All,
Last weekend I trial tetsed the heating/cooling of my locost. I started up the engine and left it to warm up to its running temperature (idle) and observe. The temperature gauge started moving up slowly and left it to going up till about mid way when I decided to overide the fan switch manually. The fan kicked in and after a minute the needle gradually moved back towards the cold. All was ok

I am running a Civic radiator whith a fan switch in the pipe just exiting the bottom tank. Its coming form a Ford something...everything is brand new.
When would I expect to see the fan kikcing in with respect to the gauge position?

Cheers

I think it depends on the switch itself, as you can get ones that come at different set temperatures.

I am in a similar position, but with it being so cool out at the moment the temp gauge hasnt got anywhere near the fan kicking in yet whilst driving- plus I haven't been stuck in traffic. If I didn;t like what happened I would just buy a different rad switch with lower/hight thresehold

anywhere between about 90 and 105 degrees i think?

About 3/4's across

Fan switch on temperature varies a lot in the 1970s and 80s 93 to 95 degrees was fairly typical for cars, on more recent cars they switch in at higher temperatures often with temperature controlled multispeed fans or two or more fans which cut in at different temperatures. For example 1st speed 106c, 2nd 110c 3rd 115c.

In your case because of your local climate I would consider fitting an additional fan switch wired in parallel fitted in an adaptor in the radiator inlet hose switch at say 93c.

If you get a fan switch for a Volvo 240 or 740 with switches on at 95c and off at 90c The Intermotor part number 50041 It has as an M14x1.5 thread which easy to tap into a radiator hose temperature gauge adapter.

[Edited on 16/11/09 by britishtrident]