simple, direct, and to the point. In all seriousness, I wouldn't be comfortable driving with one electric fan. Some may consider two to be overkill, but that is the only way that I'd run one of these trucks.

 

Mike, I have a concern that the aluminum radiators would have a pretty strong galvanic reaction with the copper mounting rods.

The naturally occuring protective layers that both copper and aluminum create might be enough to prevent a reaction in a dry environment. However, many of us drive in areas where salt is used on the roads or occurs in the sea-side air. This would provide an excellent medium to produce a strong galvanic reaction.

Can you clarify your statement re: galvanic reaction, please?

Thanks.

 

HI!... Pgmr : I have beeen running twin 16" DERALE electric fans on my truck for over 4 years now. I live in WINDSOR, ONTARIO, CANADA which is the SALT capital of CANADA. WWe have several salt mines heere and they are not affraid to use it in the winter. It also rains alot here and we get temps up over 100 degree's in the summer with a ton of humidity ALL the time. I've got the copper rods on my fans and they still look like thee day I installed them. No dis-colouring (turn light green) at all. Rad has no outside buildup of particles on it either. I also power wash my engine compartment about once a week and have never had a problem with these fans or their mounting hardware.

 

Hi, Neal,

Thanks for the reply. I'm more interested in the area where the AL and CU are touching. Have you pulled one of the rods out to check the area where it actually touches the radiator?

Thanks.

 

Anyone pulled a copper mounting rod to check for corrosion?

 

Hello Pgmr,

Gee, we've never heard of rain, snow, road salt, moisture, leaching, reference, etc.

And while we're on the subject of moisture, can someone please tell me what windshield wipers are for? They can't be for RAIN, as we've never thought of rain, and since we haven't thought of it, then "it" obviously can't even exist.

Puh-lease....................

OK........all kidding aside..............

Bottom line? As I said before, and clearly so, there is NO SUCH ISSUE.

Not 1 customer of ours has ever had any such issue, nor can you find even 1 such example among ANY of our hundreds of customers who are using our electric fan kit on numerous continents, in 38 states, etc. with any such issue.

I consider this to be so very extremely basic as to be silly, and a few minutes with a good dictionary, or better yet, doing some actual R&D, will show. So if you want to discuss this, you'll need to give us a call. We'll be happy to answer any serious and reasonable questions you may have.

We have people literally all over the world using it, from Siberia to Spain, from Miami to Canada & just about everywhere in between on this continent and others. And believe it or not, we actually do have to think of far more than just the simple matters such as the existence & potential exposure to basic elements like water, rain, snow, road salt, etc. We actually have to take the vehicle's cooling system needs, vehicle usage & capacity in mind. I mean, heck, somebody just might need their vehicle to actually be able to run without overheating once in a while.

 

Mike,

While not a prolific poster, I have been a member of this forum for over four years. Indeed, I purchased a Superchip from you in 99.

I am well aware of the search feature and use it quite often. In fact I tried to find an answer to my original question using it, to no avail. Perhaps I was using the wrong terms (or I was using the correct terms, but the original posts were wrong).

I know that you are inundated with queries; I've seen a lot of them and shaken my head in wonder at many of them. Your patience and gracious answers to even the most inane (hopefully this isn't too far into that category) are commendable and refreshing.

Coming from a science background, I was a little troubled to see copper being used in contact with aluminum. It's been a few years since my college chemistry classes, but a search on Google for "galvanic series" returns over 25,000 results. Every one that I checked showed that AL and CU are quite a distance apart, indicating that they can and do establish galvanic reactions in the right conditions, with AL being the bigger loser (more anodic).

I was hoping for more information than the anecdotal evidence you presented. Something like, "it's a copper alloy that's closer to AL in it's galvanic voltage" or "it's coated to prevent corrosion", etc. If that evidence doesn't exist, no big deal. It's not the first time I've heard, "We don't know why it works, but it does."

Hopefully this was received in the spirit it was intended, not as an attempt to besmirch you or your products; rather as the product of a mind that sometimes just needs to know WHY!

 

Hi Pgmr,

Understood, & thanks for your response. In fact, my last response was just finally edited, as it got posted by mistake well before I was anywhere close to finished (a few fingers on my right hand don't have much feeling thanks to injury, so I sometimes press oddball keystrokes trying to keep my 70 wpm (well, these days maybe 55-60 wpm) typing speed up, in trying to keep up with all my postings, email, etc. So you'll see over time that some of my posts are edited, and sometimes posted even before initial completion prior to even realizing a need for editing, etc. Thems the breaks, I mention this only because it's important to me for those I communicate with to have my intended understanding. I didn't realize that was already posted until after I had finally edited it and re-posted, at which point I saw (somewhat to my dismay) that you had already seen that post and had posted again yourself. So needless to say, I'm sure the edited post probably has a friendlier "tone" than the first did, and that's classic "me." People only see that when I've made an errant keystroke and sent something up here before it was intended to be made public, as was the case here.

At any rate..................

To answer your question directly, yes, we have indeed pulled the mounting rods after they have actually been in use, and many times, as we did that long before we ever even thought seriously of designing our own kit, so that *we* would be comfortable with that system on our own vehicles. And what we have found is just as others have already posted to you in this thread, there has never been so little as 1 incidence of any such galvanic (or other detrimental) reaction between those materials. Plain and simple, it just doesn't happen, which is why you see virtually everybody in the business using that exact same method. Regardless of what the periodic table of elements may seem to imply or indicate, that does not occur with these particular materials, in that environment. If it did, obviously we'd never use it, nor would any of the hundreds of other manufacturers use it, as nobody wants that kind of liability.

That mounting system isn't our original design of course, that mounting system has been around for *many* years. We saw it years ago, and had observed it in use for over 4 years before we ever did the first kit. So I can tell you that in 4 years of constant use in a seasonal environment that included everything from 100 degree summer days to the nastiest 3 foot snowfalls & resultant road-clearing chemicals, in vehicles wearing this mounting system for 4 years there was no observable reaction or corrosion, etc. The copper rods & aluminum tubes looked as good as the day they were installed, literally. We saw no abrasion and no corrosion of any kind, and still don't, so we're perfectly happy & comfortable with it on our vehicles and in our customers vehicles, and that has been born out with not 1 such incidence to date.

It's all in the alloys used, of course, and there are almost always other metals involved to make the alloy acceptable for the purpose at hand (I.E., copper's inherent softness), in our experience. Now, I can't tell you the exact metal mix (alloys) used, and in all candor, even if I could I wouldn't, I'd be saying the exact same thing most likely, as that's potentially giving away R&D to *somebody*. Being a man of science, you'll appreciate that aspect, no doubt.

What I *can* tell you is that this does not happen, there is no galvanic reaction, end of story. That was our very first concern, as that's pretty basic, of course. Many companies have been using this exact method of mounting for decades, and there too, we see no track record of any such galvanic reactions, with or without exposure to things such as moisture, road salts, etc. Obviously, anything under the hood has to be prepared to stand up to such things, and while road salt makes aluminum look funky (look at your engine's cylinder heads, or the alternator), there is no inherent galvanic reaction between those 2 materials as we & many others use them for this same purpose.

The automakers widespread use of such materials as both aluminum and copper together in radiators for the last 35+ years should be evidence enough that this is not an inherent problem, as nobody is cheaper than an automaker (except perhaps one of my attorneys!), and they aren't about to use copper tanks with aluminum tubes inside the same radiator taking any such chance. At least, not in the past 35 years that I personally know of. These days, we see less & less copper and far more plastic being used for inner tanks inside aluminum radiators, simply because plastic works and is *much* cheaper, but I digress...........

I appreciate your latest response greatly, thanks for taking the time to explain a bit more about your background, knowledge and your concerns in this area.

 

Hey Neal,

Just wanted to drop you a quick note, I didn't get finished here until well after midnight, and I wasn't going to call you that late. Give me a call tomorrow as soon as you get home, and I'll call you back so it's on my dime & we'll get the details on your next mod taken care of!

 

HI!... RING, RING, RING, RING...........