Parade Fan ....

Eric Henry

Eric Henry

When i bought my car from Art Gregory , he mentioned to me that i should put a parade fan in the vehicle to keep it cool during long parades ...anyone have a suggestion about where to get a decent one or some alternative ?
 
if I felt that I was going to be driving in a number of hot parade's I would put in one of the after market aluminum radiators. the car should have a factory flex fan on it and your not going to get a better one then that. the after market aluminum radiators will solve most hot problems.
 
My Bayliff Packard had a tendency to overheat if I sat at a red light too long in hot weather. I attribute part of this to the fact that the reworked front end has a much narrower grille opening than what the car was built with. The car has a factory puller fan behind the radiator, which is still there, working, and unaltered. I added an electric pusher fan in front of the radiator that I simply ordered from JC Whitney, and wired to an on-off switch in the cab. Now when my "hot" light comes on, I hit the switch, and the hot light shuts off in moments. Seems to have solved my problem.
 
I also have a electric fan in the front of the radiator on my 49, and the fan on the waterpump on the back. my electric fan has a temp controlled relay that I can set to turn it on at whatever temp I want. Like Patrick, I also got mine from J.C. Whitney.
 
Our '60 Flxible Buick used to overheat a lot in slow parades. We installed an electric fan, with a switch. We also changed the thermostat, flushed the radiator, etc. I wasn't all that impressed, it slowed the overheating but didn't prevent it.

So the solution seems to be, if I'm going to a parade that's slow (we have one that moves a little faster) and it's a hot day, I take another ambulance.

You might try the car in a parade once before you commit to the fan.
 
I got a set of fans off of a wrecked Nissan Altima along with the relays and temp switch. They fit right in in front of my radiator and when I turn on the a/c the relay kicks on the fans and when it hits 205 they kick on. Its cheap insurance I bought everything for $70.00.
 
If the engine block hasn't been internally cleaned in a long time, then all the fans are not going to help resolve an overheating problem. Ethyl glycol, the stuff that anti freeze in made from, as it ages, sticks to the passages of the engine block, and acts as an insulator, preventing the transferring of heat from the block to the coolant. You need to chemically break down this film and remove it prior to installing new antifreeze. Once this insulating film is removed from the engine block, and the radiator is throughly cleaned, the cooling system can work the way that it was originally intended to. I am a firm believer that it is best to correct the problem, rather than applying a band-aid solution to resolve a problem.
 
or if it was not a problem in 66 why is it now one?? had the car always run hot due to a poor design adding the fan might help. but for my book the money is better spend fixing the problem that is causing the problem. surprisingly enough the water pump is it a lot of times even though it's not leaking. if after you have done everything you know of. cleaned the block, cleaned the radiator, changed hoses, change the thermostat. but it's still running hot, that's all that left in the system. the addition of insurance is not a bad idea. but only if it is insurance not a cover up for another problem.
 
As I understand this post, he's not having overheating problems with the car, he wants to prevent overheating while in slow moving parades, which is not a use the car was intended for, so there is certainly no harm in extra protection. My own experience with parades is that I've been in one, and I won't do another, but that's just me.

Another change I made to my Packard to help increase its cooling ability was when I bought the car, it had a large speaker for the electronic siren mounted between the grille and radiator, which I'm sure did a good job of blocking airflow. I replaced it with a modern compact speaker which I also mounted off to the side of the grille opening. Just another thought.
 
I installed mine originally because i thought it was running hot because temp guage was running up to 230 pretty consistantly. i figured it was because of the current engine in it, and still running original radiator. After doing everything else (flushing, new waterpump, thermostat, hoses), we came to the thinking that the temp guage reads incorrect. At 230+ it should be spewing coolant and running rough, none of these ever happened with mine, so now its just extra insurance.
 
I had an over heat prob for over a year. Changed everything under the sun, except the worn metering rods in the Carter carb.
 
that was my take on it to. my thought was he would have any trouble is the colling system was working up to snuff.
 
Patrick J. Martin said:
As I understand this post, he's not having overheating problems with the car, he wants to prevent overheating while in slow moving parades, which is not a use the car was intended for, so there is certainly no harm in extra protection. My own experience with parades is that I've been in one, and I won't do another, but that's just me.

Another change I made to my Packard to help increase its cooling ability was when I bought the car, it had a large speaker for the electronic siren mounted between the grille and radiator, which I'm sure did a good job of blocking airflow. I replaced it with a modern compact speaker which I also mounted off to the side of the grille opening. Just another thought.
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I remember being stuck in slow moving traffic on the Garden State Parkway, coming back from the Jersey shore on Sunday, where the average speed was .. "I can walk home faster". My 1964 Chevy never overheated, but there were more than one vehicle parked on the side of the road because the car overheated. Back then, just as now, it is more a case of neglect, than not having sufficient cooling. Well maintained cars didn't have problems, and the "clunkers" were all on the side of the road. Did I mention that on those dog days of August, the ambient temperature was usually approaching 100 degrees.. Talk about global warming... You could fry an egg on the sidewalk... if you were not so sunburned from a day at the beach... :D
 
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