So I've just experienced the joy of replacing the water pump on my 96 GC and I almost have everything reassembled. All that's left to do is put the fan, fan shroud, and belt back on.

So in putting the shroud back in I find that the plastic tabs the screws use to hold it to the front end are both broken - I managed to get around this by using some washers to cover the gap. However, when I try to wrestle the fan back onto the shaft and the strap wrench around the pulley the washers don't pin the shroud enough to keep me from accidentally pushing it down off the screw-pegs. On top of this, while having the shroud in place only made the fan about 10x more difficult to disassemble, it's making it about 100x more difficult to reassemble (A pox on whoever designed it this way! ).

So now I'm contemplating... do I really need the fan shroud? Does this thing actually direct any air from the radiator or is it just a safety measure to keep morons like me from losing appendages to the spinning blades of death?

Anyone have any thoughts\opinions\advice?

 

Yes, you do need the fan shroud in order for the fan to pull air from the front of the radiator, not from the sides. You will overheat without it in traffic.

 

Nuts... kind of figured that would be the answer. So my other idea was to cut it in half, stick the bottom half in, install the fan, stick the top half in and then bolt the two halves together.

 

Welcome to CF. As stated by Bustedback above, it's definitely needed. Maybe you can find a good one at the salvage yard cheap.

 

Thanks, I'm sure I can dig one up somewhere... the more difficult task is getting the fan re-installed once I have one.

Best I can tell you have to slide the two into place together, attach the shroud, then twist your arms in unnatural ways to reach around it, lift the fan up into place, and try a couple dozen times to get the threads on the fan to line up with those on the clutch. Then I have to wiggle my strap wrench in and around spaces not meant for adult hands to get it onto the pulley at just the perfect angle so it will actually hold it while I get my giant wrench down onto the nut.

Anyone know if there's some trick I'm missing that makes juggling all that back into place a little easier?

 

That sounds about like what I did with my V8 ZJ when I did the water pump on it.