Ritzy4Runner

iTrader: (1)

Good morning all, have run into a bit of a snag. I need some help as I do not know where to hook some of this fan up to the controller. I have the following leads:

RED-Hot (I got that one figured out)
ORANGE- positive side of fan (yep)
BLUE- When using dual fans is hooked to second positive
GREEN- A/C clutch positive
BLACK- Ground (another no brainer)

Two of these are straight forward RED and BLACK
ORANGE- I have decided that I will only be using the slow speed on this fan so I am going to hook ORANGE to the smaller slow speed wire of the Taurus fan.
BLUE- Should I just insulate this lead and the do the same for the fan FAST speed?
GREEN- Now this one has me puzzled. I don't have a FSM yet (its in the mail) so do I need to route this lead out to the A/C fan and connect to the hot side of the fan or do I need to hook this up to the A/C compressor clutch? Really have no clue on this one.

Thats it for now, will just need to figure this part out, lengthen the probe wire so reach the inlet side of the radiator. Hey and how do you keep the probe from falling out? Use some sort of glue, putty what? Another puzzler. Thanks

Ritzy4Runner

iTrader: (1)

Well I have had a bunch of looks but no one seems to have ever put one of these in .... (read that as no responses) This is for sure where I thought I would get some response, everyone must be out somewhere. Well I can't wait, I gotta get this done so I hope I don't fry this thing. Will update the status as it occurs

Tofer

your guesses sound good to me. thats what i would do. i am planning on doing the Taurus fan pretty soon too.

mt_goat

Are these the colors of the controller wires? If so, didn't that controller come with instructions? You mention a FSM, what truck do you have?

I just made a little space in the fins of the radiator and pushed the probe in and it stays there without anything.

Ritzy4Runner

iTrader: (1)

Yes the controller did come with intsructions and I listed them in my post, but it says one wire (green) goes to the A/C clutch?? I have no idea what that means as I asked in my post. I have a 1995 4Runner. I wasn't sure EXACTLY where and what wire in my toyota hooks to the green wire of the controller. I have no idea what they mean by the A/C clutch and what wire that is. I wanted someone who has already done this to exsplain precisely where they hooked up the A/C control wire. Thanks

DirtCheap

The A/C clutch wire is the single wire on the compressor.

mt_goat

Oh ok, what controller are these instruction for?

Yeah it would be for the AC clutch, because some trucks (like mine) don't even have an AC fan. I guess it might work fine hooking it up to the fan unstead of the AC clutch though. Doesn't the AC fan turn on when ever the AC clutch does? The whole point is to get the radiator fan to come on when ever the AC is running. The one wire that goes to the AC clutch carries the signal that starts and runs the AC. There is only one wire because the AC compressor itself is grounded to the engine block and doesn't need a ground wire.

Ritzy4Runner

iTrader: (1)

Thanks for the input but my compressor is located down under the power steering pump and the wire in the back is not accessible. I sure do not look forward to ever having to work on that compressor. I was even under the truck and I can not even get my hand up there to even try to get behind the compressor. I will have to check the A/C fan as I just adjusted the controller (Torqflow) and took the truck for a test drive.

I don't know what temp it is set for now as I did a very slight adjustment and the temp now goes right up to just the left of the temp bulb on the gauge and is staying right there. Stopped after about 10 minutes of driving, popped the hood and the fan still have not kicked on. I let it run for a few more minutes at idle and the outside air temp right now is over 80 degrees. The hoses are pretty tight from internal pressure when I shut the engine down. I let it sit for about 5 minutes and checked the temp guage and it still seems to be at the same spot. I guess I will need to let it cool down a bit, pull the radiator cap and then start up the engine so the coolant can come up to temp and use a candy thermometer to check coolant temp.

Any other suggestion for checking the coolant temP?

I would like the fan to come on at about 185, and I have read that there seems to be a few different settings for th OEM thermostat. I called Toyota parts here locally and they said it was 180 for all the ones they carried ins stock.

Any other suggestions would be really appreciated. I do have this set up to come on after engine shutdwon and yesterday when set to factory of 160 (so they stated in the instructions) and after the engine got up to temp the fan was running and moving some serious air. I shut down and the fan ran for about 45 seconds then shut down for about 2-3 minutes, came back on for about 20 seconds and then off again. It did this only one more time.

Still looking for a ignition source in the engine compartment as I don't want to have to route another wire into the cab and try to get to the fuse box, pulling that dash and side panel off is a pita. Ok guys we're almost there, THANKS!

Marc P

Do you know anyone with an infared thermometer? I am going outside now to get you a pic of the a/c wire....

I took some pics, but they are hard to see. The a/c wire thoughcomes down the main loom on the passenger front of the engine. It is a black wire with a white/lt grey stripe. It has a plug in connection about 1/2 way down to the comressor. Mine is tapped just a few inches down the harness. I will e-mail you the pics I took.

Ritzy4Runner

iTrader: (1)

:bigclap: For all of you who have helped especially to MarcP (dude, you're my hero! ), mt_goat, bamachem, thanks. Your help and encouragement helped me to get over the hump on this one guys! THANK YOU!
Marc your pictures were worth a thousand words. Looked at the surrounding equip in your pics, looked at my engine bay and knew where I needed to look and sure enough, it WAS easy to install the 'GREEN' A/C wire. Works GR8!

Now for those of you who are going or thinking about doing this mod, ( toferUOP take notes!) there are a few things I learned as I was doing this.

1) Plan on it taking longer then a few hours! Murphy's Law will come into play. I started on Friday afternoon and finished up Sunday around 8pm

2) If you haven't done an Aux Fuse panel, DO IT! It will save you headaches in the long run and you will be very glad you did it, trust me!. It gave me a perfect location to connect the power input for the controller and didn't have to worry about routing a wire seperately to the battery.

3) If you consider this mod, plan on taking the radiator out just like bamachem recommended. You can do it with it installed and infact I did have it somewhat installed and was preparing to use the mounting tiewraps and opted to use 'brackets' to mount the fan instead. Just didn't seem to be very 'solid' holding that fan with plastic going through the radiator fins. Best thing I did. If you want to see what I did, I will be happy to show and explain it, super simple and well worth the extra effort.

4) If you have the skid plate installed, remove it first and then as you're taking the radiator out, replace your hoses. Simple but in the end, very cost effective. I also cleaned up the skid plate and repainted it a nice bright red.

5) Hooking the A/C control wire to the A/C aux fan didn't work. Seems somehow there is 12V sitting on the connector, when I tapped into the wire, the fan came on. Go with the tap into the black/white wire. Once I found it (way to go MarcP) was soo easy I was shaken my head. It is located above the compressor and right behind the power steering pump. You will see a single black/white stripe wire that has a connector about 1/2 way down to the A/C compressor exactly like MarcP said!

6) Really think out and give serious consideration to the location of the controller. You can cut the wires and lengthen them, but to do it correctly you will need to solder in the new wires and use shrink wrap. Not only will you be concerned with engine compartment temp but you will need to consider being able to get to the controller to adjust the temp setting. I have to take the battery hold down off and move the battery away from the mounting location enough to get a very small screw driver in to adjust the poteniometer. Not optimum, but it did work and I didn't have to cut wires or alter the probe sensing line.

I mounted the controller on the right inside fender well outboard the battery. Maybe not the best location, but it is near the right headlight bucket and there is airflow around it. This location gave me just the right amount of distance so I didn't need to cut and splice wires. Difficult to adjust the temp on the Controller but there are trade offs to everything.

7) I also decided to mount the temp probe from the FRONT of the radiator. My instructions said to place the probe high in the radiator and near the inlet, so mine is about 2-rows of fins down and about 1/2 from the inlet pipe. Multiple reasons for the placement of the probe in this location.

8) When you pull the radiator there is foam around the upper lip of the radiator. When I reinstalled the radiator with the new fan mounted, I pulled a corner piece off at the right upper corner. This is right next to where I inserted the probe as stated above in 7

After using an awl to lightly enlarge the space between the fins, gently press the probe int o position. Be careful so you don't over do the space between the fins with the Awl. The probe will slip in with a slight amount of pressure. You may hear or feel a popping sound. This is the fnis giving way to the insertion of the probe. Align the back end of the probe to the back edge of the radiator.

My Controller instructions said not to have it past the thickeness of the radiator. I then used the foam piece I removed and wrapped it around the wire end of the probe to help hold it in place. Then push the radiator back into position, bolted it back up and now the probe will be held firmly inplace and protected.

9) Temp setting-If you have one of those old style meat cooking thermometers, this will work really well. What I used. Mine went up to 200 degrees. You need to place the bulb of the thermometer in direct contact with the inlet pipe/top of the radiator housing. If you have something that will hold the thermometer in place gr8, but be careful as you can melt stuff like tape.

It tracked temp right up. Remember to keep checking your engine temp. After about 10 minutes, you can shut down the engine. You may have sufficient cooling to keep the temp from going too high but be watchful. I shut down the engine around 180+ and watched the thermometer. When it got to 185 I monitored the temp until it seemed to be decreasing. I then adjusted the pot on the controller just so the fan would come on. Job done!

I did take some pics of the brackets, and fan clearance with the pulley and the A/C tap. As for the brackets here's another little tip. With the radiator out of the truck and resting on the ground, you can place the fan directly on the radiator and then use the one screw that lines up with the one hole on the fan shroud and radiator. Mark the location of the other 3 OEM screw mounts on the fan shroud. You will need to do some trimming of the shroud for flush screw placement.

I picked up a couple of pieces of joist strapping material at Lowe's (68 cents each). They were about 6 inches long and 2" wide with small holes for nailing. Bend the strapping in a vice if you have one so it is in an L shape. Make the strap about about 1" deep for the first bend, then allow about 1.5 " for the mount to the radiator. I used #8 sheet metal screws and then predrilled the holes in the shroud after marking their location through the holes in the strapping. Screws are mounted from the outside edge of the shroud into the strapping. I then used some JB Quik Weld around each screw. This way they will not come out.

Once I figure out how to add pictures to the posts I will, but if you wish to see the pics email me.

If anyone is consdiering this mod, and you would like to see the pics of my install, please feel free to email me and I will be happy to share my experience and the pics. I will be leaving for Southern California from Seattle this coming weekend and will give you a report on how the mod performed. Until then .... THANK YOU to ALL who helped me. That is what this forum is all about! ritz

mt_goat

Hey good work! Yeah I forgot how Toyota switches everything on the ground side. That must be why the + AC fan wire was hot all the time.