Sounds good.  I'm considering pulling out the stock fan, shroud and radiator and installing an aluminum radiator with an electric fan.  It won't look stock, but I'll keep all the original parts and it will get rid of that terrible fan noise.  We'll see.

A fan shroud does help with air flow through the core.  Ideally, you do want no gaps or holes.  What you have looks to be as designed and is a lot better than nothing.

If it cools at speed, then I don't think your radiator is the problem.  You have a coolant and / or airflow problem at idle.  Given that you have observed no coolant flow, this is probably the issue.  It doesn't matter how good the radiator is if coolant isn't being pushed through.


Lawrenceville, GA

I took a closer look at this TBird.  The radiator top water neck has in fact been moved to the driver's side.   I started the car and warmed up the engine.   When I removed the radiator cap and revved the engine, I could see no movement in the coolant.  I suspect the fluid flow is top to bottom and the radiator isn't doing much cooling.   If that's true it's hard to believe it doesn't overheat when moving.  It looks like I need a new radiator.  The only question is if I should install an aluminum radiator or stay with a stock style unit? 

I have a couple of questions.   Does the fan shroud do anything except keep your hands out of the fan?  The fan blades are at least 4-5 inches from the radiator and the shroud has all kinds of holes around it.  It couldn't be pulling much air through the radiator like that.  I would like to ditch the stainless fan and go with a clutch fan or electric fans alone.  Is this advisable?    I see lots of inexpensive aluminum radiators on EBay for around $200.00.  Are these units Ok or do I need something more expensive?  Thanks for the help!

There are several ways to come up with a smaller pulley - and I sure I haven't explored them all...
(1) A deep offset 289 single groove with a spacer behind it to get the proper groove alignment - I put a one inch thick turned aluminum disc behind this one.



(2) A 302 double groove pulley with one groove machined off....


(3) A CVF brand 289 aluminum pulley - that I had re-machined to leave a single groove spaced like the original T-bird part.


 
 Steve Metzger       Tucson, Arizona

I never noticed that before.   The car came to me that way.   I see from photos of other TBirds that the hose should be on the right.   Anyone have a clue why this would have been changed?   Any reason I shouldn't install an aluminum radiator? 

What's with the radiator upper hose moved to the left side?  I can see where the original fitting was removed and the hole filled in.  Maybe done for an air conditioning compressor installation?  If there isn't some kind of baffling inside the top tank, the water may be only circulating on the left part of the radiator.

John - "The Hoosier Hurricane"

This car has a manual transmission with O/D.  I'll check the coolant flow at idle the first chance I get.  Where can I buy a smaller diameter fan pulley?  What do I ask for?   How much space do I want between the fan and the radiator.  Sorry for all the questions.

I can't remember if the Florida 'bird is a stick or an automatic? When I ran my car (with the factory cooling set-up) with the radiator cap off and the auto-trans in drive held by the brake - the low idle performance of the water pump was practically NIL. You couldn't see any movement of the fluid in the upper tank, even when I knew the thermostat was wide open. Simply switching to a smaller diameter fan pulley will work wonders for this situation. Getting rid of the factory T-bird spacer and then moving everything ahead, back to the proper fan / shroud / radiator spacing would also help a lot.

I ended up with a seven blade fan on mine - but I also fitted a Hayden clutch to cut the fan speed when it wasn't required.

 
 Steve Metzger       Tucson, Arizona

Here's a photo of the fan setup in my 55 TBird.  It was this way when I bought it.   I hate this fan.  My car has a manual transmission and it sounds like a windmill when I run through the gears.  As you can see I have the heater disconnected.  The thermostat in this car is a new 170 degree with the large opening that I bought from NPD.  The car runs right at 170 degrees running down the highway.   When I get into heavy traffic the temperature starts to creep up.  So far no big problems, but I'm worried about this summer.   We have long lines at some of the car shows which could be a problem for me.

The radiator looks stock to me.  It doesn't leak.  I replaced the radiator cap with a new unit.  It doesn't overflow when I park it in the garage.  I run 50/50 antifreeze and water.  I am willing to do whatever it takes to improve this issue.   I can have the radiator core rebuilt or buy a new aluminum radiator.  I don't have a problem with an electric fan as long as it's not too noisy.  What do you think?

Over heating at idle indicates  a coolant and / or airflow problem.  Seeing as it is a bird, it is probably a coolant flow problem.  No one has actually tested one of the spacers that Joe mentions but if it works as advertised, it is exactly what you need.

http://forums.y-blocksforever.com/Topic135031.aspx

Other solutions are to eliminate the pump spacer and then space out the fan.  A smaller diameter pulley may also help.  That will speed up the pump and fan. 

You can observe coolant flow by getting the engine up to temp with the radiator cap off and observing coolant flow.  If it is only a trickle or nothing at all, then coolant flow is definitely contributing to the problem.





Lawrenceville, GA