Change Cooling Fan.
The 2005 Chevy Cobalt Radiator Cooling Fan is attached to the Radiator facing the engine, and the AC Condenser is also attached on the other side of the Radiator facing the front bumper.
This model year (2005) has a single fan while later model chevy cobalts have dual cooling fans on the radiator. Either way they are both cooling fan assemblies and go in and come out the same way I imagine. This is my experience taking mine out. SS models have an intercooler to deal with and also 2 fans I think.
Side Note: If your fan/fans aren't working and your car is over heating; check the fuses and relays in the dash console and under the hood in the engine compartment. Look and see if the wiring is plugged in. There is only 1 wire that plugs into the fan right in the middle of it where the fan motor circle is (bullseye location), that plug then runs off about hands length and plugs into another plug, which is like a plug extension about 2 hands long which is mounted to the side of the fan outside the large fan circle, held in place by a half circle plastic clip that is part of the fan housing itself. Like how a gas station pump has a thing to rest the pump handle in when not in use. This fan 'clip' mounting point you slide the black plastic into it then that runs down to where the fan motor is and find the wiring that then plugs into the fan motor. The fan wiring hanging clip is on the driver side about half way down.
The in the driveway with a jack and stands method. If you have a lift you can lower the fan out but with jacks there is not enough room so you have to turn it and manipulate it a lot to finally have it drop on the ground.
DON'T BE FOOLED BY THE HAYES AND CHILTON OWNERS MANUALS!!! They say to remove the brackets in the chapter on this. However, the AC Condenser is filled with AC Freon gas under a lot of pressure and so have the AC system drained or really support the assembly well before removing one or both of the lower mounting brackets. They are the only thing holding the thing to the car. The manuals say "clips" and brackets hold it in, but NO/NOPE it is only the 2 lower brackets. The 2 top brackets just keep the assembly from moving much forward and backward and do not "hold" or secure anything...
...PROCEED WITH CAUTION.
0.) In the picture above on the lower left side is the AC Condenser tubes. 2 of them. Do not let those 'pop off' or you will be covered in cold freezing death! Proceed with CAUTION.
1.) Remove front bumper.
2.) Drain radiator fluid. Disconnect the 2 large black radiator tubes. Leave the other ones (silver tubes) alone. There is a turn nozzle spout on the passenger side of the radiator. When you turn this plug the radiator fluid will start to drain out the bottom of the bracket peg, but when you remove the entire screw plug above that it will all flow out of that plug hole. Wait until you are about to do the fan to drain, in case you make mess. There is a lot of screw driver and socket work to do first.
3.) Fan motor plug. The connector/harness tubing, comes off the fan, and wraps around the plastic half circle (A) in the picture, then connects to another similar tubing harness/connector. (see Step 7 and image)
4.) Remove the top 2 brackets that are above the radiator on each side. is a single bolt 10mm.
Find a way to secure the ac condenser (IMPORTANTLY! under pressure gas in it and the 2 lines running into it on the lower passenger side. Don't unscrew!)
5.) find a way to secure the ac condenser
as in wood planks under it.
6.) Lift radiator up out of the 2 plastic bumps it sits in. place it on the wood.
7.) now, lift the fan up out of the 4 plastic pieces holding it in, it has the top 2 pegs and the bottom 2 are just flat tabs, lines of thick plastic.
option 2. on the outside lower left and right there are 2 more radiator brackets. these each have 3 bolts. are easy to remove. remove one, I did the passenger side and the new fan drops in with room.
I also took off the hood latch for room.
ATTENTION:
the chilton and hayes owners manuals both says that the radiator is held in place with brackets and clips. It is only held in by the 2 lower brackets on each side, and inside those are rubber grommets that the peg of a radiator sits in. THERE ARE NO CLIPS as in from the chassis body of the car. the "clips" are I guess meant to be the way the 3 things are together. the radiator, the ac condenser and the cooling fan. All of these ride in the 2 lower brackets and clips, and bolt together.
so, unless I am missing some clip brackets DO NOT REMOVE THE LOWER BRAKCETS WITHOUT SECURING THE RADIATOR, AND most importantly the AC CONDENSOR.
I was unable to get the fan out of the top, remove air box, and all that up top and no way it was going out that way, so tried to get it out on the other side of the cars front beam, it is just a bit to thick, so had to lower out the bottom.
You can see the top radiator peg the bracket fits over and how the front upper body beam is preventing you taking the fan out from the top.
In this picture you can see the radiator hose the black one that needs to be removed so the fan moves freely. You may want to try without draining the radiator and see if you can manage it but not much of any space. Also there is a plastic black tab holding the passenger side AC tubing in to the body under where the airbox is at. I removed the silver tubing from that tab clip thing. Doesn't really help much adding 1% more play to it is all. The silver tube on the other side here seen in the picture connects shortly later to a black rubber tube that appears to have play in it and so I didn't disconnect anything else just the 2 radiator hoses. There is a set of transmission tubes connected to the radiator as well on automatic cars. Manuals with stick shift transmissions I don't think so.
CAUTION! AC Condenser. Radiator. Need to find a way to secure the condenser or have it drained professionally. It is under intense pressure!
The 2005 Chevy Cobalt Radiator Cooling Fan is attached to the Radiator facing the engine, and the AC Condenser is also attached on the other side of the Radiator facing the front bumper.
This model year (2005) has a single fan while later model chevy cobalts have dual cooling fans on the radiator. Either way they are both cooling fan assemblies and go in and come out the same way I imagine. This is my experience taking mine out. SS models have an intercooler to deal with and also 2 fans I think.
Side Note: If your fan/fans aren't working and your car is over heating; check the fuses and relays in the dash console and under the hood in the engine compartment. Look and see if the wiring is plugged in. There is only 1 wire that plugs into the fan right in the middle of it where the fan motor circle is (bullseye location), that plug then runs off about hands length and plugs into another plug, which is like a plug extension about 2 hands long which is mounted to the side of the fan outside the large fan circle, held in place by a half circle plastic clip that is part of the fan housing itself. Like how a gas station pump has a thing to rest the pump handle in when not in use. This fan 'clip' mounting point you slide the black plastic into it then that runs down to where the fan motor is and find the wiring that then plugs into the fan motor. The fan wiring hanging clip is on the driver side about half way down.
The in the driveway with a jack and stands method. If you have a lift you can lower the fan out but with jacks there is not enough room so you have to turn it and manipulate it a lot to finally have it drop on the ground.
DON'T BE FOOLED BY THE HAYES AND CHILTON OWNERS MANUALS!!! They say to remove the brackets in the chapter on this. However, the AC Condenser is filled with AC Freon gas under a lot of pressure and so have the AC system drained or really support the assembly well before removing one or both of the lower mounting brackets. They are the only thing holding the thing to the car. The manuals say "clips" and brackets hold it in, but NO/NOPE it is only the 2 lower brackets. The 2 top brackets just keep the assembly from moving much forward and backward and do not "hold" or secure anything...
...PROCEED WITH CAUTION.
0.) In the picture above on the lower left side is the AC Condenser tubes. 2 of them. Do not let those 'pop off' or you will be covered in cold freezing death! Proceed with CAUTION.
1.) Remove front bumper.
2.) Drain radiator fluid. Disconnect the 2 large black radiator tubes. Leave the other ones (silver tubes) alone. There is a turn nozzle spout on the passenger side of the radiator. When you turn this plug the radiator fluid will start to drain out the bottom of the bracket peg, but when you remove the entire screw plug above that it will all flow out of that plug hole. Wait until you are about to do the fan to drain, in case you make mess. There is a lot of screw driver and socket work to do first.
3.) Fan motor plug. The connector/harness tubing, comes off the fan, and wraps around the plastic half circle (A) in the picture, then connects to another similar tubing harness/connector. (see Step 7 and image)
4.) Remove the top 2 brackets that are above the radiator on each side. is a single bolt 10mm.
Find a way to secure the ac condenser (IMPORTANTLY! under pressure gas in it and the 2 lines running into it on the lower passenger side. Don't unscrew!)
5.) find a way to secure the ac condenser
as in wood planks under it.
6.) Lift radiator up out of the 2 plastic bumps it sits in. place it on the wood.
7.) now, lift the fan up out of the 4 plastic pieces holding it in, it has the top 2 pegs and the bottom 2 are just flat tabs, lines of thick plastic.
so now that the radiator cooling fan is up off the radiator. you can if you try really hard get it to come out of the bottom by turning it on its side without removing the brackets on the bottom. Then wiggle it back flat then side eventually you find a way to get it come out the bottom. (THIS IS WITH THE CAR JACKETED UP HIGH on both front sides).
option 2. on the outside lower left and right there are 2 more radiator brackets. these each have 3 bolts. are easy to remove. remove one, I did the passenger side and the new fan drops in with room.
I also took off the hood latch for room.
ATTENTION:
the chilton and hayes owners manuals both says that the radiator is held in place with brackets and clips. It is only held in by the 2 lower brackets on each side, and inside those are rubber grommets that the peg of a radiator sits in. THERE ARE NO CLIPS as in from the chassis body of the car. the "clips" are I guess meant to be the way the 3 things are together. the radiator, the ac condenser and the cooling fan. All of these ride in the 2 lower brackets and clips, and bolt together.
so, unless I am missing some clip brackets DO NOT REMOVE THE LOWER BRAKCETS WITHOUT SECURING THE RADIATOR, AND most importantly the AC CONDENSOR.
I was unable to get the fan out of the top, remove air box, and all that up top and no way it was going out that way, so tried to get it out on the other side of the cars front beam, it is just a bit to thick, so had to lower out the bottom.
My fan had this problem. The outside circle had rubbed down to this arrow shape and so when I turned the AC on the fan turned on and made the car shake and when I turned the car off it made a wirhling noise for a moment.
To Diagnose this problem:
1.) Turn on the AC. Does it shake the car, so that you feel it in your feet and on dash? If not wait. Turn it on high and wait for the car to warm up to trigger the fan. This problem only occurs when the fan is running and the fan only runs when the temp sensor says the fan needs to run, so you can gas the engine up and have it on and should turn on. It is not very easy to know the fan is unbalanced from outside the car. You really have to sit in it and feel it rumbling and hear it make the noise when the car is turned off.
1.) Turn on the AC. Does it shake the car, so that you feel it in your feet and on dash? If not wait. Turn it on high and wait for the car to warm up to trigger the fan. This problem only occurs when the fan is running and the fan only runs when the temp sensor says the fan needs to run, so you can gas the engine up and have it on and should turn on. It is not very easy to know the fan is unbalanced from outside the car. You really have to sit in it and feel it rumbling and hear it make the noise when the car is turned off.
2.) If your car is doing this when the AC/Heat is on but not when off, and so you drive with the AC/Heat off, at some point when the radiator cooling fan gets the signal to turn on, your car will rumble in such a way you think it is severally damaged. See #1^.
3.) Shake the radiator. It has some play in it at the top 2 brackets. The lower 2 brackets have rubber mounting inserts, if those go bad the fan may rumble because there should not be any movement in the bottom really at all just the 2 radiator plugs securely inside the rubber which has a larger rubber circle on the top and that can disconnect from age and wear so just because you see a rubber from the bottom the top circle might be disconnected as mine was on one side (passenger) but I do not know if this really played any role in the rumble since the fan was damaged.
Side Note: The internet reports that the plastic radiator pegs can break. Located in the bottom 2 brackets. Also the top 2 have same pegs. I don't see any cheap easy zip tie work around for a fix if it happens. My radiator was sitting lower before I replaced the rubber with a new lower mounting set, you can notice this from looking at the top bracket and how the radiator peg is low inside the top brackets rubber.
Bottom 2005 Chevy Cobalt Radiator mounting bracket.
3 bolts hold the bracket on. Once you undo 1 bolt it starts to come loose and the radiator dips. By 2 bolts you have basically freed the radiator. They just unscrew and screw back in no clips or nuts on the backside.
Top 2005 Chevy Cobalt Radiator mounting bracket.
1 bolt 10mm. The passenger side has a dust shield so you can't see the radiator and fan looking down.
Top radiator bracket rubber.
How my radiator was sitting before changing the rubber in the bottom brackets.
