Old 3-blade engine cooling fan

[Andrew Henshall]

Does anyone globally have any ideas about the make/model of car which used the old 3-blade engine cooling fan shown below, which came with some Jowett parts acquired years ago?

Description: cast aluminium 3-blade engine cooling fan; eccentric mounting designed to allow the v-belt to be tensioned. One identifying mark only on one blade - see photo of the logo which looks a little like a "D" below'

The brass knurled screw cap greaser (see below) looks vintage to me. I have found very similar RC11 type greasers for sale on VintageCarPartsUK & one other website.

Any suggestions as to the age of the fan would be welcomed!

I have seen a Bradford in Australia fairly recently that had an engine driven cooling fan (v-belt drive), and recall a suggestion that it was a factory option for hot-climate regions only. I can't remember whose Bradford it was, and more importantly can't remember what the fan looked like. Any suggestions or comments?


Cheers,

Andrew

[ian Howell]

Andrew: -

This looks to be very early vintage - no idea which make, BUT . . .

It could well be worth an enquiry to Micheael Worthington-Williams at The Automobile magazine, or direct by eMail to 'Worthycomments@btconnect.com, as this is the sort of query that forms a regular feature in his columns.

[Andrew Henshall]

Further data on the old fan:

I forgot to include the outside diameter: 16.5 inches.

Also, the fan is ball-bearing mounted on an eccentric shaft designed to be rotated in order to tension the v-belt.

One identifying mark only on one blade (see photo attached previously) which looks like a "D" with something inside the D. Does this mean anything to you? It could be a foundry mark.

The style/design of the fan (and the nickel-plated brass knurled screw cap greaser) definitely looks vintage to me. It must have rotated fairly slowly to have needed such a coarse pitch on the fan.

There is quite a mixture of threads involved in the assembly: 25 x 1.5mm pitch Metric, 7/32" UNC, 5/32"x 26tpi British Standard Brass (greaser), which is an unusual combination.

I have been researching my fan using the internet, and have identified very few makes/models that use anything similar. I fact, the only one that comes even close is the Bullnose Morris Oxford/Cowley.

Bullnose Morris Oxford/Cowley is the first model I found that used a cast alloy fan for a brief period in the mid-1920s, and it is 3-bladed too. I have looked into the history of Morris engines, and Wikipedia tells me that when their early engine supplier White and Poppe was unable to supply the volume of units that Morris required, Morris turned to Continental of Detroit, Michigan for the supply of a 1548 cc engine. After the First World War the Continental engine was no longer available, and so Morris arranged for Hotchkiss of France to make a near-copy in their Coventry factory. This engine was used to power new versions of the basic Cowley and more up-market Morris Oxford cars. Hence, Morris might have ended up with a mix of US & metric threads!

I can't work out why there are three different width threaded sections with plain bits in between on my fan's eccentric mounting shaft, can you? See image below. Can you help with this detail?

Also, once you have rotated my eccentric shaft around to tension the v-belt, what stops it from working backwards and loosening the belt off again? Any suggestions?