Chevy hypes Eco Cruze oil-pump
 

...more info here:

"Efficient Oil Pump Helps 2011 Chevy Cruze Eco Achieve 40 MPG on the Highway" Green Car Advisor

Jesus Christmas. All I can say, is that will be one more headache for the owner 5 years from now.

Its a good idea, but honestly, I would like to point to an LT1 block and go look, see how the water pump is directly camshaft driven...and see how its right over the over the optispark ignition, on yeah thats a good one too. That least those were external. Brilliant ideas from GM, don't always live up to the hype.

Seriously, all they need to do is go to aluminium bodies, combined with fiberglass/Carbonfirber/Kevlar composites, and they'll hit 40MPG really quick. Not to mention start removing excessively waste like 20 way power seats, 10 speaker audio systems. Car manufacturing has really lost its way.

...hence the use of the title word "hype"...I rest my case.

Actually it's not a bad idea, it's basically the same as most automatic trans pumps so I don't think there will be any reliability issues with it.

Conventional oil pumps have to be sized for the motor at idle but once RPMs start increasing the amount of oil pumped increases MUCH faster/more than the amount of oil the engine needs so they turn out to be very wasteful/inefficient designs that bypass a large percentage of their flow most of the time.

I like part of the concept.
I'd like it better if it were electric, it had a back-up, was external to the engine, and easily serviced/replaced.

At least they appear to be trying.

Once again the old brass Model T shows the way...

splash oiling. No pump at all.

http://i146.photobucket.com/albums/r...front_view.jpg

j/k. Oil pumps are good. This new one is probably good too.

Or indeed in a more efficient package, the Austin 7 with 747cc and 2 main bearing crank and 'splash' (aka 'total loss') lubrication.

http://www.carandclassic.co.uk/uploa...tin/695525.jpg

Only thing I don't like is the use of vane type pump compared to other oil pump types like spur gears or Gerotor type .

there not as robust as those vanes need to slide smoothly all the time . Any type of particles will hurt it a lot more than other types .

Splash and total loss are two different animals.

The Radial engines in a WW2 B17 carried 35 gallons of oil per engine and the system was total loss.

Pop flew a B17 back from Berlin with a cylinder head shot off of one engine and it never ran out of oil.

A Briggs and Stratton 5 HP engine is splash fed. I guess you could say it was total loss as all the oil would eventually run out, but the engine would seize before than point was ever reached.

My engine design from 2006 only produced oil pressure when combustion and compression were engaged. When in flywheel mode, oil pressure was not necessary.

regards
Mech