Hey everyone. I was wondering how much power will the stock radiator and fan work with?? I've got a 91' camaro rs. that came factory with the 5.0 tbi. I built a sbc 327 up but havnt dynod it yet. I'm aiming to be in the 400-500 horsepower range. I will be purchacing a summit racing cooling system in the future, but was hoping to get by for a little bit with the factory cooling system. The new motor has a high flow water pump with a 160 degree thermo. I will only be street driving the car and occasional drag strip. Thanks! Any advise or info. Will be appreciated. Please comment if you have thoughts.

 

I would run a 180 Degree thermostat, 160 is really too cold. Factory system will work for up to 450hp or so using the factory dual fan set up. You can look into the LT1 or LS1 fan swap if you want a little better cooling.

 

Thanks a lot for the reply!! My car only came with the single electric fan. So if I got a duel fan setup with a 180 degree therm I'd be ok? Even with the high flow pump? I'm assuming the z28 radiators are the same right? Thanks!

 

Yup.

My suggestion,

Pick up a set of 88-92 TPI dual fans and brackets, they'll bolt in (you'll need to remove the entire single fan set up but you'll see that).

Get an aftermarket dual controller since you can only run one fan off of the factory set up, and poof, good to go.

ROM U.M.C here has a good set up. I personally run a dual fan relay made by Formula1LE here on the message boards and love it. It's a voltage drop system that turns both fans on at the same time, but the first one is a lower speed, the second is full speed. Also has provisions to keep the AC and is fully automated. His prices are very comparable to the brand name ones you find from Painless etc. on Summit or Jegs.

They all do the same things. The only thing I suggest you not do, is wire the fans to a toggle switch. One time you "forget" to switch the fans on and you over heat.

I've attached some pictures of it. The third one is where I installed the relay bank. I may move it later. Don't mind the supercooler box in the background, that's another part of my project.

Where in Minnesota are you from?

 

I ran about 600-625 thru mine with no issue.

 

Great info! I'll definitely look into all that. I will not ever do the toggle switch thing haha cuz I would forget and I like things done right. I actually tore all my ac stuff out when I did the motor swap... I'm starting to regret it. But I can always put it back in. I built the motor about 6 years ago put it in the car and drove it maybe 10 miles, havnt put any on in 4 years....(kids haha) but now I can't take it anymore! I've gotta finish the car, it's not fair to it!
Anyway, when I did drive it, it would start over heating after 15 min of running.. I'm thinking it had an air pocket somewhere?

This spring I plan on pulling the motor and having it dynod since I couldn't afford it after building it lol. I just want it all done now, but it's just too much money right now ha.
I'm in the Grand Rapids area. Or the iron range. Familiar?

Wow orr89rocz!! That's a lot of power! That's with a stock cooling system?

 

What temperature is the fan starting at ?
I would run the 180* thermostat as suggested with a fan coming on at or near that temperature.

 

Hello. To be honest, I had the fan on all the time while I was testing the new motor. It did have the single electric fan in it also. I'm thinking it was 10-15 min running the car and would start climbing past 200 and still going, so I would shut the car off. I have aluminum heads so I was worried about wrecking them. Thanks!!

 

Stock reconditioned rad and dual tpi fans.
170 tstat with fans on around 180. Stayed about 195-200 on warmest days and lower in winter.

 

That's pretty impressive. What kind of water pump were you running? I'm sure you do some sort of racing or foolin around with it, stays cool then to? Thanks!!

 

Stewart stage 2. It was around 500 hp all motor doin alot of drag racing and driving in summer time. Then i sprayed a 150 shot. During 10 second pull water temps never rose. It does fine with cooling. Summer traffic was fine but i never been completely jammed up for hrs tho.

 

Oh nice! I'd like to do nitrous sometime too. I see on eBay those dual fan setups arnt cheap.. It wouldn't be a huge deal payin for one after my dyno. The 4th gen dual fans are much cheaper but I'd have to fab some mounting brackets up and buy a different upper rad support. What you think about that?

 

4th gen rad is similar size, it should fit 3rd gen rad
Shrouded fan works really well

 

Yeah that might be the cheapest and best way for me unless I come accross a good deal on a 3rd gen set up. Some of the prices I saw I could of bought a brand new set up from summit! I'm sure I can get a few bucks from my single fan setup so that would help towards the duals. If I did go with a 4th gen dual fan I'd have to find an upper support for it.. I see on the Internet you can buy a chrome for a 2nd gen that might work fine. Might have to do some miner fabbing to get to work.

 

Ozz1967 ,is right on the money.
The controller's Formula1LE sells are top notch. Great quality.

 

I have dual tpi fans i'm tryin to sell for 40$ plus shipping

 

Oh really? Is it the complete setup? Lower and upper brackets? Got pics? Is it off you're camaro? So many questions haha. But they won't be the last! Thanks.

 

Just the fans. No brackets or rad support. Would have to get those pieces or somehow radiator tie them with those ziptie like attachments

 

Ok I will let know when im able to do it. Seems like a good deal. Thanks!

 

Pushed 625hp through my original radiator, stock LT1 fans, stock LS3 WP, stock 195 T-stat. Overall temp would jump about 30* after a 1/8th mile pass but back to normal after about 30 seconds with the fans blowing. It had a condenser and huge heat exchanger in front of it too

Main thing to look for are that all your parts are working including the air dam. No/broken air dam will cause a weak V6 to overheat when moving

 

Search the classifieds here or on Ebay. No need to jury rig the fans up if you can get the correct brackets for it.

One thing I foudn on mine when I swapped from a single to dual fan, is that the fans were "Twisted" a bit and I had to space them out with washers so they didn't rub against the radiator. I don't know if this was because my radiator mount/front chassis is a little twisted or if the fan shroud is twisted or what. Just something to think about when you do your install.