[Healeys] electrc fan vs. belt drive

Alan Seigrist healey.nut at gmail.com
Sun Feb 8 07:52:40 MST 2009


All -

Not to beat a dead horse, but the reality is you will usually be better off
with an electric fan set up (if it actually keeps your car cool).  With a
pully mounted fan - technically it may be more efficient to use a pully
mounted fan, but these are always on and always sapping power from your
engine.  This is even more the case at highway speeds when you really don't
need a fan.

An electric fan, however, will only come on when you need it, so by default
it operates less often than a mechanical fan, meaning it will sap less
power, esp. when you are going fast.  Upside is a good electric fan should
work when you need it the most - in hot stop and go traffic.  You don't need
alot of horsepower in this situation.

Alan

'52 A90
'53 BN1
'64 BJ8


On Fri, Feb 6, 2009 at 7:40 AM, Bob Spidell <bspidell at comcast.net> wrote:

> Agreed (I did mention that the advantage of electric accessories is the
> ability to reduce or cut power to the motors as required). This would be a
> good use of the excess computing power available in our Healeys ;)
>
> My main point is that it takes the (essentially) the same power to drive
> the pump and/or fan, whether it comes from the engine directly or is
> converted to electricity by the alternator, and that from a strictly
> efficiency standpoint the conversion losses in the alternator and motors are
> not inconsequential.
>
> Of course, due to the reverse Coriolis Effect down under the power flows
> INTO the alternator from the motors, a HUGE advantage.
>
>
> Bob


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