How likely to overheat w/o shroud?

[Ben B.]

Anyone run without a shroud and not have any problems?

 

[shoudabinacowboy]

For a couple months. No problems yet.

 

[Wasatch K5]

Why don't you want a shroud?

 

[Elroy303030]

I havnt had one in years. it creaps up a little in traffic in hot summer heat, but never over heats.. Knock on wood..

 

[rollin36s]

mine runs a little hot when im on the freeway or doing trails never over 210 though just run an electric fan it will make life easy

 

[1978Blazerk5]

i havent ran a shroud in my daily driver(95' Ford Cargo Van) for about a year now and havnt had a problem. I had to cut it up to get the alternater out. lol

 

[cegusman]

The 6.2 diesel in my k5 hated not having a shroud. Would run at 215 degrees just sitting there. Once I installed the shroud it went back down to 195

 

[broncoman6524]

My 383 has never had a shroud. never overheated it. It has a 195 Thermostat and hasn't creaped above 210.

 

[xtrmjoe]

I had half a schroud for a while it did run warmer than I liked but at the time I lived in the central valley here in Cali lots of 100+ days and a very heavy right foot in me teenage years.
I took the innner fenders out and have never looked back.

 

[dbreid]

Run flat electric fans. Best of all worlds. I am a firm believer in shrouds. They are a cheap piece of plastic that makes your engine run cooler and better. Why wouldn't you use one?

 

[dyeager535]

Simple answer: if you don't have a shroud, and the engine doesn't get hot without it, don't worry about it. If you have a shroud, leave it. If the engine gets hot at other than cruise, get a shroud, or at least make sure you don't have other problems with the cooling system.

 

[Randy92782]

Took the one off my Blazer to change the water pump and was just too lazy to put it back. I know, i know

Never had a problem as of yet but it's been broke for awhile now so it doesn't get hot at all

 

[onetonbb74]

mine had one with the 350 that came with it, but the 454 is longer and the 350 shroud comes really close to the belts, so i decided to not use it and look for a big block one or try to fab a junkyard one to fit. Without a shroud and my 454 just idling in my driveway it gets to 205 with a 180 stat, so im getting one. When I had the 350, it was at 170 all the time no matter what i was doing with a 160 stat and shroud.

The very first time i removed my shroud was when i heard the fan hitting it badly on the trail, so i investigated the situation and found that my radiator support failed and ripped the bolt through on one side due to flex and rust, causing my radiator support to move up and down dramatically and the shroud hit the fan badly so i ripped it off on the trail. Just glad it wasnt the radiator.

 

[blazin_blazer]

w/o shroud every truck i've ever built would get hot while crawling/goin slo, or was in grass hood deep, install a shroud and it would be fine,

a shroud makes the fan pull air thru the entire surface area of the radiator(corners), while just a fan actually only pulls air thru just the size of diameter of the fan is and, running no shroud will allow fan effiency to drop also, as air moves around end and edge of blade, stirring air infront of enegine, instead of pulling air threw the radiator...like a boxless speaker will cancel most sound by air just moving around edge of speaker...but if you have a large enuff radiator, it will cool w/o shroud,..

i.e. we put a becool rad in a sbc toyota that was overheating w 4 row rad b/c it was to tight for shroud, so it didn't have 1, the increase in effiency of the becool alum. radiator made up for lack of shroud and idles in traffic fine now...so if radiator is borderline small, a shroud will increase the effiency and allow said radiator to keep engine cool, while it wouldn't w/o shroud

i have a friend who had a cat radiator of some sort on a bogger,..measured prolly 30''wx28''hx8-10'' thick, his hood has a rectangular hole cut in it where the top tank sticks thru(actually didn't look to terrible) water pump pulley bolted on w/o fan...also tractor pull headers thru hood, its such a huge radiator, he has no engine fan, theres 1 11or12'' electric fan , if it got hotit'll cool it down

 

[stillnotbob]

damn I must be the only one... I have a 1977 Blazer.... took the shroud off once and within 15 miles of driving on the highway I had to pull over because it was overheating.

That was a few years back, and I have since gone to a electric fan setup that works great.