think that my fan is different to the construction you describe ??; it has
a one piece metal spider and each blade is riveted with 5 rivets to it for
about 1/2 of the length of the blade.
See enclosed pix. and hopefully is not the Moss/China one with all the
problems. ?? The blade spacing is symmetrical so it is not the Texas cooler
one.

Your input appreciated.

I am of the opinion that we really only need the help of a fan in slow
traffic and particularly after the engine has been working (increased
losses) after a run at some speed and the oil is really hot. Ideally I would
like to remove it for quietness and to regain a few HP when cruising and
replace with an electric one; however this seems to be a tight fiddly
conversion ...
Anyone with experience doing this...??
rg





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