Fans and Water Pumps

Electric fans have improved tremendously in recent years, in both quality and reliability. Electric fans now outperform mechanical fans in nearly every application, except towing and dirt oval track racing.

When using a mechanical fan, a properly designed shroud must be used. Most mechanical fans are not designed for high RPM use: they can have serious vibrations problems, due to air turbulence, when run over 6,500 RPM. This is a turbulence problem, not a balance problem, and will destroy the water pump and components in front of it. The large fans preferred by dirt oval track racers can consume up to 18 horsepower at 6,500 RPM. Do NOT run a mechanical fan that is any larger than required for the application.

Flex fans are a poor design for performance applications. They move less air at higher RPM, and only consume a fraction less power than standard fixed pitch fans.

Clutch-style fans are inconsistent and we do not recommend their use for any application, if possible.

Using the proper pulley and drive system is critical to matching the water pump's performance to your specific application. RACE applications require a maximum water pump speed of 7000 RPM. For STREET applications, the water pump speed must at least match crankshaft RPM, to a maximum recommended 25% faster than crankshaft speed.

The actual savings in parasitic horsepower loss through the use of underdrive pulleys is minimal. In addition, a properly designed cooling system's flow and efficiency are designed to operate at a given speed. The engine will lose more horsepower due to higher operating temperatures than any possible gain from underdrive pulleys.

Electric water pump rated at 55GPM free flow are comparable to the small displacement import engines and in some instances flow more. For drag applications, when combined with an early opening or no thermostat, the ability to give full pump flow at idle proves to be very useful for cool downs before and after a run. Not to mention freeing up the parasitic loss of horsepower from a mechanical pump. It can also be used as a booster pump placed before the mechanical pump to boost the pump rate significantly when high flow pumps aren't available.