If replacing: CUT off the old one.

Clearly they are installed at the factory with engine not in the car!


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This is excellent advice OP. As Andrew points out, once you have the old boot cut off then the awkward clamp positioning is easy to get at to remove. :thumbup:

Of course when I did it the replacement was a crap copy I couldn't use however super glue did a fine job of putting the old back together until my OEM replacement came.


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I don't think that the air temp is your problem as I get into bumper to bumper traffic and the temperature here can get up to 60c (140f) although normally it's around 120f in the shade...

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OP here with my final recap!

So was coming back to the city yesterday and instead of taking the George Washington Bridge, I took the tunnel. About half way into the tunnel the gauge started to climb and then about 3/4 of the way in, ding - Coolant Temperature warning. When I got out of the tunnel, it took longer for the needle to move back - it was hotter out yesterday than any other day.

I now think i was lucky to have a nice warm Lincoln Tunnel to find this issue. Had the outside temp went to 90, I would have started to overheat with no way to cool it back down other than turn off the car.

I didn't have the courage to stick something into the spinning fan, but I read another way to test the fan clutch. Turn the car off and watch the fan, if it spines for several seconds after the car is off, then it is toast. Sure enough mine spun.

Last night I swapped in my new fan clutch... took longer to find my fan clutch removal tool than to do the rest of the job. LOL. You need a 5mm allen to remove the fan clutch bolts from the blades, I had 3 bolts on my 2003 X5. Amazon part Hella Behr was $80, with 2 day free shipping.

After the swap, I checked the fan when the car was turned off and it basically stops in 1/2 turn or less. Totally different from what was seen before. I am sure this was my issue, but like the first guy said, who responded to my initial posting. Thank you and thanks to everyone else who helped out.

Other comments: Getting the fan nut off is always a guessing game, but at least I know you can move the nut around to try and get better position to take it off... putting it on always sucks too, takes me many tries, but always gets back on.

Now I need to do my valve cover gasket and lower boot (which I actually taped up yesterday), it has a HUGE crack in it, but at least now my lean error codes have gone away...

Congrats! Thanks for posting the conclusion.


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You may have one more problem. If the car doesn't get enough cooling from the mechanical fan, you should have the electric fan kick on before the temp hits the red. Do you remember if that happened? The foxwell scanner will let you engage the fan on command to test it's function also when you start the car I think it will turn like 1/2 a turn to self test

I did not notice the electric fan turning on at any time when looking at the fans in the overheat state. I will take a look. Does that fan do anything when the AC is on? thanks again for your help specifically.

The electric fan program is such that it turns on at lower temp when ac is running. That's why the mention of ac being on in early posts.

The usual first symptoms of fan clutch worn out is not the fake gauge hitting red usually it's complaint of the electric fan turning on too frequently or fast. (It can sound like the car is trying to hover).

Any time the mechanical fan doesn't do its job the electric fan should kick on.

Usually on a hot day at idle the engine will get warm enough for the fan to cycle on and off when AC is on and car is not moving.

A month ago or so I took a video to demonstrate how to stop the mechanical fan and when I did that it took mere seconds before the electric fan kicked on. I let the fan spin back up to speed and the electric fan turned off.

When your car cooled off quickly when out of the tunnel, perhaps did the electric fan finally come on? You definitely want to confirm the fan is working. I believe it uses the outlet temp sensor so it would be good to know that is reporting a valid reading ;use an IR thermometer to confirm the temp is similar to the computer temp.

It feels like your elec fan is not working and that led you to discover that also the mechanical fan wasn't. If either one was working properly you'd probably have never gotten the overheat situation. The elec fan should turn a little bit when you start the car but also typically on hot days with AC going it will cycle on and off when car is idling and not moving.