cooling fan

I have a 2.7 L Tacoma with manual transmission and 230,000 miles. My fan seems to run a real lot on hot days and I'm not sure whether this is normal. I just replaced the water pump with a factory pump and put in a new thermostat. I checked the coolant temperature and it's right about 183 degrees. I don't see much water flow inside the radiator. The temperature gauge looks fine everything else works fine but the fan is just running like crazy particularly when I go up a hill, like pretty much 90% of the time. Is this normal?

 

Your description is confusing, sorry. Having said that, if what you are refering to your "fan running hot" you mean that the fan is louder than normal when you go up hills? That is normal to a point. If the 183 degreee coolant temp is the temp all of the time then that is normal too. The fan clutch, the bit that the actual fan bolts onto is designed to "lock up" as the temperature off the radiator gets higher, thus pulling more air throught the core. If the clutch is locked up all the time, that is not normal.

 

If the clutch is locked up, it's not necessarily a bad thing other than more fuel consumption.

You can check it when the vehicle/engine are absolutely cold; the clutch should not be locked up and the fan should spin freely.

 

They're tricky to check.

When you start it cold, the fan runs for a few minutes 'til the fluid loosens up and it kicks out, it remains kicked out 'til the fluid is thin enough from temperature that it flows outwardly in the internal vanes and locks it back up, 'til it cools and repeats.

In summer it's hard to tell, in winter if it never kicks out, then you need a new one or to replace the fluid and clean out internally. I bought a new one and am not happy with it either. Some others have experienced this also. Aisen or cheapo's. None seem to be as good as the orignal was 20 yrs. ago.