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Electric Cooling Fan (600W) - E85 / E86

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kaiser01
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Electric Cooling Fan (600W) - E85 / E86

Post by kaiser01 » Sat Mar 06, 2021 11:49 am

Hi All,

I recently had a failure of my electric cooling fan on a Z4 M. The cost for a new one from BMW is around £700, which is fairly steep for a fan motor and some moulded plastic.

Naturally, I'd try and find a good OE quality alternative when posed with an unreasonable part cost. However, after searching high and low, it appears that this part is not provided by any of the OEMs (TEMIC, BEHR, HELLA, VELO ect..). Not great.

The problem is these are all supplied as complete units. It is not possible to buy the fan motor. You have to buy a complete assembly with new shroud and fan. So, the OEMs choose higher volume (normal) models and don't bother with lower volume sports models like the Z4.

After a bit of research, I was able to find a mainstream BMW model that used the same electro-mechanical part. The six-cylinder E60 5-series from around 2005 had the same TEMIC manufactured fan module / motor, but in a different shroud.

Fan housing with fan 600W for the Z4 is p/n 17427542912 from BMW. I can confirm that the motor supplied in MAHLE brand (BEHR) with p/n CFF 366 000S will fit in our shrouds / housing. Even the wiring the same length. It is a drop-in replacement.

This is a 9 blade fan with 600W motor.

I bought mine from Eurocarparts, they had it in stock for next day delivery at £280 with one of their discount vouchers.

My local BMW dealer could offer the original for £630 with a club discount, but it would take 5-7 days to get from Germany. And you don't get a free E60 shroud to add to your own pile of automotive junk either.

I hope this helps other Z4 M owners and probably six-cylinder auto as well. I think the smaller engines and manual cars use a 400W item that is completely different.

Here are some useful pictures:
OEM Fan Label
OEM Fan Label
OEM Fan Label.jpeg (61.63 KiB) Viewed 1742 times
E60 Fan Shroud
E60 Fan Shroud
E60 Fan Shroud.jpeg (73.63 KiB) Viewed 1742 times
Back plate of original fan
Back plate of original fan
Back plate of E85 E86 600W.jpeg (90.33 KiB) Viewed 1742 times
Back of original 600W fan
Back of original 600W fan
Orginal 600W Fan.jpeg (142.95 KiB) Viewed 1742 times
Front of 600W fan
Front of 600W fan
front of 600w fan.jpeg (122.74 KiB) Viewed 1742 times
Now for reference this is what the 400W one for smaller engine / some manual cars looks like.
front of 400W fan.jpeg
front of 400W fan.jpeg (113.9 KiB) Viewed 1742 times
400W fan.jpeg
400W fan.jpeg (96.64 KiB) Viewed 1742 times
If you have this one, you'll need a different part. This OEM swap won't work for you.

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rawpilot
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Electric Cooling Fan (600W) - E85 / E86

Post by rawpilot » Thu Mar 11, 2021 7:49 pm

:thumbsup: great work. I fixed a £700 VW fan with a £2 bearing recently.
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ArturoRockin
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Electric Cooling Fan (600W) - E85 / E86

Post by ArturoRockin » Wed May 31, 2023 6:09 am

Hello Kaiser! I actually have recently ran into a similar issue with my radiator fan. I purchased my 2006 E85 6 speed from Cincinnati, OH last August. I’ve seen then drove the car without air conditioning. Temps in Tennessee usually don’t get too high till around mid-June. I actually never knew that there was an issue with my radiator fan not coming on until I took the car to get then air-condition system tested. Everything came back good and that’s when the Tech a friend of mine pointed out that the radiator fan had yet to come out the entire time it had sat in the bay. That was in September. I’ve drove the car for 8 months without a radiator fan. Luckily the car has held up fine and I recently got back to trying to diagnose the issue and repair everything accordingly. I replaced the Engine Coolant Temp Sensor and immediately saw the rad fan come on, well I guess sometime from then and a couple days later when I attempted to recharge the system manually with a couple cans of R-134a from a auto parts store. I noticed the fan didn’t come on anymore well I guess that it was on it last leg and had finally given out from not working for god knows how long. Saw your post about sourcing the motor from a E60 Mahle-Behr fan and wanted to see if you had any follows up with your experience? Going to order a new E60 Rad Fan Assembly and was just trying to get everything in order before making the jump!

Marty65
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Electric Cooling Fan (600W) - E85 / E86

Post by Marty65 » Fri Mar 01, 2024 7:55 am

Hi Kaiser, I have the same problem. Just found that part number on Amazon costing £213. Only problem I can see is it's rated at 580W rather than 600. In your opinion, would this be a problem?
Thanks in advance,
Marty.

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