Electric water pump

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03-11-2009, 10:33 PM
creek

Electric water pump

This is just for the sake of curiosity. I hear of so many drivers eliminating the P/S and A/C from their cars leaving only the water pump and alternator to be belt driven. It makes me wonder if there is an electric water pump available that could be used along with a coolant reroute to leave the alternator the last man standing. You could then of course have the alternator cut out at full throttle leaving only the belt drag as a load on the engine. Just wondering. Anybody think the horsepower gain would be noticable? I realize the extra load on the alternator would negate a lot of the gain of eliminating the water pump, but you would lose the belt/pully losses and prevent overdiving the pump at high RPM allowing the battery to power the system until you backed off the throttle. I know of systems for other cars that also eliminate the thermostat and use a controller to vary the speed of the pump. Thoughts?
03-12-2009, 07:27 AM
POS Racing

Electric water pumps have been around for a while.

Had a buddy back in the day with a Camaro that we ran an electric pump on for a while, it was fine for drag racing which was about all that car did.

http://www.jegs.com/i/Proform/778/66225BK1/10002/-1

http://www.jegs.com/images/photos/70...8-66225BK1.jpg
03-12-2009, 07:36 AM
MadMerv

I did the same thing back in my drag racing days. Worked fine for 11 second runs! I'm not sure if it would be worthwhile for extended operation, but then slowing the pump might be a lot better for cooling, since you could reduce the cavitation that occurs at high RPM. Alternator is easy. Put a switch in the excitation line to open it up when you need more power.
03-12-2009, 08:39 AM
nealb

there are a lot of street driven muscle cars with pro motors that use electric water pumps

not exactly daily drivers, but close

have seen a bunch of them driving the 2000 mile Power Tour route each year

mostly SBC and Fords
03-12-2009, 08:47 AM
Miatamaniac92

I don't think the cost/hp gained would make it worth the money or time.

FI FTW.

Chris
03-12-2009, 11:38 AM
Nexus Flux

Also have to consider the weight of the electric pump vs the mechanicaly driven one. Meziere does make some pretty nice pumps and I think they had one for the RX-7's.

Depending on the configuration an adapter plate could be fabbed up and a fully external electric pump could be used inline to the radiator. It's speed could be controled via a temp sensor to eliminate the thermostat and it's inherent flow restriction.

Possible pumps include
Stewarts
Aerospace Components
Meziere
Meziere radiator mount

To take it one step further would it make sense to dump the ignition coils in favor of a magneto to eliminate the load on the alternator? Less load on the alternator vs more load on the engine.
03-12-2009, 12:32 PM
MadMerv

The one I used on my darg car was a heater blower motor, mounted on a bracket just above the water pump(small block Chevy) with a single belt drive. It was great for cooling it down between runs.
03-12-2009, 08:18 PM
creek

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nexus Flux

To take it one step further would it make sense to dump the ignition coils in favor of a magneto to eliminate the load on the alternator? Less load on the alternator vs more load on the engine.

Where would you mount the magneto and drive it off what? There is no room where the CPS mounts, drive it off the front of the cam? Magnetos take a lot of energy to spin, TANSTAAFL. I have some experience with electric pumps that mount in place of the belt driven OEM's, I realized that I hadn't seen one for a Miata and was wondering why. I understand how the Miatas cooling system got to be the way it is, why they didn't change it is beyond me.

I'm just fussing because I ordered the nine! hose set and I am not looking forward to it. I already replaced the heater hoses and I am waiting to heal up from that. I bought them first so I should have the heater hoses from the new set for sale soon if anyone is interested.
03-12-2009, 08:23 PM
jrj512

I found the heater hoses to be the hardest, so it is down hill from here.
03-12-2009, 08:43 PM
JuanoTejano

Hey creek once your acronyms reach more than 6 letters it's probably better to just type it out and save us all the trip to google.
03-12-2009, 08:53 PM
creek

Quote:

Originally Posted by JuanoTejano

Hey creek once your acronyms reach more than 6 letters it's probably better to just type it out and save us all the trip to google.

I thought all you nerds would be big Robert Heinlein fans, just wanted to see who wasn't.:D
There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch.
03-13-2009, 04:28 AM
cone-cerned

That sounds like the first law of thermodynamics, You can't get something for nothing.

The second law of thermodynamics says you can't even break even.
03-13-2009, 05:45 AM
tailchaser

A lot of 3rd gen Dodge Cummins owners were resorting to electric water pumps until someone figured out snipping one of the blades on the pump did the trick to keep it from pushing too hard and blowing the freeze plugs out of the block... That would qualify as streetable. :-) OTOH, there's a lot more electricity to spare in that system...