Fan shroud

I have a 1949 international and the only thing left i can think of to cool down this beast is a fan shroud. I drew some dimensions for it then i realized that the fans lowest point is lower than my radiator... what should i do? Do i just notch the bottom of the shroud around the fan so it just avoids it? or what?

 

A lot of stock shrouds have an area bumped up, for sticking above/below the radiator. Any local junkyards with 60's or 70's stuff in it you can browse? Mine has an area about 3 inches past the radiator, came out of a 69 nova but I can't swear it was a stock nova shroud. The car had been passed around a lot.

 

Would you just make a notch out around the bottom like this?

 

Not a problem, it will still draw air through the radiator if it is sealed on all the edges so it can only draw air through the fins. My '53 is like that.

 

so make it like my image shows?

 

yeppers, it would be better to have the lower portion in front of the fan angled as much as possible, but it will work either way.

 

One thing to allow for is the movement of the engine in the frame. That movement can allow the fan to strike the edges of the opening in the shroud if the hole is too tight for the fan under full throttle. I have 1/2 inch clearance around the fan on mine. I also have the fan 1/2 in and 1/2 out of the shroud. Works great. You can check out the shroud pics in my album.

 

If you look close you will see that the shroud is in two pieces to make the install or removal easy.

 

Here is mine ,a lot like the sketch.

 

Here's mine, made out of the top of a galvanized garbage can. It's open at the bottom by about 9," but it cools the sbc just fine. I recently started driving it in some pretty hot weather & it hasn't gotten over 180. I know I should have sealed off the corners, but I took a chance. Also, I've heard it said here that the fan should actually not be completely covered by the shroud (depth wise) like mine is. Apparently (in theory) the shroud should only cover about two thirds of the fan depth. I only found this out after I covered the whole thing. But again, I guess I got lucky. The nice part about having an open bottom is that the shroud can be removed if necessary.

 

You can ditch the mechanical fan and go with a electric fan(s), centered on the rad/engage more of the radiator area....it'll cool much more effectively this way.