So I'm charging up my IROC the other day after it sat in the driveway for several months. I lock it up and let it idle for about 20 minutes while I went inside and ate. All of a sudden I hear a BOOM, HISSSSSS. I was like WTF? At about the same time a car had driven by so I just thought he hit something. Then, my girlfriend yells from the back of the house "YOUR CAR IS ON FIRE!!!". At about the same time I heard the engine shut off. I grab the fire extinguisher and run outside. Turns out it was just steam from the hot radiator fluid that was all over the car and the driveway. I look inside the car and see the temp gauge is pegged. Apparently the fans never came on. Good news is it was just a hose the blew, not the radiator or engine.

I'm now trying to figure out why the fans aren't coming on. Neither one of them are coming on. Here are the tests I conducted so far:

- Turn ignition to ON and short the wire to the coolant temp switch on the right side of the engine. Result: Fans DO NOT come on

- Turn ignition to ON and short TAN and BLK/RED wires at the wire connector of each fan circuit to the relay. Result: Both fans DO come on

- Purchase new relays. Result: Fans DO NOT come one

Obviously it's not the fans, the relay or the fuse to the fan circuit. So what else can I check?

 

Turn on your A/C and see if it turns on. I don't know the wiring of the cooling system but I'm sure there is a temp sensor that turns on the fan. If the fan comes on with the A/C on it's in there I guess.

 

Your fan motor may be bad. You can test this by running a wire from the fuse box (one of the terminals that says ign) to one terminal on the fan plug and another wire from a ground source to the other fan plug. The ignition key must be in the on position for this to work. If the motor is good, you can then use this connection to keep your car running while you look for the real problem. Hopefully you didn't blow a head gasket already.

 

I stated that the fans DO come on when I power them directly (short the TAN and BLK/RED wires). So both fans ARE running.

The fans DO NOT come on with the A/C on.

 

My mistake. Anyway, hardwire them until you find your problem.

 

I also have a 89 Camaro IROC-Z28 and basically had the same problem. Could not find a temp switch that would control the fans, I'm thinking they must go through the ECM which is looking at the temp sensor in the front of the block.You may not want to solve your problem the way I did, but anyway I took the ground wire at the fan relay(located on my car near the battery) and grounded it. This will cause the fan to run all the time. With the other fan I connected the ground wire to a switch mounted on the dash and ran it to a ground. That way there if the one fan isn't doing the job, like in stop & go traffic, you can switch the second fan. With both fans running the car should not overheat.

Viper39

 

i just wire'd my to a switch

 

check the fusable link, should be near the batt next the the rad off a black junction post

 

the best idea is to just wire up a switch to the fans so that you can turn them on when you want. thatll help keep the car cooler. Chances are the relay that turns the fans on are Dead. Check with the AC on and see if the second fan goes on.

 

I had the same problem when I bought my 88 Formula.
I wired up switches to control the fan relays.

Now, the funny part is, is that after I did my Auto to T5 swap I decided to change the programming in my prom, so I burned a chip, installed the adaptor and whatnot in the ECM and fired her up, let it idle a bit then the fan came on by itself.
I don't know if the stock prom was messed up or if it was the wires at the ecm but my primary fan works like it is supposed to now.