[kismetcapitan]

I've been doing a lot of thinking about trying to come up with failsafe pump systems for the RB26 - some of us have fallen victim to a shattered oil pump, and I'm surely not the only one to have been burned by a fuel pump failure (I've been told that Bosch pumps in particular like to dribble and weakened flow rates just before dying).

anyways, here's my fuel pump idea:

-use two fuel pumps, but each one by itself should be enough to supply your fueling needs (i.e. one of the pumps being rated to flow your required liters/hour at specified pressure)
-have each pump feed one end of a fuel rail. Set the single return line to the appropriate fuel pressure with the FPR.
-I'm guessing, I don't know, but I'm thinking that, with double the pumping power, the flow through the system will be doubled, but with standard fuel pressure
-if one pump fails, the other will still be running, and although flow will be halved, the single pump will still be enough to maintain pressure and, being already rated to cover flow, will keep the engine from running superlean and undergoing a meltdown.

ISSUES:
will the fuel system really be ok with a rated flow of nearly 600liters/hour? Any problems with injectors wearing out? How about the pumps? Will each pump be strained less (as it has a partner sharing the work) or would they interfere with each other, making failure more likely?

Most importantly, what kind of sensor can be rigged to indicate a pump failure?


Oil system idea:
-run an Accusump

ISSUE:
as an Accusump is designed to kick in at exactly the oil pressure your engine is already running at, is there any way to detect (via a sensor) that the oil pump has failed, during the 15-60 seconds that the Accusump is supplying its backup oil?


If this all worked, I'd have three LED indicators on my dash, and if one starts blinking, I'd have plenty warning that a pump has failed and my engine could be saved.....

 

[kismetcapitan]

will this work? anyone know about fuel or oil flow sensors?

 

[T.F.S.]

i had a twin system on my old car, details (breif) can be found on wwww.max-boost.co.uk under NOS

worked very well

 

[dontfeelcold]

program a microcontroller to monitor electronic pressure sensors (in the fuel rail for the pumps and maybe linked in with the oil pressure sender for the oil). If the pressure drops below a certain value (that value would change depending on your rpm) then kill the power to the engine.

 

[Luckham]

program a microcontroller to monitor electronic pressure sensors (in the fuel rail for the pumps and maybe linked in with the oil pressure sender for the oil). If the pressure drops below a certain value (that value would change depending on your rpm) then kill the power to the engine.

You could do this with only one pump fitted and it would presumably still save the engine..?!?

Why don't oil pumps / fuel pumps have these sensor/engine cut devices fitted as standard??

If the oil pump blows at speed you would presumably still need to [manually] dip the clutch to prevent any damage from occurring though..

If these things don't already exist why don't we have a chat with R32 Combat and make some!

 

[kismetcapitan]

well, I've got a scattering of gauges - in true ricer tradition, my R32 cockpit will look like it came out of Boeing. Hopefully, if there is a failure, I'll catch the warning light and kill the engine in time. It'd be nice to have a double backup with the oil and fuel systems though - just like on airplanes actually, come to think of it.

 

[T.F.S.]

on the race cars we had a massive red light bolted onto the dash to alert driver....anywhere else and they wouldnt see it

you may find a LED cluster light that would be good for this and be a bit smaller too


Wizards of NOS sell good quality pressure switches normally used for nitrous installiations (on the fuel side)

 

[fabianGTR34]

if you would like to make a pump failure detection with multiple pumps you should have one way valves fitted and have a pressure sensor between the pump and the one way valve.. Probably the one way valve will restrict the fuel flow, I don't know if this has been done, but this way you can make it work.. if you don't have these one way valves, the sensor will just read the pressure of all the pumps... and if one fails you will still see pressure.

 

[RamRod]

You could try these

Check the return pipe of the fuel rail does not drop to low using flow sensor when pump is on. If it does then either cut power to ignition or indicate to driver. Will also give flow rate if you place another one in the feed side to the rail.

For the oil pump you can do the same using flow sensors. They can be directional and hence if you use a accusump you should be able to detect if the oil pump is providing oil or the accusump is. This will also let you know if accusump is doing what it says on the tin when you are on a track and you starve the pump when cornering very hard.