How to Remove & Test an Electric Cooling Fan

Video Transcript

In this clip we're going to talk about the proper way to remove and replace an electronic cooling fan. In this step we're going to go over the proper service procedure for removal of the actual cooling fan assembly. And we're going to go over the test procedure for a used cooling fan assembly. The reason why I like to use a used cooling fan assembly. These part are not cheap, they're extremely expensive. You can spend upwards two to three hundred dollars for the fan assembly. Now if you can find one in a junk yard on a particular vehicle that happened to be wrecked in the rear, the cooling fan is going to be in great shape. What you're going to do is take and slide the cooling fan out, you're going to want to be extremely gentle, again, this stuff is made of Bakelite plastic. Which is extremely brittle. And right there that is the proper way to remove your cooling fan and we'll get into testing the junk yard cooling fan in a moment. Alright, I'm going to grab my used cooling fan assembly, as you can see the fans blades here. The first thing you're going to want to check before you install a possibly defective cooling fan is that the motors actually turn. A lot of times what happens to these being that they're in front of the vehicle, they take the brunt of any rain, or snow, or road debris that you drive through in your course of driving. What that'll do is take and seize up the bearings inside the cooling fan. You're going to want to make sure that they turn freely and there's not excessive play in the fan drive shaft. What you'll do is grab a hold of the hub, and wiggle it back and forth. Now a very slight amount of play is nominal and won't cause any trouble. We're going to check the other one, right here. What we're going to do is the acid test on our cooling fan motors. In order to perform this test, I'm going to take it and lean it up against a piece of wood of my cabinet here, fan blades away from me. Now we're going to take some jumper wires, and send twelve volts to the fan and make sure that it engages and it runs smoothly. Caution, caution, caution, these fan blades are extremely sharp and will cut you. That's why you place the cooling fan away from you, and make sure when you're running your jumper wires, to keep your hands clear of the moving parts. We're only going to be working on the electrical area right here. Like I said, caution, caution, caution. These fan blades will engage, they do carry a decent amount of torque and they're sharp. Alright, what I have here are some jumper wires, I have one hooked up to the positive of the battery, I'll use some vice grips to hold it on. And again one hooked up to the negative side of the battery. Now caution, caution, these are hot wires now and will spark if you arc them together. So make sure not to touch any of the other components on the vehicle. What I'm going to do is take and hook up the powering ground from the engine battery, to my fan motor. And my fan motor has several connectors on it, one of these is positive, one is negative. It doesn't specifically matter which one you hook up, if you have them backwards the polarity change will cause the fan to turn backwards. But all we're looking for is to establish the operation of the motor. What I'm going to do is just take and set the wires inside the connectors for a brief second, just going to hook up the positive and bump the negative, just so. If the fan motor engages, that will verify the integrity of it for you. As I'm going to hook up the positive here, and the negative and bump the motor. And one more time. And again you can see how the fan blade is spinning, keep your hands clear. You're going to want to lean it blades away from you, you can see this protective grate here, do not put your hands anywhere inside this circular area, because they will get caught by the fan blades. You're going to go ahead and rotate your cooling fan assembly, and test the secondary cooling motor prior to installation. Just like so, going to take my jumper wires and again engage the secondary cooling fan. And as you can see I'm just bumping it. And one more time. That is the proper way to test your cooling fan motors, both primary and secondary, and the proper way to remove your cooling fan motor from the vehicle.

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