Outside the box

[Focus-Ak]

Two items of outside-the-box pondering here. Not sure how practical these ideas are (and that may depend on the make/model of the car and how much room is available in the engine bay).

1. ALTERNATOR DELETE/UN-DELETE, ON DEMAND.. How about mounting the alternator drive pulley on an electrically activated clutch, with the alternator mounted on the back side of the clutch? The clutch could be controlled either by a manually activated switch or a purpose-made controller that is connected to appropriate ECU inputs or outputs. The alternator could be automatically engaged when the battery reaches a particular voltage state, for example, but otherwise be disengaged. And in addition the automatic engagement could be activate when the engine reaches a particular range of load and RPM (in combination) in which using the alternator would contribute to a relatively high BSFC (brake specific fuel consumption), but would be disengaged at times when BSFC is low.

2. USING WASTE HEAT FOR FASTER WARM-UP, IN COLD WEATHER. A small heat exchanger (a small cabin-heater core from a junkyard?) could be placed in a air box. When coolant temperature is low, a fan would blow air from the vicinity of the exhaust manifold through the heat exchange. Thermostats would control whether coolant flows through the heat exchanger and whether the fan is on. This would be a particular advantage for those who make primarily short trips, where inability to warm up quickly or completely is a big impact on MPG. The airbox could possibly include a WAI air filter, in which case the fan may not be necessary (although the pressure drop across the heat exchanger may be adverse for engine breathing in comparison to power a fan would draw -- I don't know).

Just some thoughts for discussion, for anyone who thinks there may some theres there.

[2000mc]

On #2, Imo the air temperatures you would be able to deliver to said heat exchanger would tend to only marginally outpace the normal rising of the coolant temps. I think a normal hot air intake would provide a similar benefit, with less cost and complexity. If you run with your idea, I would rely on the ducting of the intake air, and not use a fan.

[Focus-Ak]

Thanks for your quick reply. Ducting from the heat exchanger to the box is what I had in mind (with or without a fan); thanks for picking up on that.

[spacemanspif]

Someone did a power steering on demand set up on here a while ago. He used an A/C clutch to activate the power assist. Not sure how well the same idea would work on an alternator since usually alternators have rather small pulleys. Seems many here run some kind of "off" switch to the alternator to enable them to stop it from charging and, thus, reducing the extra engine load to almost nothing. Not sure how well that works on our Foci, but it could be worth looking into.

I'm beginning to wonder if a skinny battery would open up enough room to run a tube around to the exhaust manifold for a WAI. One from a civic could work if it has the CCA's. Otherwise a more pricey Odyssey battery or Kinetik would fit the bill. Need to start looking at measurements...

[Vman455]

You could look at the current Prius for ideas on implementing #2; the coolant lines run to the exhaust just ahead of the catalytic converter (if I remember right), though, not at the manifold.

[Focus-Ak]

Originally Posted by spacemanspif

... I'm beginning to wonder if a skinny battery would open up enough room ... One from a civic could work if it has the CCA's. ...

You may find this thread interesting: "Supercapacitor Battery Replacement" http://ecomodder.com/forum/showthrea...ent-27936.html. One type of the capacitor packs is quite small, and can be used in combination with a small battery. The capacitors have plenty of CCAs (cold crank amps). If a car is not used regularly, I think this could be rigged so the alternator charges the battery and the capacitors are not normally in the circuit. The capacitors would be charged from the battery for starting and would be in the circuit for starting. They charge up very quickly. It seems that a smallish battery and small type of capacitor pack would save some space.

[oil pan 4]

Some one already put a heater core in the air cleaner box, it works.

If you want to recover waste heat for faster warm ups try this:
http://ecomodder.com/forum/showthrea...ler-29085.html

[jamesqf]

The problem with the alternator delete is that most of the losses come from the belt - that is, the alternator itself only creates more than a friction load when the system is actually using electricity. So you'd have to mount the clutch pulley on the crankshaft to see much benefit.

[oil pan 4]

http://ecomodder.com/forum/showthrea...ncy-30061.html

Most of the alternators losses at least in highway driving are due to spinning it 3x crank shaft speed and only using a small fraction of the power it can produce at that speed.

Then once you remove the alternator drive you have to cut power to it because it will still draw 2 to 3 amps to power up the voltage regulator.
You can leave it powered up, it will just drain your battery that much faster.
You will find when you do an alt delete that every amp counts.