Well, here is the DIY for installing an electric fan on our trucks. If you have any questions or need pics you can always PM me and I would be happy to help.

Hammer, I guess this should go in the DIY section but since a few people have been asking me on here for it I thought it would be ok to post it on here first. Hope you don't mind .

Installing an Electric Fan on a 2004 Dodge Ram

Parts and Tools Needed:

First thing you need is an electric fan. I got mine from a pick and pull off of a 94 Taurus with the 3.8 engine in it. I chose this fan for a few reasons. It is cheap, mine only cost me $25 and they can be bought on ebay for around $50. Second, it is two speed which I like so that way I have an option of how much air my fan will be pulling through the radiator. Finally it is a good choice because it comes with a shroud around it that allows multiple points for mounting bolts to and fits perfectly on the trucks radiator. If you go the pick and pull route make sure that you cut as much of the wire loom off with the fan as you can. It will make wiring much easier later on.

Second thing you need is a fan controller. You don’t actually need one, there are ways to wire it up without an expensive controller but I chose to use a nice dual speed controller with adjustable settings. I chose to go this route because since I saved so much on the fan I figured that I might as well splurge on a nice controller J. Here is the one that I purchased.
http://moesperformance.com/index.php...oducts_id=1658

This is a nice controller because it has adjustability of when the fan turns on and off. It also can handle plenty of amps. When I first wired my fan up I wired it to the high setting on the fan which draws 33 continuous amps and controller handled that draw with no problem. So this should be plenty of handling power almost all fans out there short of a viper fan.

Third you need some tools. To do this job you need a drill, some bits, a large crescent or pipe wrench, sockets and ratchets, metal shears to cut the bracket metal, and a good wire stripping/crimping tool. You also need something to get the stock clutch fan off with. I made a homemade spanner wrench to get it off with (I will post a pic of the wrench I made at the end of the post). You can also rent a tool for this from some parts stores. I made mine out of a couple of hurricane straps that I bought from Lowes for about $3. If you want some specifics of how to make it just let me know.

Last thing you need is something to make brackets from for mounting the fan. I used the strap metal used for mounting garage door openers to make mounting brackets for the fan. I bought this at Lowes too. A six foot piece was $5. I also bought some bolts, nuts and washers for mounting the brackets to the fan while I was at Lowes. I bought (11) 3/8 inch bolts that are ¾ of an inch long. Nuts, bolts and washers totaled about $1.

So total cost for everything I needed to mount and wire up this fan including the fan and controller cost me about $140 total.


Mounting Instructions.

Step One: Disconnect Battery
I removed both the positive and negative cable since I was later going to be attaching wires to both the positive and negative terminals.

Step Two: Remove Coolant Overflow Bottle and Washer Fluid Reservoir.
First I removed the coolant overflow bottle. There is one bolt that goes through the mounting tab on the coolant bottle and into the fan shroud. Remove the bolt and pull the hose that goes from the bottle to the radiator. With the bolt and hose removed the bottle should just lift off. Next remove the wiper fluid bottle. My bottle would not come off (not really sure why) so I just pulled the plugs for the sensor in the bottle and the plug for the wiper pump and left the bottle on the shroud. Spilled a little wiper fluid but other than that, no biggie.

Step Three: Remove the Stock Clutch Fan.
You need to have the fan off the mounting bolt in order to get the fan shroud off. So what I did was use a big pipe wrench and the spanner wrench I made to break the fan loose. It came off really easily, made the time I spent making my spanner wrench well worth it. I have heard some guys taking air tools to this thing to get it loose and I was able to get it loose on my first try, so that made me happy. Now I just loosened the fan at this point but still left it attached to the engine since the fan and shroud have to come out together. Just leave your fan loose but attached for now until you get the shroud ready to be removed.

Step Four: Remove the Fan Shroud.
The fan shroud has two bolts and two clips that hold it to the radiator. First, there is one bolt on the top of the shroud on each side of the radiator. Remove these bolts and set aside for later. Once the two bolts are out, pull the shroud away from the radiator about an inch or two and then lift up. This will remove it from the clips. Now that the shroud is off, loosen up the last couple of turns needed to get off the clutch fan. Remove the fan and shroud all as one unit.

Step Five: Start Making the Mounting Brackets.
For mounting my electric fan, I used the holes already in the radiator. On the top and bottom rim of the radiator there are already some holes running across the length of the radiator. A 3/8 inch bolt fit in these holes perfectly and they match up in size to the holes on the length of garage door opener bracket that I bought. So I took some measurements and started cutting and bending metal. This can be done by hand because this metal is fairly easy to bend but I used a vise and hammer to make perfect 90 degree angles. I just think this makes the brackets look better but that is just for my personal preference, it is not necessary. I measured up and made the brackets for the top of the fan, I made two for the top, one on the passenger side and one on the driver’s side. The brackets I made bend over the front of the radiator, run across the top toward the driver’s compartment and down the back of the radiator to where the fan will go. This way I am able to use the holes in the front and back rim of the radiator to mount my brackets making them much more secure. I attached both of these mounting brackets to the radiator just loosely for the moment.

Step Six: Mark for Holes on the Fan Shroud of the Electric Fan.
The Taurus electric fan has a generous amount of shroud around it which makes it perfect for mounting in many custom applications. With the top two brackets attached loosely to the radiator I slid the fan into place. This fan fits into position on the radiator like it was made to go on there. With the fan in position on the radiator, I marked for the holes to mount the fan to the brackets. I used two bolts on each bracket (four total for the top two brackets) to attach the fan to the brackets. With the four holes marked I removed the fan and the brackets from the radiator. I then drilled the holes into the shroud around the e-fan and mounted the brackets to the fan.

Step Seven: Making a Bottom Bracket.
With the fan attached to the brackets I set the brackets back on the radiator and allowed them to hold the fan in place without installing the bolts because this whole setup is going to have to come back off one more time. Now with the fan being held in place with the top two brackets, crawl underneath the vehicle and measure for a bottom bracket. On my truck most of the holes in the bottom rim of the radiator are being used by trans cooler and other things. So I only had enough holes to mount one bracket to the radiator, but as strong as these brackets are, I doubt this will pose a problem. With the measurements taken, crawl out and make your last bracket. When it is done, take it under the truck, attach it to the radiator loosely and mark for where you are going to drill the last two mounting holes on the e-fan shroud. Now you can pull the whole assembly, drill your last two mounting holes in the e-fan shroud and attach the bottom bracket to the e-fan. At this point you should have all three brackets attached to the fan and you are ready for the install.

Step Eight: Install the Fan.
With all of your mounting brackets attached, place the fan and brackets back into place and tighten all of the bolts that attach the fan to the radiator. Do not over tighten it. It just needs to be snug as the fan weighs in at about 6 pounds and you have three brackets each made from metal rated to hold 50 pounds. Also, I used locking nuts for attaching everything just so it doesn’t rattle loose. Lock Tite will work well here too, just use something so your fan doesn’t come loose. I had read where some people have used weather stripping around the outside edge of the e-fan shroud to make a tight seal to the back of the radiator so I bought some. I never used it because this fan fits so well to the back of our radiator that there were no areas where air was sneaking out.

Step Nine: Reinstall Your Stock Shroud.
Just reverse the steps you used to remove the fan shroud earlier. I trimmed the bottom of my stock shroud to make it easier to get it to fit over the new fan but this is not necessary. I just did it because it was going to be close to slip the stock shroud over the new fan and I only wanted to do this one time. With the stock shroud back in place, replace your wiper fluid sensors and plugs, then reattach your coolant overflow bottle. At this point you are ready for some electrical fun J.

Step Ten: Wire Up the New Fan.
This step will be different depending on what type of controller you use, but I just followed the instructions that came with the controller I bought. The only thing that I changed is on the large gauge wires I used wire nuts instead of the supplied crimp style attachers. This is my personal preference because I have seen the crimp style come loose, but again this is just me and my personal preference. If you need a picture of the wiring schematic let me know, I have it in my garage.

Step Eleven: Run the Truck and See If Your Fan Works.
Well, this is the point of the payoff. I started the truck and let it run to get warmed up. While I waited I used this time to clean up my garage. When the truck got close to where I thought the fan should go on I attached my Superchips to the truck and started monitoring the coolant temp. When it reached the temp that I wanted the fan to turn on at, I adjusted my controller so that the fan would go on. And with that, my fan started running WHOOOO HOOOO! Now I let it run a little to see what would happen and sure enough the fan kept it right at the temp I set it the controller to keep it. Next I took the truck for a ride and the temp never moved from where I set it. With everything working the way I wanted it, I closed up shop and called it a day.

It has been about a month now and this fan has worked flawlessly. I have had a little boost in power from having the stock fan removed (dropped about a tenth off my 0-60) and best of all, I have had a big jump in MPG. By big I mean a solid 2 MPG increase from what I used to get. I hope this write-up helps anyone hoping to do this project. If you have any questions or need more pics just let me know and I would be happy to help you out. This whole project took me about three hours, but I think that you guys can do it faster than that. Since I really had no idea what I was doing when I started I kind of had to figure it out as I went. Good luck guys J


Spanner Wrench Below:




Bracket Material:


Brackets: