Cooling Fans smoking fuse

unclemikeys2001 · 04-27-2008, 08:09 AM

Well, finally got my 83 944n/a out of winter storage & ready for the road. Fired her up & drove around for 5 minutes no prob, everything normal. Then I notice my temp getting hot...my fans not turning on. I stop, check the fuse & its bad. Replaced it, turned the key forward & fans kick on since the engine was hot. Then next thing I know all this smoke comes pouring out my wheelwell. I thought I had a fire, took a long time for the smoke to finally get out of the fender. Anyways, the fuse for the fans was blown again. ...Im not sure if the the fuse could have caused so much smoke, never had that happen before, oddly there was no smoke inside the car. I have not replaced the fuse again, in fear of something burning in the fender. ...Has anyone had this happen? Is there something easy I can check for the reason the fuse keeps blowing? Is there something in the fender that may have burned up? ...Any help would be appreciated. I really want to get driving my car again.

Arizona_928 · 04-27-2008, 10:18 AM

is the fuse's wire grounded?

bazar01 · bazar01's Garage

Your radiator cooling fans are about to fail. They are drawing too much current thus blowing the fuses. You will need a good fan motor replacement.

unclemikeys2001 · 04-27-2008, 04:31 PM

Not sure how to answer this.... is the fuses wire grounded? ...well I havent done anything other than park it, not sure how anything would be grounding out, or rather lack of ground either ............ALSO if its my fan motors about to give out, is this something very typical that they pull too much juice & pop fuses? Or is there something else electrical to look for as well? Thanks

earlr85944 · 04-28-2008, 05:26 AM

with the key out of the car, spin each fan by hand, maybe seized or sticking from storage
if one is tight , take it from there, if not bench test them and work your way back thru the wiring, fues, relay etc

AKCJ · 04-28-2008, 10:33 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by earlr85944

with the key out of the car, spin each fan by hand, maybe seized or sticking from storage
if one is tight , take it from there, if not bench test them and work your way back thru the wiring, fues, relay etc

+1

Pretty common for these old fan motors to fail. I found one of mine was obviously bad just by spinning by hand. I just took it out and have been running on one fan for several years (it's not very hot here, I recently bought a pair of the newer style as replacements).

Somewhere (this winter) I saw a writeup on taking the fan motor apart to attempt a repair.

unclemikeys2001 · 04-28-2008, 11:49 AM

Thanks for the help everyone... Both fans spin freely by hand but I do remember the hearing the fans kicking on before the fuse melted, quite possibly could have been only 1 though. Im a bit leary of putting another fuse in only to melt it, guess Im gonna have to bench test em. As soon as it stops raining here Im going to pull em & will post my findings. ...I may have another good fan motor somewhere here...Ive gone through 3 parts cars to make my current good car so who knows what I have in my shed.