New cooling fan installed

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454cid

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I found a good deal on an OEM 11-blade fan on ebay. I got it installed yesterday.... no shroud for now. I've had it off for awhile, as here in MI it's not super necessary.

I already had the original 9-blade fan off the truck from when I did the water pump.

I installed the studs into the water pump with blue Loctite, and then used lock washers under the nuts holding the clutch and blade on. The blade is held on with the original bolts and blue Locktite.

The new blade wobbles a bit just like the old blade. I'm thinking it must not be the blade but the clutch. This is my third clutch and I'm thinking some blade wobble must be normal. This clutch was new 3-ish years ago.

The slightly scary part is that when reving the engine when cold, I can see the blade distort. Later when it was warmed up, I couldn't get the blade to spin that fast, as the clutch was warmed up enough to slip. I hope I don't end up with an exploding fan blade.... I'm sure it'll be fine :crazy:

It doesn't move as much air as I thought it would. Although, it's been awhile since I've had the old fan on, so it's hard to compare the two. It should work fine, Though. I wanted to get some weight off the water pump and the old blade is starting to rust a bit too, even though I've kept it painted.

I took some pictures, but my computer isn't letting me get the pictures off the phone at the moment.... I'll post them when I get that figured out.
 

454cid

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The new blade installed in the first two pictures:

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The next three are the old blade. You can see in the 3rd where the steel hub is starting to rust hwere the aluminum blade attaches. It's been painted a couple of times.

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Here are some pictures of the radiator and brackets for the 454, since I was there taking pictures, and the big radiator has been talked about lately. Notice how the radiator is taller than the core support.

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454cid

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Wild Guess: the smaller fan WITH a shroud, moves more air through the radiator than the bigger fan WITHOUT a shroud.

The original fan is the larger diameter one, and I haven't' had a shroud on the truck in years, so I'm not comparing with and without the shroud. The only change was the fan and some of the hardware.
 

L31MaxExpress

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That 34x19 radiator sits flush with the core support on my van, but prevents the stock air box and factory coolant recovery tank from fitting. I have a new 3500HD 8.1 fan shroud and a duramax fan with a TBSS fan clutch to go on my 8.1 Tahoe. I for the life of me cannot find those mounts though.
 
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