Leave fan shroud off?

[Touchdown038]

Alright, I replaced my water pump yesterday, and while doing that I had the fan shroud at because it made the job so much easier to do. Putting it back in, though, made me wonder: what harm would it do if I left the shroud out? It made so much room inside the engine bay with it out. Anyone have any ideas, or even done this? Let me know... thanks.

[trpower7]

It shouldn't hurt it. I run an electric fan with no shroud, so do most people

[Touchdown038]

Sounds good.... where did you get your electric fan at?

[trpower7]

Advance auto parts sells a 16 inch Hayden unit for $75. As long as you are driving a stock KA you shouldn't need more than that. Search for Electric Fan conversion it will yield tons of results and suggestions.

[p00t]

u can get by without a fan shroud but it helps the fan pull air through the radiator. without it at least half the air thats getting pushed by the fans is comming from the space next to them in the engine bay and not through the radiator. making them less efficient. hurray.

tho i do wonder if they restrict flow at 50+mph speeds when air is being blown in from outside instead of through the fans... oh well.

guess i coulda summed it up with: "Fan shrouds help your car cool itself more efficiently when its idling or at slow speeds." :rolleyes

[trpower7]

As long as you don't sit in hot weather in traffic at idle for hours on end you should be ok without the shroud, while it does help the fan pull air it's also there as a dummy device to keep hands from getting chopped off. I'd say that's at least 50% of it's purpose.......

[180fan]

Hey trpower7, you were able to fit a 16" on your radiator? I had an option of getting 2 12" or one 16" but I didn't know that the Hayden 16" would fit so I opted for the 2 12's. How'd you get it to fit? Just slap it on?

[trpower7]

It fits with tons of room to spare. I don't understand how you thought ONE 16 would take up more space than TWO 12s based on math alone. Hayden supplies a mounting set that is something like zip-ties with circular hold downs. You just run those zips through the radiator and secure them on the other side. It's hard to explain over the internet. I bought one 16 because it was just $75 and Hayden says it is suitable to cool from 2.5-3.1L engines.

[180fan]

Well I figured that it was wider than it is tall for the space that lies between the upper and lower portion (the un-finned portion) and thus would support something that's wider than taller. A 16" is all the way around fairly large and wasn't sure if it would fit in that area. The 12"s fit in that spot, but just wasn't sure about the 16"s.

[trpower7]

I think you probably made a good decision, I would have done dual 12s if I'd had the dough. At some point I'll be putting in a huge 3-core Howe unit with dual 12's and one 16 on the opposite side. I'm insane about cooling, I want oil coolers, diff coolers, huge radiators, water wetter, lots of fans, dual rad temp gauges (one at rad inlet, one at outlet), etc.