Crankcase Evacuation with the LT1 smog pump. How To:

[Pablo]

Pablo,

Can you please post a pic of how and where the PCV valve is placed?

Thanks

I don't have a good shot of it right now... but you can see it in the background on the valve cover here:

I have it set up essentially how small block chevys do. I had to buy a valve cover grommet from the autoparts store that would fit the pcv (the one I grabbed had a hole too small that I had to open up). From there I kind of had to rig things a bit to go from the pcv to the check valve (which sits right above the pcv) since they were different sizes. I'm gonna come up with a better set up as far as that goes. Same design, just different check valve and hose arrangement from the pcv.


BTW the reason I relocated the pcv there is because the pcv in the lifter valley has a nasty tendency to suck up a lot of oil.

 

[gnxtc2]

If anyone that wants to do a vacuum pump belt drive set up, it can be done simply. The electric vacuum pumps don't last long and few have stated that they don't pull enough vacuum under high boost comditions.

Here is my vacuum pump belt set-up. The car must have no AC and use a Champion AC delete bracket.

There are some pics of the set up in my "pictures" at the bottom

Crankcase evacuation pumps - t6p.com - Turbo Buick Regal Resource

Billy T.
gnxtc2@aol.com

 

[ttypewhite]

If anyone that wants to do a vacuum pump belt drive set up, it can be done simply. The electric vacuum pumps don't last long and few have stated that they don't pull enough vacuum under high boost comditions.

Here is my vacuum pump belt set-up. The car must have no AC and use a Champion AC delete bracket.

There are some pics of the set up in my "pictures" at the bottom

Crankcase evacuation pumps - t6p.com - Turbo Buick Regal Resource

Billy T.
gnxtc2@aol.com

Billy i respectfully disagree with your statement. The electric pump lasts very long. It is not on at all times. It is activated by a hobb switch once you are in boost, and only stays on for very short periods of time. I have this on my car and it pulls enough vaccum to stop any leaks that a Turbo regal encounters when being pushed. The vaccum pump belt setup is working as long as your motor is running, which is all the time. For a race only application, your setup makes better sense. For a daily driven street application (which the majority of us have)that setup is not ideal. Also it will eventually effect your oil pressure if you drive the car often and get stuck in traffic. For the money, the electric evac pump is a great purchase and works extremely well.

 

[turbosam6]

There seems to be alot of misinformation here.

First, the inlet of your turbo pulls more vaccum than that pump, I promise. If you don't believe me, measure it.

Second, a belt driven vacuum pump will not affect oil pressure. It will, however, suck the oil off the cylinder walls causing excess friction.

Theres nothing wrong with using the electric pump, but running your PCV into the compressor inlet is more effective. Norbs has a nice setup to illustrate what I'm talking about.

 

[norbs]

There seems to be alot of misinformation here.

First, the inlet of your turbo pulls more vaccum than that pump, I promise. If you don't believe me, measure it.

Second, a belt driven vacuum pump will not affect oil pressure. It will, however, suck the oil off the cylinder walls causing excess friction.

Theres nothing wrong with using the electric pump, but running your PCV into the compressor inlet is more effective. Norbs has a nice setup to illustrate what I'm talking about.

I had to remove my setup due to still too much oil entering at the turbo and the pcv at the time was in the lifter valley still sucking oil. So i am now going to go with a provent system used by lingenfelter. With 1" hoses. Read up on this system. The vacuum pump idea would help reduce leaks this system just keeps everything clean only. The blow by oil gets returned to the pan via an external hose.

There should be almost no vacuum in the inlet pipe, only if your air filter is restrictive you would see a high vacuum there.

Read up on this, its used by alot of corrvette guys and is good to 600 hp per unit. They cost $137 and you do have to replace the filter , not sure how often. But its for blow by gases, i would still use a oil separator on the pcv valve, as this does nothing for that from the looks of it.

eBay Motors: turbocharger oil-air separator filter crankcase pcv (item 150097494947 end time Nov-26-07 20:52:33 PST)

928 Specialists - ProVent Air/Oil Separator

 

[gnxtc2]

There seems to be alot of misinformation here.

First, the inlet of your turbo pulls more vaccum than that pump, I promise. If you don't believe me, measure it.

Just like the factory did. Remember that passenger side breather that was plumbed into the turbo bell.

Billy T.
gnxtc2@aol.com

 

[turbosam6]

I had to remove my setup due to still too much oil entering at the turbo and the pcv at the time was in the lifter valley still sucking oil. So i am now going to go with a provent system used by lingenfelter. With 1" hoses. Read up on this system. The vacuum pump idea would help reduce leaks this system just keeps everything clean only. The blow by oil gets returned to the pan via an external hose.

There should be almost no vacuum in the inlet pipe, only if your air filter is restrictive you would see a high vacuum there.

Read up on this, its used by alot of corrvette guys and is good to 600 hp per unit. They cost $137 and you do have to replace the filter , not sure how often. But its for blow by gases, i would still use a oil separator on the pcv valve, as this does nothing for that from the looks of it.

Lost redirect

928 Specialists - ProVent Air/Oil Separator

There is vacuum there, and you don't have to have a restricted intake for it to be present. I have a 4" inlet on my blower and I have alot of vacuum present, just as I did on my GN. You think the factory put it in the turbo inlet for the hell of it?

 

[ttypewhite]

turbosam6- have you personally tested this theroy with both the electric and stock type setup? If so please share your data. I have tried both methods when I had a 4" air inlet pipe plumbed into both breathers. What a mess it makes in your intercooler/ intake manifold with oil. Putting a oil seperator inline is just another restriction that takes away from the amount of vaccum the system pulls. Oil tracking in the intake manifold can cause preignition before the combustion chamber which can be catastrafic. I am always up to learning something new. If you can educate me, please do. Thats what these forums where made for and this is a very interesting topic.

 

[gnxtc2]

Billy i respectfully disagree with your statement. The electric pump lasts very long. It is not on at all times. It is activated by a hobb switch once you are in boost, and only stays on for very short periods of time. I have this on my car and it pulls enough vaccum to stop any leaks that a Turbo regal encounters when being pushed. The vaccum pump belt setup is working as long as your motor is running, which is all the time. For a race only application, your setup makes better sense. For a daily driven street application (which the majority of us have)that setup is not ideal. Also it will eventually effect your oil pressure if you drive the car often and get stuck in traffic. For the money, the electric evac pump is a great purchase and works extremely well.

No problem.

If you going to run the electric pump then you must also still run the PCV. If you "seal" up your motor to make vacuum then the windage created by the crank and piston travel must exit somewhere hence the PCV.

You leave out the PCV and run the electric vacuum pump via Hobbs then there is crankcase pressure present.

From what I've been told, the electric vacuum pumps don't like heat.

Billy T.
gnxtc2@aol.com

 

[ttypewhite]

When I was testing this setup at first, I bought the 3 wire pump that had the solenoid in it. When I went down the street for the first time (PCV still in place) it shot oil out my dipstick and almost set my car on fire and I was just about to make some boost. I got it back home and removed the flap so the solenoid was deactivated and all was good. I have my hobb switch set to 5psi and the pump only comes on for the max of 3 to 4 sec on the street and about 15sec at the track which does not allow the pump to get hot. I have had my pump in my car for 2 years now with no problems. My pump is mounted where the charcol canister used to be.
Billy your motor looks like a work of art, that is awesome attention to detail. All I can say is WOW. Thanks for sharing. Now excuse me while I find some tissue to wipe my bottom lip.

 

[Pablo]

There seems to be alot of misinformation here.

First, the inlet of your turbo pulls more vaccum than that pump, I promise. If you don't believe me, measure it.

Second, a belt driven vacuum pump will not affect oil pressure. It will, however, suck the oil off the cylinder walls causing excess friction.

Theres nothing wrong with using the electric pump, but running your PCV into the compressor inlet is more effective. Norbs has a nice setup to illustrate what I'm talking about.

You mean like this?

If so, I hate to break it to you buddy, but it doesn't work.
I'm speaking from experience, not theory.

I really did not want to have to add the smog pump and that is why I tried what you THEORIZE works better. I even shaped the bung on the inside of the tube like the discharge tube in a carburetor venturi to maximize vacuum. Know what that looks like?

I think the enormous cloud of oil smoke and oil all over my engine bay were good indications that the amount of vacuum being pulled from there was not enough, and indeed was LESS effective than just running breathers.

"First, the inlet of your turbo pulls more vaccum than that pump, I promise. If you don't believe me, measure it. "

I think you are forgetting about the huge vacuum leak in that system called THE AIR FILTER. Certainly if I plugged the air filter, then I would be pulling nothing but crankcase air but then the car wouldn't run.

The differential pressure you suggest using is only whatever you get from the impeller wheel to the air filter opening, and that is not a whole lot in a properly designed turbocharger inlet. If there is, then please explain why my original system did not work. I'm open ears.

Bear in mind that I still have my pump exhaust to this bung to take advantage of whatever delta p might exist in that pipe but I can assure you, it's not a lot. The gain is in the airflow over a properly shaped tube entry to take advantage of the low pressure region behind a slash cut tube opening.

In NA apps if you are seeing even 1" HG of static manifold vacuum at wot then that means you are choking the engine. From the impeller to the airfilter is much like a plenum in a naturally aspirated application. If you are seeing even 1" Hg then you need to look at redesigning your turbo intake setup.Turbos are very inefficient vacuum generators.

 

[Pablo]

No problem.

If you going to run the electric pump then you must also still run the PCV. If you "seal" up your motor to make vacuum then the windage created by the crank and piston travel must exit somewhere hence the PCV.

You leave out the PCV and run the electric vacuum pump via Hobbs then there is crankcase pressure present.

From what I've been told, the electric vacuum pumps don't like heat.

Billy T.
gnxtc2@aol.com

From what I have been told, the electric vacuum pumps last 100k miles all the time in the engine bay of a variety of bone stock cars driven in places like Arizona and Florida. I think the limited use they get for a few seconds at a time in this application is no where near pushing them to their limit.

 

[Racetronix]

There seems to be alot of misinformation here.
First, the inlet of your turbo pulls more vaccum than that pump, I promise. If you don't believe me, measure it.

The amount of vacuum in the inlet pipe is related to the amount of air flow the turbo creates and the restriction in the intake system People running large intake pipes and low-restriction air filters may have very low vacuum in the intake stream.

 

[Brookgn]

Does anyone have information about how much vacuum the electric pumps pull wide open? Does anyone know which pump pulls the most? Has anyone done back to back passes or dyno pulls?

 

[Pablo]

Does anyone have information about how much vacuum the electric pumps pull wide open? Does anyone know which pump pulls the most? Has anyone done back to back passes or dyno pulls?

For me the pump wasn't necessarily about an hp gain but more to stop oil leaks. For that, it works magnificently. I think RJC has one and he pulls like 2" of vacuum with it. I don't know if he has modded the pump or not though.

 

[turbosam6]

For me the pump wasn't necessarily about an hp gain but more to stop oil leaks. For that, it works magnificently. I think RJC has one and he pulls like 2" of vacuum with it. I don't know if he has modded the pump or not though.

If you need a vacuum pump to eliminate oil leaks you have more problems. Like severe blow by.

 

[Pablo]

If you need a vacuum pump to eliminate oil leaks you have more problems. Like severe blow by.

You apparently haven't been around many high boost cars have you?

My car probably does have more blow by than a fresh short block but I still just ran 96.5 mph in the 1/8th... if I have severe blowby then thats pretty amazing don't you think?

Ive seen several LS1s with the same "oil everywhere" problem running sts kits

 

[turbosam6]

You apparently haven't been around many high boost cars have you?

You obviously don't know me huh?

Strange how the several boosted cars I've owned didn't have oil leaks. And since my Z makes roughly twice the power your car does and has the vacuum from the compressor evacuating the crank case something must be working.

 

[Pablo]

You obviously don't know me huh?

Strange how the several boosted cars I've owned didn't have oil leaks. And since my Z makes roughly twice the power your car does and has the vacuum from the compressor evacuating the crank case something must be working.

I'm sure if you think about it you'll realize that impeller to airfilter vacuum depends on the inlet restriction and that your blanket statement was kind of silly.
Maybe you have a lot more restriction pre turbo, maybe you arent running boost that high, maybe you are running total seal rings... lot of factors at work. I know for a fact that there are numerous cars with the oil problem due to crankcase pressure and high boost. You can't just say "because my car doesn't do this, it must not exist".
In my case, something must be working too, and it certainly wasn't the turbo inlet evac method. I also think severe blowby due to perhaps blown out rings isn't a huge issue considering the power I am making. If it is, I think thats pretty impressive im making that power despite that.

And not to bust your balls but I would say you are making considerably less hp than double what I am making. I did make 460hp/498ft lbs to the wheels at 4800 rpm before I blew out the spark on some bad plugs and several mods ago. I would hope I was near 500 now.

BTW i would like to see a shot of the system on your camaro, post it up.

 

[Brookgn]

I was asking about the horse power gain because I think it's alot of work just to eliminate oil leaks. My car leaks oil just like every Buick. I've been interested in doing an electric pump for a while but I haven't seen any results from anyone. If you can get 2in.vac at 25psi, I would think the car would pick up.