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Tauruses are "bottom breathers", the upper grille is mainly for looks. I'd block off the upper first (I can't remember if 2001s have the ford emblem on the grille) then most of the bottom grille.
My Focus has a 3 piece bottom grille - there are 3 openings. If I block off the two outers and leave the inner one connected, the car runs cooler!
Having an 04, you should have the digital display in it. I would bring it into "engineering mode" to get an actual reading of the temperature.
TO get into engineering mode:
Hold reset button
Insert key and start key
Keep holding reset button
Release after car has been on for 5 or so seconds.
You can cycle through by using the reset button - this will show you a bunch of things ... most importantly for grille blocking, the actual coolant temperature.
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