I've been pleased with an added dashboard switch to manually turn on the
cooling fan, when I see that temp needle climb.

Scott Maurer  (Boise)
almost 80K on my "List assisted" 1.9L rebuild... Thanks again to all!

----- Original Message -----
From: Wade Shen <swade@UMIACS.UMD.EDU>
To: <vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM>
Sent: Wednesday, August 01, 2001 4:12 PM
Subject: Cooling Fan Themoswitch Woes

> Allo Mes Amis,
>
> My '85 westy seems to be running hot these days when I'm stuck in rush
hour
> traffic or if I let her idle at the curb.  It seems strange that the
> radiator fan doesn't want to come on until the temp gauge has climbed up
to
> about 7/8 at which point it cycles on/off at low speed.  I don't believe
> that I've ever heard it go up to high speed - though the high speed
circuit
> does work when i short the aproppriate wires.
>
> I've recently replaced the thermostat and flushed the entire system, but
> neither action had any effect.  My latest suspect is the fan thermoswitch.
> Thus raising the following questions:
>
> 1) Do these things tend to go bad?
> 2) I'm guessing that these things are some sort of bimetalic switches that
> rely on heat expansion?
> 3) Is there anything particularly bad about shorting the low-speed fan
> connection semi-permanently (or at least until I can get around to getting
a
> new switch)?  Particularly, I noticed that the fuel injection system uses
a
> temp sensor near the water pump.  I assume this is to make the mixture
> richer when the engine is cold?
> 4) Is there any problems associated with using the the thermoswitch from
the
> 86-91 models which seem to have lower temp ratings?
>
> thanks,
> wade
>