Talk Morgan Forums Morgan Sports Cars Morgan Three Wheeler & Super 3 M3W cooling fan amp draw.

Hi Richard,

Harsh? Not at all. Good stuff. What I really need is to have a formal ECU Protune evaluation to look at all parameters but the only way to do that would be for me to drive my M3W on the road while the tuner is sitting in the passenger seat with his lap top connected to my ECU. But it’s my understanding they also need exhaust measurements as well and I’m not sure they’re able to do that while driving. Nobody around here has a stationary rolling road tuning set up for M3Ws.

It’s my understanding the Love Jug fans throw a lot of air at the most important part of the cylinder heads and I intended to essentially keep then on while driving and not periodically.

I’ll go have a talk again with our local S&S shop and see if we can figure out how to do an open road ECU tune. I’ll figure a way to get a good cylinder head temp measurement at peak operating temperature as well.

Thanks.

if i remember correct.y you can run the car with the fan removed and unplugged and it runs fine. i tried this during the cold winter on a test drive after installing the cams and i only put about 30 miles on it but no codes.

Sportster, although in mind I forgot to add that given the M3W's engine orientation the fans you propose would actually impede natural airflow over barrels and heads. Even with these fans permanently on I suspect that cooling will be reduced at anything above town speeds.

I also forgot to mention that I had valve and timing covers powder coated silk black from new. Although done for cosmetic reasons it must have improved heat dissipation (high school physics, black body radiation).

Finally the US chose to class the M3W as a motorcycle which it clearly is not. This led to the ruling in some/all states that headlamps had to be placed close together. To conform MMC sited the twin headlamps immediately in front of cylinders. I understand that most are re-sited to original positions at pdi in the US, but worth bearing in mind if yours haven't.

I agree that a check of ECU parameters would be an excellent idea. Programable ECU's were available but may be hard to find now.

BTW the OE fan is fused at 15 amps. I'm guessing the current draw would be in the order of 8-10 amps, in answer to your original query. Certainly not a problem for the charge system.

I'll join in with my thoughts.
Current draw from fans like the Love Jugs is unlikely to be a problem of any sort.
Except at very low speeds indeed, Love Jugs will produce much less cooling than the simple air flow due to the movement through the air and at speed there is more even cooling of the cylinders due to the cowl that the factory cooling kit includes. I was told by one of the engineers involved that the improved cooling at speed was a bit of a welcome surprise to them when they were developing the kit. Any cooling effect from a fan will be utterly overwhelmed by the wind rush by about 30mph or even less.
Skip fire is disabled when the cooling kit is fitted, you might want to re-enable it if you fit manually actuated fans in case of forgetting to switch them on in time. Presumably your ECU is unlocked so changes can be made.
The various oil cooler arrangements will certainly cool the oil but the engine is primarily directly air cooled by the fins on the cylinders so a reduction in oil temperature doesn't necessarily make a big difference to overall engine temperature. Some engines such as the original Suzuki GSXR bike engines were oil cooled but they had oil galleries similar to a water cooled engines water jacket around the cylinders specifically to give even cooling and they had enormous oil coolers to cope with the amount of heat generated.
I'll take a punt that the uneven running when hot for an extended period is more to do with something electrical. My suspicion would be on the the plug leads, the coil and possibly an out of adjustment throttle position sensor. The standard plug leads are not the best and are prone to breaking down particularly if they have been pinched by the bodywork or over zealous tie wrapping which leads to poor sparks. The coil generally isn't a problem on the M3W but a dodgy coil can give heat related misfires. The throttle position sensor is officially non adjustable according to S&S and needs the throttle body returned to them for calibration. In reality the adjustment screw is simply covered by a plug of silicone which can be unpicked, then it's a case of checking the voltage it gives on a closed throttle and adjusting the screw to give the correct figure. It would of course be more helpful if I could remember the correct voltage...apologies but I've never written it down but someone out there will know what it should be. I'm pretty sure that Protune gives a direct readout of the voltage but it's also easily done with a multimeter.
My basic thought is that the problem isn't the cooling system per se, but is another fault that is heat related but that won't be cured by changing the cooling arrangmeents particularly to a system that gives less cooling than standard when travelling at speed.

Really great input.

Thanks everyone!

I also think that you will have less cooling with Love Jugs fitted rather than the admittedly ugly but effective standard cooling fan and shroud. The standard set up helps with cooling the rear of the cylinders on the move and Love Jugs won't. If you have 569 cams then NGK DCPR6EIX plugs are recommended rather than the 7's. A check of the ignition leads, particularly around the edge of the bonnet cover is a good idea.

You can read the history of your engine with ProTune 2 recording the max cylinder temps and peaks on recent runs, that will tell you if you really are getting some exceptional temperatures or not. I cannot remember what my peak figures were the last time I looked but most trips were fairly constant. I really doubt that your running issues are caused by overheating. Probably different in the USA but in the UK over cooling seems to be more of a problem for most of the year. I have an oil pressure and temperature gauge that gives a good indication if things are getting hot. Even on a hot (30c+) day the oil temp rarely gets over 110c and the engine runs steady at that.

Sadly we don't have a knowledgeable S&S ECU tuner with a M3W compatible dyno at Krazy Horse or anywhere else in the UK now either. Not many dealers that know there stuff with M3W's here, so the "every sniffle" 😁 option doesn't exist either and I doubt things will improve with the end of production.

Going back a few years , Matt at Matts Machine Shop ( mattsmachineshop.co.uk ) was S&S trained on tuning the X-wedge, and while he didnt have a dyno in house , he had access to a suitable local dyno a mile or so away.
I have not been in contact for a good 5 years but have no reason to believe he has stopped trading.
I used his tuning services after I upgraded to Morgan stage 2, he fitted roller rockers for me, then tuned it on the dyno.

Thank you again everyone.

The only time I had issues with running a bit rough, was when I had the larger S&S air filter on mine. At speed (70 mph) it would feel like it missed, unless I was accelerating. I put the regular size filter back on and it cleared up. To me, that meant it was running too lean. I also had thought of love jugs (fan oriented to push the air rearward) but the urban cooling fan moves a heck of a lot of air and cuts out at 10 mph when ambient air flow is now passing the exhaust ends. I do have a fan assisted cooler under the bonnet, which dropped my oil temps from the 230's to the 2-teens.

On my wife's heritage softail I put on a fan assisted JAGG cooler and the smaller version of the love jugs, and they do a great job.

Thanks Rodger,

The collective experience and knowledge in this forum is really great. I appreciate it.

I have a local friend who has a 2014 M3W. It might be a good idea for me to drive his and vice versa. That would help in establishing what is normal and what isn’t. From what I remember my M3W has had this issue from new with stock equipment. The selling dealer and local S&S shop didn’t find anything wrong. I’ve upgraded to a S&S Stealth high flow air filter, less restrictive exhaust, Stage 2 cams, Stage 2 ECU, and tried NGK iridium spark plugs,
The symptoms are better than stock equipment but I feel at times this engine just seems rough and causes more vibration than other times. I have to admit it sometimes seems random. There are days when I start out where the engine is initially as smooth as can be but other times immediately I can tell the engine seems to be running rough. That would argue against a temperature dependent causation. Most of the time it seems to happen after I’ve driven for awhile which has lead me to believe it’s a temperature issue. I think I’m going to replace the spark plug leads to the Magnecor KV85 thoroughly discussed in a previous thread in case these were damaged. Magnecor currently supplies 7 mm leads for the M3W. How would I check the ignition coil? If there was a problem with the fuel system wouldn’t that show up with error codes in the ECU? I’ll also connect with a good tuner and try to arrange an open road tune.

If anybody has any other thoughts please share.

Thanks again.