I was staring at my RX-7 the other day as I prepared to install some brake ducts and a potentially great idea hit me. This could work for any car that can get ducts installed. Why not use one of those (for each wheel) electric superchargers to cool our brakes? I'm not talking about those little wimpy bilge fans on eBay but rather a ducted fan such as the e-ram that we've all seen before.

http://www.electricsupercharger.com/

This thing is designed to go in a 3" pipe and that's what my ducts are. This way I wouldn't have to worry about finding a place to run the ducts to the front of the car or about duct to wheel clearance. Just tuck these up in there somewhere behind the wheels. The fan will pull in air from wherever it can. Wire these up through a relay system so when the brake lights come on, so do the fans.

Conventional ducting relies on vehicle speed to cool the rotors. These little guys have some serious flow. I'm a sceptic about their gains as a supercharger but I'll bet they flow enough to cool your brakes. Think about it, if you're braking for a corner at the track, it doesn't matter how slow the corner is, you've always got the same amount of air this way. I'll bet you've got to be going really fast before conventional ducting would have any advantage. Just as a safety feature you could also install an on/off switch in the dash so the fans aren't running when you are in traffic stopped. Just turn the switch on when you intend to drive agressively.

So what do you guys think? Good idea/bad idea?

 

humm sounds lik eit has promise..

 

Couple things about fans of that caliber, they are noisy and they suck juice down pretty fast. I dont think it would be practical to run at anything other than the track. Although in that situation I can certainly see the benefit of having 400CFM of air flowing past the brakes.

 

What's the benefits of running really cooler brakes?

Less brake fade and better feel. Does that in turn make for faster lap times during a race? Does it have any practical benefits outside track use?

 

What effect would water have on the fan if moved to this location?

 

Hey no worrys I have done this all ready. I have 3" ducts running to the brakes and one running to the ram air box. NO problems with water. The water is to havey to go up the air tube, plus there isn't any suction. The duct is conected to the ram air box (K&N), so the top is open all there is, IS AIR FLOW.


I feel less brake fade in long hard runs. It is easy to run. all of my ducting was run from the bottom openning. all you have to do is cut the many walls of plastic.

The duct cost 10 bucks from Lowes. Just go to the dryer section. BAM you got it.

 

You mean like using water as a coolant or just water spray?

Less brake fade and better feel would give better lap times, as you can brake harder, longer, staying faster longer.

 

I can't believe there's something that I know about cars & aftermarket parts that Rotarygod doesn't! There goes my hero-worship. :D

The "supercharger" you reference here might well work, but keep in mind that some electric superchargers (like the ESC unit here) require 48 Volts from a bank of four automotive 750 CCA batteries. They pretty much have to be put in the trunk, and you'll add around a hundred pounds right there. And even then, they are only good for 1-3 minutes before they have to be recharged via the alternator, so the only way to do this is to have them actuated when braking for short bursts. A good idea, but not with the ESC unit.

However, why not an even smaller "leaf blower" type of fan? All you really want is some positive flow through the ducting - and you certainly don't need the 6-12 Lbs of boost the ESC unit is capable of putting out. Probably not even the output of the one in the link you provided, either. Personally I'd try it with a smaller fan first.

 

I'm not talking about the same unit you are. The Thomas Knight ESC supercharger does need banks of batteries. This one doesn't.

This is primarily a track use mod and not really for the street. I'm not really concerned about water getting into it since it wouldn't be wise to be running at the track when it's raining.

Dryer duct are you serious! Don't EVER use that stuff. It is fragile and can't handle the harsh uses that it gets in this application. There are many that use it but when it falls apart and flies through something, you'll hate it. Go to a racers wholesale store and buy some reinforced belted rubber hose that is designed for this use. It won't disintegrate.

 

I know you weren't talking about the ESC unit, and tried to make that clear. Sorry about that!

 

I remember a few guys on the FD forum using dryer duct for bringing in air from the passenger side oil cooler inlet on non-R1 models (only one oil cooler for those, on the other side) and ended up picking bits of that stuff out of their filters.

jds