Are you sure it's not running on "High" all the time?  (Assuming you have high
and low speed, like I do.)  The temp switch may be bad or the resistor (the
coiled wire thing behind the left headlight.  When mine failed and ran on high,
it was noisy enough to turn heads nearby.
steve

Brad Anderson wrote:

> Please help if you can...
>
> Ever since I rear-ended that damn Explorer (not my fault) 3 years ago, my
> radiator fan has made a loud droning whenever it starts. The nose was pulled
> out by the dealer body shop and the radiator was replaced, but not the fan
> or cowling. Another shop took a look at it, decided nothing was touching the
> blades, and that my choices were to either to buy a $300 replacement fan
> motor or turn up my stereo. And so we rocked for three years.
>
> Well, some time ago, I inspected the cowling and found it to be disfigured,
> so I straightened it as best I could with it in place, but no change. At
> this time I noticed the ends of the blades were indeed worn off.
>
> So, a while later I pulled the whole thing down and replaced the cowling
> with a clean one from a junk yard. At this time I noticed the had a slight
> 'unhappy' feeling when I turned the blades by hand, but I reinstalled it
> none the less. Less vibration, but still droning.
>
> Yesterday I replaced the fan with a beauty I pulled from a Vanagon at my
> local junkyard; it sounded great, by the way, when hooked up on the bench.
> But after install, the same loud droning (enough to make other drivers take
> a look around).
>
> Am I missing something? I am reasonably sure the thing is rotating in the
> correct direction, and I know its not touching anymore. I didn't mess with
> the balancing weights, either. Does the position of the spare have anything
> to do with it? Am I doomed to rock and annoy passerby forever.
>
> >       [Brad Anderson]
> >       Noisy 87 Vanagon Syncro
> >