Broke my Fan

[sjmst]

OK, so I took off my fan and shroud that it is mounted in to sand and paint the shroud. When I put it all back together, of course, the fan did not kick in when the temp went up. So, how to diagnose? Presume that either some connection is loose or I somehow messed up the motor. I did not drop it so I am wondering where to start.
Thanks

[So Cal Mark]

it should have power all of the time, so just jumper across the fan switch terminals to check the integrity of the system

[dartme]

You can unplug the black wire that leads to the fan motor and ground it, If the fan comes on the fan switch is bad or the ground is bad.

[sjmst]

Ah!
But, there is one wire coming out of the fan. If I unplug that, how will the fan get any power?
I undertand the idea of what you are saying, but still a little ignorant on the mechanics of getting it done.

[mdrburchette]

There should be two wires.

[sjmst]

Right. Out of the fan is one "cable" surrounded by green casing. So, do I run a ground wire from the fan motor itself to to a ground?

[mdrburchette]

Can you open up the casing to see if the other wire is in there or try to move the casing from where the wiring goes into the motor?

[ventura ace]

See this link for a partial wiring diagram for the 81 spider: http://www.mirafiori.com/faq/content/81_82_COMPLETE.pdf.

It shows that you should have a 2-wire connector on the 'cable' from your fan. Can you probe around inside that green 'casing' to verify? One of the wires (light blue) carries 12 volts from fuse #10. You may want to verify that you have 12 V on that wire, and that the fuse is not blown. The other wire is black, and goes to the thermostat switch at the bottom of your radiator, and then to ground. You can leave everything connected, and jumper accross the thermostat switch, as Mark suggested, or just connect the black lead straight to ground (bypass the thermostat switch). Call me if you run into something different than described above.

Alvon
805-338-1767

[danaspider]

There are 2 wires in the harness. One is 12 v to the fan and the other is ground. Check the plug and make sure that when you hooked it back up, you didn't push one of the pins back. (seen that on mine as well as on the turn signal connections to the front)

If those are good, then as Mark said, go to the temp switch at the bottom of the radiator. you should be able to easily access the 2 pins. This is just going to ground. So jumper across the 2 pins. Fan should start and run. I kind of bet on the plug, but ... Can always pull plug on fan and jump one wire to 12v and then other to gnd and gurantee the fan runs. Then work back from there.

Good luck, really pretty easy circuit to work on.

[So Cal Mark]

as I wrote previously, jumpering the switch checks the integrity of the entire system. If you jumper the fan to ground, you have bypassed the ground side of the system.

[sjmst]

Just did a quick test. I jumped the fan with the alt. The fan works. Prob the sending unit at the bottom of the radiator, but I will see if I can jump from there are Mark suggests.

[spider2081]

Not sure what year your car is but on my 1981 the horn and the fan are on the same fuse. Does your horn work?? It is fuse #10. If the fan ran and you jumped voltage to the fan from the alternator output terminal that means you already have a ground at the fan. The plug for the windshied washer and the fan are the same type connector. Could they have been swapped??

[sjmst]

Not sure what year your car is but on my 1981 the horn and the fan are on the same fuse. Does your horn work?? It is fuse #10. If the fan ran and you jumped voltage to the fan from the alternator output terminal that means you already have a ground at the fan. The plug for the windshied washer and the fan are the same type connector. Could they have been swapped??

Yes, the horn works.
Here are a pics. I don't think anything was swappped.

[Tappy]

if you make contact between the 2 male connections on the temp switch on the radiator with the wires still connect , and the fan comes on , you will probably have a bad temp switch

[spider2081]

The way you have it connected looks correct to me. Maybe someone else could confirm also. Another question is did you also remove the radiator and If so did you follow the proceedure for bleeding the cooling system. An air bubble in the system can cause the fan not to come on.
The only reason I am looking for something other than the switch is it seems it was working before you took the fan out to paint it.