What is best cooling setup. I ran just the mechanical fan at the last Road Atlanta event and it stayed cool until my water pump went out. Anyone check how much power the mechanical fan takes away on the dyno. I have the fan and radiator out right now so I was thinking of putting in 2 850 cfm fans and removing the stock fan.
Cooling fans
jlevie
#2
I’ve run a 16" 1400CFM puller fan (not sufficient), a 14" 1800CFM pusher fan (barely sufficient) and a 16" 2300CFM puller fan (completely sufficient). While the 14" pusher fan was the easiest to mount and proved to be sufficient, I switched to a 16" 2300CFM puller on the new car. Partly because the oil cooler I mounted in front of the radiator was in the way of a pusher and partly because the 14" fan struggled in a red flag situation. The 2300CFM fan has had no problems keeping the system temps within reason in that case.
turbo329is
#4
I have my old a/c fan still mounted to the condenser, but that thing is super heavy and can’t flow that well. I think I would rather stick with the mechanical fan. I also like these.
http://www.summitracing.com/parts/PRM-19010/
The cfm is actualy 1250 not 2100. 2 of them would work nicely as pullers if they fit. They are also out of stock till mid august.
Ranger
#7
The charm of pusher fan is that it’s out of the way of the front of the engine.
You have to look beyond size and CFM because there’s other variables that can have a big input. I bought a little 14" fan some months ago and installed it. Didn’t work with a damn. It didn’t have any standoff between fan blades and radiator, and it didn’t have any stationary vanes in that standoff.
A properly designed fans has stationary vanes that redirect the rotary flow of air into linear flow. That makes the air flow thru the radiator, instead of just spinning around on it’s surface.
With the fan sitting on your workbench it will feel like it pushes air out just fine. But once you put it on the flat surface of your radiator, the absence of stand-off and stationary vanes is going to tell.
In both pusher and puller configs, my cheap fan didn’t work worth a spit. So I put my AC aux fan back on, and it works fine. The aux fan has both stand-off and stationary vanes.
jlevie
#8
turbo329is wrote:
The fan that I’m using now is a 16" SPAL rated (as I recall for 2300CFM). I got it from Bimmerworld.
A puller that powerful is a tight fit between the radiator and the engine. Coming up with a mount will require fabrication of something. Don’t be tempted to use the through the rad type mounts. My one experience with those destroyed a brand new radiator in a few track weekends.
rrroadster
#9
Jim, the BW recommended fan for the E30 is Spal model number 30100400. It is a 16" puller rated @ 1300 CFM. Is that the one you’re using? Or did you manage to shoe horn the 30102120 @ 2360 CFM in between the block and radiator (1.32" thicker than the 30100400)?
I’m with Ranger, I’d prefer a pusher to a puller for sake of retaining working room in the engine bay. I’ll probably start looking to see if I can fit a 30102047(2360 CFM pusher) in my car.
I drove at CMP the weekend of 6/23 for 3 days with no fans. You just had to watch your temps in grid. I’ll be doing Comp School @ VIR in a couple of weeks and don’t want to have to worry about temps while going through the drills.
turbo329is
#10
I assumed that he was talking about the 2360cfm fan. The Spal website lists it at 3250 m3/h which I converted to only 19xx cfm.
I am thinking maybe this one. http://www.jegs.com/i/Be-Cool-Radiators/134/75001/10002/-1?parentProductId= It is also listed at 2360 cfm but it is thinner than the spal. I could not find the specs on the be cool website to verify.
I decided to get my priorities straight, and this is not one of them so the mechanical fan will go back on for now. I think I probably destroyed the ac fan trying to get it off the evaporator so it isn’t an option anymore.
jlevie
#12
rrroadster wrote:
[quote]Jim, the BW recommended fan for the E30 is Spal model number 30100400. It is a 16" puller rated @ 1300 CFM. Is that the one you’re using? Or did you manage to shoe horn the 30102120 @ 2360 CFM in between the block and radiator (1.32" thicker than the 30100400)?
I’m with Ranger, I’d prefer a pusher to a puller for sake of retaining working room in the engine bay. I’ll probably start looking to see if I can fit a 30102047(2360 CFM pusher) in my car.
I drove at CMP the weekend of 6/23 for 3 days with no fans. You just had to watch your temps in grid. I’ll be doing Comp School @ VIR in a couple of weeks and don’t want to have to worry about temps while going through the drills.[/quote]
I used the 30102120 fan. It is a tight fit, but can be made to work.
A pusher fan is the best solution. Just leave room between the fan and radiator (at least 1") to avoid choking the fan. If not for the non-OE oil cooler that I mounted in front of the radiator, I’d have used a pusher rather than a puller.
Think big when it comes to the fan. The worst case is a red flag event when you have to bring the car to a stop with a big heat load in the engine. “Just enough” for idling on the grid may be woefully short in that case.
King_Tut
#14
I removed the mechanical fan and the AC setup and then mounted a 16" pusher to the front of the radiator. It is just a cheap one from the local auto parts store. I wired it to the low temp switch so it only comes on once the car gets up to temps and it needs to come on. It rarely ever comes on though, normally only while I drive slowly back to my parking spot in the pits at the track. I like it because I have tons of room in the engine bay to access things on the front of the engine.
Steve_D
#15
jlevie wrote:
[quote]turbo329is wrote:
The fan that I’m using now is a 16" SPAL rated (as I recall for 2300CFM). I got it from Bimmerworld.
A puller that powerful is a tight fit between the radiator and the engine. Coming up with a mount will require fabrication of something. Don’t be tempted to use the through the rad type mounts. My one experience with those destroyed a brand new radiator in a few track weekends.[/quote]
I am running a 16" pusher (Spal, I believe) mounted to an aluminum rad using through-the-rad mounts. Not sure what the issue is with those, but I am 2 years into it with this configuration and have had no problems.
The aluminum rad seems like a small price to pay for engine insurance.
In the South, you need a good rad and a good fan. Or an engine hoist.
donstevens
#17
Steve D wrote:
[quote]mcmmotorsports wrote:
Madooski -
Pantas said “no fans”, not “no fan”.[/quote]
Clever play on words 
rrroadster
#18
I just completed mechanical installation of a Spal 30102047(2360 CFM pusher)In the front of my car. Here’s a couple of pics.
For simplicity, I’d just like to connect it to the stock radiator T-stat. Anybody got pics/instructions for that? I’m getting short on time.
jtower
#20
rrroadster wrote:
sooner or later you’ll learn not to make statements like this on this forum