Yesterday I had my R53 die on my while driving around the streets of Brooklyn, all the lights on the instrument cluster went on and I could tell something was wrong so I pulled into a spot and the car died.

I was able to get it jump started and the engine was running, but while I stepped away for a second the door closed and locked me out. Had to wait 20 to 25 minutes to get a spare key from home when all of a sudden the engine starts spewing white smoke out the front, and smelled like the sweet smell of coolant. After letting it cool I opened the expansion tank cap to find it totally dry, I was able to drive it home and park it but then the high speed cooling fan comes on after shutting down making me realize the low speed wasn't on at all when I had the hood popped up.

This probably means I need a whole new radiator fan right and probably a new battery? It's a 2005 R53.

 

I'd start with the cooling system, fill and test that the slow fan comes on at 105 c and the high fan at 112 c.

watch your temps

you might need an obd reader / scanner. you can go with something simple or something more complicated like inpa. do you have one of those? I can recommend one if you don't...

 

Also make sure the cooling system is bled properly.

If your dash lit up like a Christmas tree then it might be worth scanning for error codes.

 

I just got back in from checking, I have an ANCEL OBD2 scanner and according to what you said and other posts the low speed fan didn't kick in as I saw the coolant temp hit 105 and keep going. At that point I shut the car down since I didn't want it to overheat. When I turn the AC on the fan does kick in though, so maybe its the resistor for controlling low speed that has gone bad.

The only code that I pulled was a P0456 code which I thought had been fixed, but it came back apparently. I think this is unrelated.

EDIT: Perhaps it overheated because of that fan failure while idling, because when I got out of the car I shut the AC off and couldn't shut the ignition off since the door closed and locked me out...

 

low speed fan is hard to hear. you can let it keep going to 112 c. at that point the high should kick in and bring it back down. and again, and again...

however, if you have air in your cooling system, no dice.

must be filled, bled, proper coolant, proper 50 / 50 mix...

 

Hmm, the low speed should definitely come on at 105 right? I looked in the engine and the fan wasn't spinning after it hit that temp and stayed there for a while.

Edit: I don't think the cooling system had air in it, for a while it's been doing the high speed on and then off, then back on, but it never overheated like this.

 

ok so yes you have a fan problem. should come on at 105 c (not 105 f).

if not, you have an electrical (fan) issue. I suck at those (electrical). but from what I have read it is not uncommon (low speed fan failure)

 

Yeah 105 Celsius. I think I'll order a new fan assembly.

Hopefully I didn't toast the engine after it overheated yesterday, it shut itself off after it started spewing white coolant smoke.

 

I fixed the stage 1 fan issue, ordered a new one from FCP and replaced it without moving the radiator support. New fan comes on immediately with the AC and when it hits 105 so hopefully that will help the engine breathe better.

Still don't understand why the car decided to lose all electrical functions that day, lost power steering and Christmas tree dash. It drives perfectly fine now.

 

Good to hear. Hopefully it stays 🙏