Fan clutch and correct fan direction?

[maybeadinosaur]

Hi GW friends!

I posted a few weeks ago about overheating at idle. I finally grabbed a fan shroud from another member of a FB group, and purchased a new fan clutch from BJ’s. I don’t believe the lack of a fan shroud would consistently cause overheating into the red, so I took your suggestions about the clutch.

Installed both today, will drive soon, get it warmed up and idle to test very soon. In the mean time, I wanted to share this with you and get your opinion.

https://imgur.com/gallery/FNZEhrv

A few guys on FB noted that they think my fan might be backwards. I reinstalled as I pulled it and I thought it was the same in my manual. At the moment, the leading edge is the curved side, on the right and the fan spins clockwise, when looking at the jeep from the front. It’s pulling great airflow as far as I can tell. What do you think?

Also, someone pointed out the blades should partly be in the shroud...I’m guessing my radiator isn’t as thick as the original and therefor the shroud doesn’t come out as far. Is it useless in its current configuration? Maybe I need to get some spacers/washers and readjust to push the shroud out? Different fan clutch?

[lkmarsh]

Can't tell for sure but it looks like the radiator is thinner than stock.
The fan is mounted right, good seven-blade non-flex, clutch looks right,
so... best choice is a longer fan shroud. Or make a sheet metal extension.
Another option is a 1 or 2" spacer and longer pulley studs.
Fan blades should be a third to a half inside the shroud.
I'm not a big fan of open-bottom shrouds, seems self-defeating.

[DarkMonohue]

^What he said. Fan is installed corectly, and these things just don't put the fan very far inside the shroud to begin with. I looked at my J20, which has an OEM-style radiator from BJ's, and only about half an inch of the fan blades are inside the shroud. Yours may be a little off due to a thinner radiator, but the OEM configuration doesn't really seem ideal to begin with, especially considering that the shroud doesn't wrap around the bottom of the fan. Maybe the engineers had a reason to leave the shroud open at the bottom, or maybe it just made the package cheaper or easier to assemble.

Having any shroud is better than no shroud at all. Let us know how it performs with the shroud and the new fan clutch.

Ford Contour electric fans fit the radiator very neatly and are a popular swap. Might be worth a look if you live in a hot area and/or see a lot of traffic congestion or other driving that builds extra heat that the stock setup just can't handle.

http://www.ifsja.org/forums/vb/showthread.php?t=122738

http://www.ifsja.org/forums/vb/showthread.php?t=127293

http://www.ifsja.org/forums/vb/showthread.php?t=179493