Whoever engineered this lash up deserves to be promoted to Rube Goldberg first class.

Why in Heck would anyone design anything so convoluted to disassemble and reassemble is totally beyond me. It takes forever to change out this bracket, when they could have easily mounted the fan to the water pump as most manufacturers do, but no, they had to design a completely independent piece to hang the fan and viscous clutch upon.

Anyone else been through this exercise?

Maybe I should do a D.I.Y. on it.

 

Well it saves wear on the water pump rollers, makes the engine that much better.

A write up couldn't hurt...

 

Here's how to do it:

Tools needed: Metric socket set, Metric Allen Socket set, screwdrivers, end wrenches, drain pan.

Parts Needed: New fan bracket, new serpentine belt, idler pulley, tension pulley (note, you may feel that you don't need these pulley's but why not change them while you are this deep into it? Coolant, and you might as well replace the thermostat too.

1. Disconnect battery
2. Drain engine coolant
3. Disconnect all hoses to radiator (including the transmission cooling lines, and there is a bracket holding the cooling line to the bottom of the radiator that will need to be removed).
4. Turn shroud ring and lay ring behind fan
5. Remove 2 upper clips from shroud and core support
6. Remove shroud, ring and radiator.
7. Release tension on belt adjustment and remove serpentine belt
8. Using 8mm Allen socket, remove fan clutch and fan
9. Remove the 4, 6mm bolts from fan pulley
10. Remove the heater supply steel pipe (there is a 5mm Allen bolt that locates the pipe to the top of the fan bracket that must be removed).
11. Remove idler pulley
12. Extract the bolts that hold the fan bracket to the engine (keep track of their placement because they are of different lengths)
13. Installation is in the exact reverse order of removal.
14 Refill the coolant with fresh 50/50 mix.
Start engine and check for leaks.

This procedure takes a couple of hours to do. I got my new bracket from Parts Geek, and they overnighted the bracket for $171.05 complete.

Best of luck if you do this one. It is pretty simple once you figure out what all is connected and what all has to be removed to access the bracket. Mine had spit about half the steel ***** out of the bearing. Didn't make too much noise, but you could hear it. If I had gone much further, I would probably have caused more damage.

While the radiator is out be sure to back wash the core to remove any road debris that may have collected in the fins. A garden hose works fine for this.