Water Pump Pulley Sizes for Early Ford Engines 1

[AllorNothing]

Anyone have a listing of ford part numbers vs. water pump pulley diameter / offset / bolt pattern?

I want to overdrive the waterpump on my 71 429 to alleviate some slow idle cooling deficiencies.

Thanks

 

[MikeHalloran]

I had a used radiator that was not more than 18 months old, and looked perfect inside. Every tube you could see was clean and shiny and demonstrably flowing nicely.

The tubes that you _couldn't_ see, in the other row of two, were _all_ clogged up so solid that no amount of commercial radiator cleaner, acid, whatever, would even touch the gunk in them.

I only discovered the clog because I had the radiator out, and was sloshing acid back and forth between the tanks by seesawing the core on a sawhorse, and the flow into the lower tank didn't look right.

I only tried that because I had already tried everything else.



Mike Halloran
Pembroke Pines, FL, USA

 

[patprimmer]

AllorNothing

The approach you mention will tell you where the problem is.

I would also suggest that a stock water pump will solve any problems if they exist.

I have never seen an overheating problem attributable to lack of water pump capacity on a modern, engine in stock condition and in good working order.

I have seen plenty of problems from insufficient airflow, whether due to insufficient fan capacity or removal of shroud.

I have seen some problems due to air flow restrictions, especially due to engine bay crowding.

I have seen plenty of problems from poor water circulation due to deposits blocking or restricting flow.

I have seen plenty of problems due to replacement thermosets being poor quality or incorrectly designed or installed.

Regards

eng-tips, by professional engineers for professional engineers
Please see FAQ731-376 for tips on how to make the best use of Eng-Tips Fora.

 

[Metalguy]

Here's my 2 cents--after a long absence from here because of a sciatic nerve pain down my leg.

I've never had a decent clutch-fan with one exception. I've tried quite a few new aftermarket clutches and none of them ever drove the fan fast enough for me, and they wouldn't even attempt to lockup until over ~200 deg F--too hot for me.

The one exception was the stock clutch on my ex-1975 Chevy half-ton w/454. That clutch would lockup above 200 deg F just about solid. The fan would roar, the truck would actually slow down, and the temp. would drop pretty fast.

Wish I could find some kind of inexpensive magnetic clutch that I could control myself, that would lockup tight.

 

[AllorNothing]

I am intrigued with mikes experience with clogged passages. I had a 76 LTD with a hopped up 400M and as the years wore on a noticed that it would heat up under heavy load on the highway. Ironically the problem was seperation of the water passage from the cooling little metal wrinkles of heat dissipating metal.

Looking at the aftermarket pump, it looks considerably better made than the stocker that I took off with the leaky seal. The tolerances between the impeller and case as well as the backplate and impeller look a lot more precise. Perhaps pretty but not good for pumping at low speed.

As my handle would suggest, the following plan of action is under way. (once I reinstall the steering box which just got back from repair from other non-related issues). I am going to add not one but three temperature measuring probes. radiator inlet, radiator outlet and block temp. I found some nifty temperature sensors from national semiconductor (LM34DZ) that read off degrees farenheight directly to a digital voltmeter. I will keep you posted on the result. (Now i want an IR scan to see the temperature distribution in the rad !!)

I have rustled up a clutch fan out of a 95 3/4 ton and fan, solid steel five blade, and the six blade steel flex fan from the 400M. I have found a raft of the large pulleys but no small ones yet.

Regrettably the bolt pattern from the clutch fan is different than the pulley and pump. And based on comments above, that looks like a pretty marginal fix. BTW, my 90 mustang GT 5.0 has a clutch fan and a seven blade fan that seems to move a lot of air when required. The Rad in that car is now 16 years old and still working dandy. Amazing what regular antifreeze changes does. For the record the pump seal pooped out about 2 years ago.

I will be concentrating on finding a smaller pulley as the next step post temperature gauge installation, provided my suspicions are confirmed.

My money is still on that rotten ($200) edelbrock pump not working very well at low idle. (Agreeing with the comment about stock water pumps working very well!!)

Regrettably, I never had the opportunity to tow with the stock pump, but tend to think that since the problem is at idle, the problem is independent of the trailer be attached while sitting still.


Cheers.

 

[Grouser]

Good comments all!
I think you can get IR sensing thermometers fairly cheap at cooking / kitchen shops like Williams Sonoma, Crate & Barrel, maybe Hoffritz. They may not be really accurate but you're looking for variation, not accuracy.

Anyway, good luck. What happened to the 400M?

Cheers

 

[AllorNothing]

First 400M spun a rod bearing a wrecked the crank, second 400M got parted out when the car was retired. The 400M made good power, the 76 LTD would chirp the tires going into second gear and topped out at 145 mph.

Some preliminary info on the temperature readings from the last couple of days.

Temperatures are stable on the highway, engine runs at 175°F and suprisingly the inlet and outlet temps of the radiator are not that far different.

When idling, the temperature of the engine will slowly climb to 205° F at which point I got back on the highway to cool it off.

I did observe a nearly direct linear correlation between engine temperature and radiator temperature.

When the motor was at 200, the outlet (bottom) of the rad was 180 and the inlet was 190.

The conclusion that I have reached in that the radiator is not performing adequately with only a 10° drop across the rad. I would have seen much cooler outlet temperatures on the rad outlet if the coolant circulation was inadequate. Can't expect the engine to run at 180° if the coolant temperature going into the enginer is already 180°.

A band aid fix could be fan speed increase, but I have chosen to order a new radiator as the next logical step. Should be here this weekend, I will keep you all posted.

Please don't get too picky about the 10° differential between radiator inlet temperature and the engine temperature, the sensors were just strapped onto the hoses and the upper rad hose probe was subjected to significant airflow from the fan and may have been reading cooler than actual. The radiator outlet temperature sensor was much more wind protected.

For the record the radiator looks perfect, but is quite old. (I have owned the car 20 years +) and can't quite remember if I changed the rad when I bought the car or not.

Perhaps I will saw it apart and do a post mortem.

 

[patprimmer]

Sorry, but it seems to me you are about to replace your radiator based on known to be quite inaccurate data.

Regards

eng-tips, by professional engineers for professional engineers
Please see FAQ731-376 for tips on how to make the best use of Eng-Tips Fora.

 

[Fabrico]

Is there something inconsistent about that?

 

[AllorNothing]

The mystery deepens.

I put in the brand new 3 core crossflow radiator, and a fresh 180° thermostat for good measure.

Went for a drive on a 75° evening.

The cooling system behaves quite differently but still not right.

Before the car would always cool back to normal if you could get on the highway and get some air to move.

Now it takes a lot longer to overheat, but when the temperature creeps 180 190 195 200 there seems to be little that one can do to cool it down. Driving on the highway does not cause the engine to get back to normal operating temperature.

Regrettable I damaged one temperature sensor during the install and have to replace it.

Oddly the heater in the car is not putting out the heat that it should either. At 200°F coolant temperature you should be able to nearly bake a cake inside the car. There is a vacuum operated block valve in the heater core line that I will check next to see if it is not opening up properly.

I checked the fan to shroud clearance, 1/2 inch.

Hoses are clean inside. I did notice a few gummy stringy looking deposits on the "spring" in the lower rad hose (the one that keeps the hose from collapsing under vacuum). Cleaned it well and reinstalled. Strained the nearly new coolant. Got very little debris. Engine block looked whistle clean when the water pump was off a month ago.

I did a fancy install of the temperature probes on the new rad. I put a brass thermowell in the top and bottom shells next to the inlet and outlet ports. While the coolant was out I also put a brass thermowell right in the intake into the coolant passage on the engine side of the thermostat.

I ran the car 3 or 4 times, trying to get out any airlock that may have occured, the coolant reservoir went down significantly the 1st and 2nd time but has stabilized now. This leads me to believe that the system is now full.

Starting to really be puzzled, am considering putting old stat in if temperatures don't make sense when the 3rd probe is reinstalled and I can verify radiator operation.

Thinking about spending some time to more effectively seal the radiator to the radiator support to ensure all air goes through rad and not around. Looking at the places where the air could go, there is maybe 10 per cent (compared to the rad surface) cross sectional area where the air could bypass rad.

Seriously though, I am sure you could suck a pad of writing paper onto the front of the rad at idle. At 3000 rpm it is really sucking a boat load of air through the rad.

 

[patprimmer]

Could it have a blown head gasket.

Could you have moved the ignition timing.

Could you have damaged a sensor that effect A/F ratio.

Regards

eng-tips, by professional engineers for professional engineers
Please see FAQ731-376 for tips on how to make the best use of Eng-Tips Fora.

 

[AllorNothing]

I Don't believe there are any head gasket problems, engine runs good, coolant level is stable once full, oil is clean, no steam in the exhaust.

Will check timing.

A/F is a 800 cfm edelbrock carburator, A/F ratio is at best "dynamic"

I have recently learned of Robertshaw Balanced Sleeve Thermostats and am wondering if my high volume pump is not hamping the oem thermostat.

Getting the thermo sensors back online soon, I will be able to measure rad in, rad out, engine, trans oil in, and trans oil out.

Will keep you all posted.

 

[patprimmer]

I do not normally recommend running without a thermostat, but for a test run to eliminate it as a variable might be a good idea.

Regards

eng-tips, by professional engineers for professional engineers
Please see FAQ731-376 for tips on how to make the best use of Eng-Tips Fora.

 

[AllorNothing]

Hmmm,

Got temperature probes on line.

Locations:

Radiator Inlet (Tank near upper hose)
Radiator Outlet (Tank near lower hose)
Coolant in Intake Manifold, (Water Passage Behind Distributor)
Oil (Lower Left Side of Pan)
Trans cooler in / out.
Trans cooler is connected in series with trans cooler in radiator.

Okay, with the stock type thermostat the engine coolant would climb to 200F and the radiator reads 170 top and 155 bottom. What it tells me is that flow is not happening. Thermostat appears to work, radiator is 80F till motor hits 180 and then begins to warm, but not as much as I think it should. 30 degrees differential! 45 degrees pump suction to engine.

Heater is working fine, indicating that there is at least some flow if not good flow.

Changed thermostat to balanced tube robert shaw design. 180F. Cooling system is much more stable, first run was last night and the system was not fully purged of air yet. (This morning the overflow container was about a pint of fluid lower).

Last night I had to move the 6500# trailer and was able to idle the car successfully for 5 minutes or so while I hitched. Temperature climbed slowly to about 205F, and the radiator was considerably warmer than with the stock thermostat. (Still about 15 degrees differential between engine and top of radiator.

I am still puzzled why the radiator top was still 15 degrees cooler than the motor and the coolant at the bottom of the rad it was still 25 degrees coolant than the motor.

I would have expected the top of the rad to be almost identical to coolant in the motor.

Oil in the motor was 30F cooler than the engine coolant sensor at idle, but rose to near 200 when towing. (no suprise here).

It was a cool evening about 70F.

Once the engine was at 200 after idling for a while, it was reluctant to cool back down on the highway. (Odd, since it would always cool on the highway even with the stock stat and old rad.)

The upper radiator temperature crept up to 190 or so but still had a differential top to bottom of 20 degrees or so.

I can't quite put my finger on it, but it seems like something still isn't quite right.

The rad is now new, water pump is new, 180F robert shaw thermostat is new. 55% glycol / 45% water is new prestone with Redline water wetter.

Have spent some time plugging holes in the radiator support to force airflow through rad. No bugs, bras, windscreens, or crap like that in front of rad either.

Fan is 5 blade flex steel (oem ford 400 circa 1976.) Blades are 3/8" from shroud. Blades extend from shroud about 1 inch beyond shroud.

The pulleys from engine to fan are such that the fan runs slightly faster than the crank. 10%?

Thinking about ceramic coating the headers.

Thinking about more detail to "seal" radiator support for airflow.

I did install a trans cooler in front of the rad, about 10x10". Temperatures on it go from 130 to 180 depending on load.

It appears to be more or less working, but I wouldn't mind a little more insurance.

I am also hoping that the rad is full now since it has cooled and sucked in another pint.

I sure wish I had a flow meter on the heater hoses and radiator hoses . . . . . .

 

[AllorNothing]

Last night's test run was quite informative.

Ambient was about 65F

City driving resulted in a stabilized engine temperature of about 190. (180 Thermostat). Typical upper radiator temperature was about 10 degrees cooler, typically 180. Lower radiator temperature was about 10 to 15 degrees cooler at 165-170.

Extended idling would cause the engine temperature to climb as high as 205 after extended idling (10 min)

Radiator temperature went to 195 top and 190 bottom. Pretty much on the bubble if you ask me. I am not really convinced that a hot day would be a good situation. The oil temperature was quite a bit lower at idle, probably in the 170 - 180 range.

The 205F engine was reluctant to cool much when resuming city driving. The engine hovered around 200 for a good 15 minutes of driving.

Getting out on the highway resulted in a very quick cool down, the motor settled in right at 180 - 185 and the radiator settled in 155 top and 150 bottom.

Going camping on the weekend, forcast is hot. Keep you all posted.

 

[swall]

Until I got my overheating problems corrected on my '96 Jeep Cherokee, I carried a 2 gallon Hudson sprayer and would stop and spray the radiator with water when the temp gauge began to nudge the red zone after slowly climbing for an hour in 90F weather. Then,I was good for another hour of highway travel.