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radiator fan issue

vs2nvi

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hi,
was doing my radiator bleeding today and noticed, when my car is running the fan wont kick in till its about 3/4 of the way to Hot on the temp gauge in the car.... im not sure weather gauge is fault or thats normal or if my thermostat is boned... but in traffic it tends to be hot (i personally thought due to no fresh air) on freeway perfect never over half way, but stationary today i just noticed waiting and waiting for fan to kick in and it did when 3/4 of the way to hot...

any info would be appreciated.
Thanks
 

justbad4you

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BRETTJJJ has got it covered in this post > take a read>>>http://forums.justcommodores.com.au...or-fan-no-workee-i-have-tried-everything.html
hi,
was doing my radiator bleeding today and noticed, when my car is running the fan wont kick in till its about 3/4 of the way to Hot on the temp gauge in the car.... im not sure weather gauge is fault or thats normal or if my thermostat is boned... but in traffic it tends to be hot (i personally thought due to no fresh air) on freeway perfect never over half way, but stationary today i just noticed waiting and waiting for fan to kick in and it did when 3/4 of the way to hot...

any info would be appreciated.
Thanks
 

hako

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hi,
was doing my radiator bleeding today and noticed, when my car is running the fan wont kick in till its about 3/4 of the way to Hot on the temp gauge in the car.... im not sure weather gauge is fault or thats normal or if my thermostat is boned... but in traffic it tends to be hot (i personally thought due to no fresh air) on freeway perfect never over half way, but stationary today i just noticed waiting and waiting for fan to kick in and it did when 3/4 of the way to hot...

any info would be appreciated.
Thanks

This is completely normal - when the car is stationary there is no cooling airflow thru the radiator and the engine will increase its temp till it reaches about 3/4 gauge then fan will kick in and the gauge will drop to about 1/3 and fan will turn off.
When the car is moving you have a continual flow of cooling air thru the radiator.
The Ecotoc is designed to run relatively hot, which is why they run a 1.35Kpa radiator cap which is pretty high. The higher operating temperature improves economy and decreases pollutants.
IF the engine does overheat, it will reach the top of the gauge and just before it does this the warning chime will sound. I've only heard this once when my waterpump seized - gauge went rapidly from half to full then warning chime sounded....switched off immediately and avoided any damage.
 

justbad4you

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yes hako is right i had the same on my last vs always kicked in at 3/4 and dropped to 1/4 ( lot lower on my v8>the v8 never goes of 1/4 even on a 40plus day with the aircon on it just dont budge thanks god )
This is completely normal - when the car is stationary there is no cooling airflow thru the radiator and the engine will increase its temp till it reaches about 3/4 gauge then fan will kick in and the gauge will drop to about 1/3 and fan will turn off.
When the car is moving you have a continual flow of cooling air thru the radiator.
The Ecotoc is designed to run relatively hot, which is why they run a 1.35Kpa radiator cap which is pretty high. The higher operating temperature improves economy and decreases pollutants.
IF the engine does overheat, it will reach the top of the gauge and just before it does this the warning chime will sound. I've only heard this once when my waterpump seized - gauge went rapidly from half to full then warning chime sounded....switched off immediately and avoided any damage.
 

fireballv8

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on my vs the fan wont switch on till two notches from the top, and switches off just below the second last notch, thats way to high for me, and I've changed sensors and all that stuff.... Is the computer adjustable? can ya make it turn the fan on at a lower temp ?
 

tezza

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Instead of mucking around the guages etc, its best to see what temprature the car is running at. If its within the factory range, then there is no need to go mucking around with sensors etc.
 

BerlinaBoy

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What tezza said - need to check the actual values rather than what the numberless guage says. While probably not likely, your guage could have shifted calibration or at least be different to others.
 

fireballv8

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I have changed the sender unit, to see if it was faulty, no different, I tried a different gauge- shows the same, tested the fan relays according to the w/s manual, all good, it just seems to turn the fan on way to close to red hot. I suppose the next thing to do is somehow install another temp gauge (I've got a VDO gauge in the shed), and see if the fan comes on at 103c .
 
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Brett_jjj

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Ive read on here before of a guy who fitted a new temp gauge sender to his VS,and it made his temp gauge read up to 3/4 instead of half way,he took it back to holden and they gave him a different sender unit.Apparently there was a revised temp gauge sender unit relesed to fix the VS temp gauge from reading high.My VSV6 only gets to half way on the gauge, and the cooling fan cuts in and drops it to below a quarter.On the highway it sits at the second mark on the gauge.Even lower on cool nights.But around town it only gets to half way at the most.I wouldnt like my temp gauge sitting at 3/4 or more.It doesnt leave much room for error.The cooling fan on/off temps can be adjusted in the memcal.Ive had a bit of a play around with them before ,but Ive now got it set back to the standard settings,which works fine if theres no other cooling system faults etc.
 
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