Looking through my FSM for my '01 Windstar, I see the manual spells out replacing the fan shroud (bad fans) by removing the radiator.

Is this really necessary? Has anyone done this and know of a short cut?

Thanks

 

Most likely as the fan assembly comes out from below if I'm not mistaken. You may even find that the A/C lines are in the way and you have to recover the system to get the A/C lines moved. Don't believe that there are any short cuts for this job.

 

I was hoping this was one of those situations where the FSM erred on the side of caution, but it looks more and more as though that's the situation. The radiator comes out the bottom.

Thanks for your input.

 

After a day of this, the radiator DOES have to come out the bottom. Fortunately I didn't have to open any A/C lines; the A/C muffler and its lines just swing out of the way. The hardest part was finding the two bolts that fastened the radiator to the A/C condenser. From the FSM, they look to be pretty sizeable bolts, but they're not. Also, the FSM fails to mention that the bolts tie the radiator and the condenser together, not the condenser to any structure, which the picture led me to believe. Can't tell you how long I spent discovering that.

Also would like to thank the engineers at Ford for making it so damn difficult to slip a drain hose on the radiator drain. The space allowed for this 3/8" hose means it's going to kink and slow things up considerably. I'd recommend to anyone attempting to do this that they connect a 3/8" elbow to the drain with a very short piece of hose.

Other than these things, it went pretty much by the book. I don't see any shortcuts around this method.

Thanks for viewing!

 

Glad you got it figured out. I've learned a long time ago that once you have it figured out, some engineer threw something else in the way. Like the cam synchronizer...You mean to tell me they couldn't have designed one coolant tube so that you don't have to drain the cooling system to replace it.