I've got a friend with a 1990 4 Runner with a V6 who said that his fan has started rubbing and hitting the fan shroud under acceleration.

Any idea what's broken? I'm pretty much a 4 Runner newbie, so I'm not sure.

Thanks.

 

Wow, depending on what part of the shroud is being hit it could be a bad motor mount. As tourque is applied to has a tendancy to pull upward on the right side motor mount. This would make the whole engine twist up and to the left and the left of the fan shroud would contact the fan. That's a worst case deal. Maybe a bolt that holds the radiator in place is missing and it shifted to one side somehow.

 

I am not sure if that model has one but, it could be a bad fan clutch. When the clutch goes south, it tends to run the fan "out of round".

 

It apparantly is worse than a motor mount or a shifted radiator. From what I understand, the fan can actually be "jiggled" around, like something is loose.

He just called and said that as he was pulling into work it all let go. The belt came off and the fan is AFU. I'm going to go look at it during lunch and see if can tell what's going on.

 

Fan clutch and water pump replacement sould fix it. This involves disconnecting one timing belt so you may want to replace those while at it if they are in questionable condition .