kcsoa22

Looking to add an aluminum radiator with an electric fan to my 89 LX. I am assuming I will need to upgrade my alternator to handle the electric fan.

The question is, what Rad, electric fan combo have you had luck with ? I would prefer as much of a direct bolt in as possible. I have heard some bad things about different electric fans out there, so which do you recommend and why?

As for the alternator, standard 3g upgrade? or buy the smaller PA Performance upgrade, that does not require any grinding for $250.00?

Thanks in advance for your input!

86 5.0L

any aluminum radiator(2-row)
Taurus Elec Fan
3G alternator upgrade

FoxGT

I've been running an electric fan & 3g both from an sn95 mustang for over a year with not one problem. Mine is wired to a key-on. Used to have cooling problems with the stock fan, have had none at all with this fan, it moves quite a bit of air.

I did have to modify both of the parts to work a little bit though. For the alternator I had to grind a small piece off the bracket, if you don't have access to any kind of grinder you could do it with a file if you had some time, the aluminum is very weak.

On the fan, it dropped into the old clips on the radiator, but I had to make 2 brackets to fit. I bought two L shaped pieces of metal from lowe's for like 90 cents a piece & bent them to fit with a pair of pliers. Also, the reservoir on the old fanshroud wont bolt to this one. I just zip tied mine to the passenger side fender.

Jfsram

I have an electric fan and a stock charging system with underdrive pulleys.

I'm barely maintaining charge at idle and it's deep discharge when anything like fans, AC or lights are on.

Not worried about it. This scenario is only 5% of my driving. Most of the time I'm not in that situation of idling and fan on. If I am it's only for a few seconds and the other 95% of the time I'm charging. Mine is a true daily driver, traffic jams, winter time, summer with AC and my battery has never went dead.
Just be smart about it and never let it discharge fora super long time.

92cobra

to be honest i really dont know if my car has under drive pullies on it or not. Im assuming it does because at idle my stock volts are pretty low, however when i get moving they shoot up. Either way i do have an electric fan and i can tell you from experience that they can be a little bit of a hassle sometimes. For example if you buy a toggle switch to use with it instead of direct wiring it to your ignition (which in my opinion is better) then you need to make sure the guage of wire you run is big enough to handle it, along with the toggle switch being able to handle it. I wasnt aware of this at first and many toggle switches died on me lol. As far as the charging goes, ive got a new battery and dont have a problem with charging anymore. My old battery was about half dead and would never hold a charge, i jump started that thing more then all vehicles put together in my life haha. So all in all im just letting you know, that if this is going to be a daily driver and your looking for good cooling, go with a tuarus fan from a junk yard, a big toggle switch, and make sure the battery works to the full potential. I am using the stock alternator and have never ever had an issue. Good luck mate, its pretty simple.

stang8689

The 3g alt is easy to install and works great.I have the FFRP aluminum

kcsoa22

Any one tried this fan/rad combo?

http://www.flex-a-lite.com/auto/html/ford-mustang.html[/align][/align]

Jfsram

This is not fault of the toggle switch but fault of not using a relay to carry the high current of the fan motor.

92cobra

actually its the fault of the toggle switch. Some toggle switches can only handle so much. Sometimes you need a bigger toggle switch to handle the job. Trust me, i went through 4 cheap autozone 1.50 small toggle switches until i realized my mech told me i needed a bigger one.

FoxGT

Nothing wrong with running it from key on.

I have mine running on a toggle & the 12v key on.

When the switch is in the on position, the key has to be on for it to run. I can turn it off while the car is running too. It's impossible for the fan to run with the car not in the on position. I found this to be the best setup for my use. Using a temp controlled switch didn't seem like such a good idea because of the high current draw when the motor is first started up.

I would never advise running a toggle switch inside the car on a decent sized electric fan without a relay. That's asking for an electrical fire. My friend tried that with his electric fan even after I told him not to do it. About 3 weeks later his carpet caught on fire & burnt a long line through the carpet & melted a rubber grommet.

I installed a push button starter on another friends car with a relay & one of his friends took the relay out & told him he didn't need it. luckily in his case it only melted the wire & fried the switch.

It really depends on what you want. If you don't mind having a heavy duty switch in the car & don't mind running a decent gauge wire in then you can get by without one. I prefer smaller switches that have some looks.

I bought a bosch relay for mine new I believe I payed like $18 due to the amp rating. & bolted it to the shock tower near where the coil is. If you would prefer not to spend much on the project you can easily go to the junkyard & grab a fuel pump or engine relay off of a car, then put some spade fittings on it. I'm sure those don't cost any more than a dollar or two.

If you need any help wiring it up i'd be happy to help.