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| Manual Radiator Fan Switch |
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One of the most irritating problems with my (or any other, I believe) Saturn is that it likes to get reallllly fucking hot. If I sit in traffic, it almost immediately starts to heat up. In addition, the fan doesn't come on to cool the coolant until it's already steaming out of the hood! Wow...awesome. I decided that I'd had enough of this after my last trip to the track, where the coolant temperature was annoyingly hard to control while in the staging lanes, waiting to run. To solve this problem, I installed a switch that allows me to manually control the funtion of the radiator fan, while still allowing the computer to turn the fan on and off whenever it normally would, such as when the A/C is on or whatever. The general directions I used to install the switch were created by Wolfman, on Saturnfans.com, just for references sake. Now, the first thing you need is some kind of switch. I used a push on, push off, kind of switch. You could just as well use a toggle switch or any other kind of switch capable of maintaining a closed circuit without constant attention.
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The next thing you have to figure out is where to put the wire that will run from the fan relay to the switch. The concept behind this whole project is that the fan turns on when one specific contact on its relay is grounded. What we want to do is run a wire from that contact to ground and then put a switch in the middle of the wire so we can control when it's grounded and when it's not. To find out which contact is the one we're interested in, go to the underhood fuse box, open it up, and look on the underside of the plastic cover. You'll see two objects on there that are labeled Cooling Fan or Fan or something like that. One is a fuse, and it's rectangular. The other is square on the cover diagram and a cube in real life. This is the relay. You can see it in the picture to the right. Pull straight up on it, and you'll see something like this. Now, take one end of a wire and connect it to some kind of grounding spot. If you don't know where you can ground it, use the screw that is directly in front of the fuse box, on the frame of the car. Now, stick the other end of the wire into one of the holes that those prongs on the bottom of the relay insert into. Then, shove the relay back into place, making sure it's snugly into it's spot. If you stuck the wire into the right hole, the fan will turn on. If not, keep trying different holes until you find the right one. In my car, if you're standing in front of the driver's side front wheel, it's the hole to the top left.
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When you find the right hole, undo the end of the wire that is connected to ground. You're going to now run this wire into the driver's side footwell through the grommet shown in the picture to the right. It is located right next to the brake booster on the firewall. It's not hard to find, as it has a huge bunch of wires running through it. If you pull down on the bunch of wires, you'll see that the grommet can stretch a bit. Take a pencil or other sharp object and, while stretching the grommet somewhat, poke a hole through it. Run the wire through the hole, go into the driver's side footwell, and find it on the other side.
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All that's left now is to connect it to the switch, and the switch to ground. Connect the wire from the engine bay to one side of the switch and another wire to the other side. Run the second wire to a grounding point inside the cabin and ground it. I used the same ground as I did for the A/F Gauge. When you push the switch, the fan should now come on. You'll hear it. Ahhhh, the beautiful sound of no more overheating. And don't ask about how to mount it. I super-shit rigged it with electrical tape, since I know less than nothing about mounting anything. You're on your own with that one, kiddies. You can see my mounting point to the right. Enjoy, beeshezzz!!!!
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