electric turbo fans
01-24-2003, 10:26 AM
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electric turbo fans
No, I am not selling one or buying one. I decided to investigate the idea and see if I could find an actual electric motor driven fan that would do the job. That is, provide 1-4 psi of positive pressure air at enough cfm flow rate to get a HP gain. Leaving aside the "how do you hook it up" problems.
To shorten the story, I now know more about fans than I ever wanted to but I couldn't find one. All the fans that were small enough, couldn't push enough pressure to be effective. All the fans that could push enough air used too much power and/or were too large to fit into the engine compartment.
A couple examples. A 4" axial (i.e. inline) tube/duct fan can move 300cfm of free air but at only .6 in/h20 the airflow is zero.
A 10" diameter regenerative fan can move 200 cfm of air at 4 psi, but requires a 110v, 15amp motor to do so.
To shorten the story, I now know more about fans than I ever wanted to but I couldn't find one. All the fans that were small enough, couldn't push enough pressure to be effective. All the fans that could push enough air used too much power and/or were too large to fit into the engine compartment.
A couple examples. A 4" axial (i.e. inline) tube/duct fan can move 300cfm of free air but at only .6 in/h20 the airflow is zero.
A 10" diameter regenerative fan can move 200 cfm of air at 4 psi, but requires a 110v, 15amp motor to do so.
01-24-2003, 12:00 PM
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I've heard that before. But I did bother and now I know why it won't work. No offense, but there is a lot of "don't bother" type of answers on the hyundai boards. And not just on this topic.
3-4 months ago when I was asking about the practical MAF sensor limits, all anyone would say was "oh, you don't have to worry about it" but noone could/would explain how they got to that answer. So I figured it out on my own. Turns out they were right, I don't have to worry about it, but now I know when I do have to start worrying about it.
This situation is a tad different. Noone wanted to talk about electric turbos, so I did some research and thought I would share my findings. If you all knew already, I'm glad. But the question comes up often enough I thought anyone doing a search (like they should) would like to find a real answer and not just a bunch of threads where people say things like "Don't bother".
3-4 months ago when I was asking about the practical MAF sensor limits, all anyone would say was "oh, you don't have to worry about it" but noone could/would explain how they got to that answer. So I figured it out on my own. Turns out they were right, I don't have to worry about it, but now I know when I do have to start worrying about it.
This situation is a tad different. Noone wanted to talk about electric turbos, so I did some research and thought I would share my findings. If you all knew already, I'm glad. But the question comes up often enough I thought anyone doing a search (like they should) would like to find a real answer and not just a bunch of threads where people say things like "Don't bother".
01-24-2003, 05:30 PM
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I understand what you're saying, but we say "Don't bother" because it HAS been covered, to FULL technical extent SEVERAL times. One person even went and bought a Electric Supercharger to try to prove us wrong, and didn't win the argument. Some of us are short, and I apologize about that. We should go into larger explanations, but this one has REALLY been beat to death. Remember also that most of the people on this board cross post on other boards so you're getting the same answers. If you want me to search for them for you, I'll show you the posts on this subject.
01-24-2003, 11:26 PM
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I did a search. Your right, there is a lot of explaination of what is needed, why the ripoff things on ebay won't/don't work, and similar stuff. Apparantly there was a detailed technical discussion on fxtreme's board but that board is gone. I decided to learn some stuff about fans and though the search was fruitless, I figured I should at least make a quick post about it.
(as an aside, you might be surprised how many technical discussion questions end up with a post in them that start "mike over at fxtreme covered this and....") smile.gif
[ January 25, 2003, 06:28 AM: Message edited by: blue2000 ]
(as an aside, you might be surprised how many technical discussion questions end up with a post in them that start "mike over at fxtreme covered this and....") smile.gif
[ January 25, 2003, 06:28 AM: Message edited by: blue2000 ]
01-30-2003, 12:37 PM
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yeah. Snake oil is usually really cheap. Not the point though. I wanted to see if I could find a fan that would work. At least in theory, but I couldn't. As long as we are on the topic though...how much HP gain would you get from adding 3PSI? would the compression be too high? Would the stock ECU work? The stock fuel pump and injectors?
Could I get a cheap old turbo and manifold and run it at 4PSI without changing anything else? Obviously I'd have to do some exhaust work, but you get my point, I trust.
Could I get a cheap old turbo and manifold and run it at 4PSI without changing anything else? Obviously I'd have to do some exhaust work, but you get my point, I trust.
01-30-2003, 03:31 PM
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QUOTE
This was written up by one of our members after researhing the topic.
[b]Electric turbos/superchargers.
Items promoting themselves as "electric turbos" or "superchargers" have been available for some time now. They are the bad deal that wouldn't die. But are they complete manure? I would argue that the theory at least is sound.
Which is why it comes up over and over again. But in reality, an electric force induction system for automobile engine is not workable at present. The problems are numerous but I'd like to start with some basic technical stuff.
Forced induction gets an engine to create more power by increasing the airflow into the engine. How? By pressurizing the ingoing air. Here is
the formula for calculating Mass Air Flow: MAF = D x V x A.
D= air density
V= air velocity
A= cross-sectional area of the airflow region (the pipe or tube it flows thru)
Air density varies both on atmospheric pressure and on temperature. Its easy to see that if 7PSI of pressure is added that mass airflow rate goes
UP. The other thing to consider is how much air is acutally being moved.
Air volume is measured in cubic feet per minute (CFM). Without getting sidetracked into volumetric efficency, bascially it's necessary that a forced induction system pump the required amount of air (CFM) at a positive pressure. If you look at technical specifications of a supercharger, it will say "200 CFM at 6PSI" or something similar. That means it will pump 200 CFM of air pressurized to 6PSI above atmospheric pressure (14.7 PSI at sea level). Which means once the air expands to normal atmospheric pressure, it will take up considerablly more volume. Turbos and superchargers are basically different types of fans. Turbos are a specific
type of fan with a side intake and directions outflow. Superchargers are more commonly known at "positive displacement pumps". Technical drawings for both of these fans are easily discovered by a google search. There are
many types of fans and blowers capable of creating a pressurized flow at the CFM required for automotive engines. So whats the problem, it should be easy to find one, right?
Not so fast. What exactly are we looking for? A postive pressure fan capable of moving 150-200 CFM of air. (150-200 is the amount needed for a
2.0L engine) So what are our exact options? I'd like to address them one at a time.
Option 1: The inline (or axial) 12VDC fan. Small fans will move the needed CFM but airflow falls off rapidly at pressure increases. Typically flow
reaches zero at 1/30th of a PSI. Industrial applications use LARGE (up to 72" in diameter) axial fans to create pressurized airflow (or vacuum) but it's hard to use a fan the size of your car.
Option 2: The squirrel cage blower. Correctly called the Scirroco fan. Again, small (4-6" impellers) 12VDC blowers are not powerful enough to push pressurized air. There are 110V models in all forms from leaf blowers to carpet driers to woodstove and forge blowers. They move the required CFM of air, at 1-2 PSI. So we have our 2 requirement. But at what power requirement? Most of these motors require 12-15 amps of current. That means 1200-1600 watts of power is required to run them. So to put one in a car, you need the fan, the motor, and a tranformer to switch from 12VDC to 110V. A 1600 watt continuous power converter weighs 30-50 pounds, the motor weigh 20 pounds. All this for 1PSI? Not practical, your weight to HP ratio went UP not down.
Option 3: some industrial medium pressure fan. Such as the Sonic-70 industrial regenerative blower. 200 CFM at 3.5 PSI. Sounds pretty good
until you get to the size and weight factors. Again you need 110V at about 8 amps. The motor and fan are 12" wide, 8" deep and 10" high. There isn't room in our engine comparments for something this large. And the motor and fan weight a combined 103 pounds. All the same problems at option 2 with the added problem of size.
So, I guess at present we are "Stuck" with engine driven turbos and superchagers. It looks to me for good reasons.
[b]Electric turbos/superchargers.
Items promoting themselves as "electric turbos" or "superchargers" have been available for some time now. They are the bad deal that wouldn't die. But are they complete manure? I would argue that the theory at least is sound.
Which is why it comes up over and over again. But in reality, an electric force induction system for automobile engine is not workable at present. The problems are numerous but I'd like to start with some basic technical stuff.
Forced induction gets an engine to create more power by increasing the airflow into the engine. How? By pressurizing the ingoing air. Here is
the formula for calculating Mass Air Flow: MAF = D x V x A.
D= air density
V= air velocity
A= cross-sectional area of the airflow region (the pipe or tube it flows thru)
Air density varies both on atmospheric pressure and on temperature. Its easy to see that if 7PSI of pressure is added that mass airflow rate goes
UP. The other thing to consider is how much air is acutally being moved.
Air volume is measured in cubic feet per minute (CFM). Without getting sidetracked into volumetric efficency, bascially it's necessary that a forced induction system pump the required amount of air (CFM) at a positive pressure. If you look at technical specifications of a supercharger, it will say "200 CFM at 6PSI" or something similar. That means it will pump 200 CFM of air pressurized to 6PSI above atmospheric pressure (14.7 PSI at sea level). Which means once the air expands to normal atmospheric pressure, it will take up considerablly more volume. Turbos and superchargers are basically different types of fans. Turbos are a specific
type of fan with a side intake and directions outflow. Superchargers are more commonly known at "positive displacement pumps". Technical drawings for both of these fans are easily discovered by a google search. There are
many types of fans and blowers capable of creating a pressurized flow at the CFM required for automotive engines. So whats the problem, it should be easy to find one, right?
Not so fast. What exactly are we looking for? A postive pressure fan capable of moving 150-200 CFM of air. (150-200 is the amount needed for a
2.0L engine) So what are our exact options? I'd like to address them one at a time.
Option 1: The inline (or axial) 12VDC fan. Small fans will move the needed CFM but airflow falls off rapidly at pressure increases. Typically flow
reaches zero at 1/30th of a PSI. Industrial applications use LARGE (up to 72" in diameter) axial fans to create pressurized airflow (or vacuum) but it's hard to use a fan the size of your car.
Option 2: The squirrel cage blower. Correctly called the Scirroco fan. Again, small (4-6" impellers) 12VDC blowers are not powerful enough to push pressurized air. There are 110V models in all forms from leaf blowers to carpet driers to woodstove and forge blowers. They move the required CFM of air, at 1-2 PSI. So we have our 2 requirement. But at what power requirement? Most of these motors require 12-15 amps of current. That means 1200-1600 watts of power is required to run them. So to put one in a car, you need the fan, the motor, and a tranformer to switch from 12VDC to 110V. A 1600 watt continuous power converter weighs 30-50 pounds, the motor weigh 20 pounds. All this for 1PSI? Not practical, your weight to HP ratio went UP not down.
Option 3: some industrial medium pressure fan. Such as the Sonic-70 industrial regenerative blower. 200 CFM at 3.5 PSI. Sounds pretty good
until you get to the size and weight factors. Again you need 110V at about 8 amps. The motor and fan are 12" wide, 8" deep and 10" high. There isn't room in our engine comparments for something this large. And the motor and fan weight a combined 103 pounds. All the same problems at option 2 with the added problem of size.
So, I guess at present we are "Stuck" with engine driven turbos and superchagers. It looks to me for good reasons.
02-01-2003, 01:58 AM
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QUOTE
REDZMAN:
One person even went and bought a Electric Supercharger to try to prove us wrong, and didn't win the argument.
I was there for the testing of one of those electric turbos. It was done in winipeg. we saw a 3hp gain ....NOT worth it.
One person even went and bought a Electric Supercharger to try to prove us wrong, and didn't win the argument.