During a ride yesterday, I started hearing a grinding noise when the fan came on. Thought a bearing was going. Pulled the fan off today to see a gouge in the rad fins. The fan bearing seemed OK. No slop and it spun smoothly. I filed the surround of the blades down a little and added some high temp weather stripping. Can't really figure out what the problem was to begin with though. Any thoughts? Thanks.

 

If you say the bearings and fan blade seem O.K., is it a possibilty you got a piece of debris in there? I guess the question is, was the noise constant, and is it still doing it. Of course the vets on this forum will probably come back w/ some quirk or known problem about this and fill you in. My company does alot of ac work, and usually when there's a ding/scruff in the radiator like that, the culprit is either the fan blade working loose of the shaft, the mounting system failing, **** poor prior installation, or debris caught in the fan...

 

Check to make sure that your lower rad bracket is attached. There are (2) 10mm bolts on the front of the motor with associated brackets (one for each side) that hold the radiators. Make sure they are there and that the bolts are tight.

 

I've heard of rocks hitting and even jamming the fan. If a blade is cracked or chiiped it could make it run unbalanced and make noise but not necessarily.

To prevent such an occurance I'm currently fabing a fan guard similar the the oil cooler guard shown attached. I'll eventually post pics of my fan guard.

 

Hi Hammer,
Yeah, it's possible it was debris. It happened for a short time on Thursday or Friday. Spun the fan by hand with no wierd sound or grinding. Then is came back in a big way on Saturday. There was a section of the fan that looked worn down too. That was the section that was closest to the radiator (the part of the fan that encases the blades on the outside).

 

Hi Greg,
Is this the radiator bracket you're talking about? I had to remove it when I took the fan assembly out and it wasn't loose. Put it back in with some locktite.

 

Sounds like you found it. Glad to hear it...

 

GW, yep, that's the one. Hmmm, if it was tight then I'm at a loss. Maybe it WAS debris.