BBC news flash on their website
Mini to recall about 235000 vehicles worldwide, including 30,000 in the UK due to fault with the electric water pump
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-16586961
link edited in
Last edited by: VxFan on Tue 17 Jan 12 at 00:48
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Hah, my vintage car has the worlds most reliable, least maintenance hungry water pump there is. It's thermo-syphon cooled - ie relies on the fact that hot water is less dense than cold, so rises.
Seriously though, I'm a bit surprised to see electric pumps on a road car, though race cars have often had them for a while. Simple mechanical pump is well proven and doesn't sap that much engine power. True an electrical can better that, but does it last as long? Is it as cheap?
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>>
>> Seriously though, I'm a bit surprised to see electric pumps on a road car, though
>> race cars have often had them for a while. Simple mechanical pump is well proven
>> and doesn't sap that much engine power. True an electrical can better that, but does
>> it last as long? Is it as cheap?
>>
My 96 Omega had both mechanical and electric pumps, I think the latter was to stop hot spots forming as the engine was switched off.
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I understand they're quite common nowadays to prevent 'heat soak'. Particularly in turbo-charged engines. The bearings are often water cooled I believe.
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Maybe this recall is to stop them setting on fire as they have been doing of late.
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>> does it last as long? Is it as cheap?
Damn silly idea, was my instinctive reaction. I bet silly fashion victim Mini-owning dollies will be thinking the same about now.
Electric cooling fans are a good idea. But electric power steering and silly electric water pumps aren't.
Of course I'm a notorious luddite...
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>> Of course I'm a notorious luddite...
Count me in, as far as i'm concerned they were never broke in the first place so why fix 'em.
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but they were, over the years terrible tales of striped pump vanes, woodruff key failures, seizures leading to thrown off cam belts.
The water pump has a horrible history across many marques.
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>> water pump has a horrible history across many marques.
Tsk. Lost count of the damn things I've had to grapple with, red sticky stuff, water pouring through the old bearing, torn paper gaskets, all that palaver... But they let you know when they had had it by leaking and squealing.
They're simple and cheap, unless you have the wrong sort of car, and until recently usually in an accessible location.
Perhaps stuffing them down in the depths behind the cambelts, and even driving them off the cambelt, was the thin end of the wedge before silly electric pumps. God how I hate capitalism.
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>> The water pump has a horrible history across many marques.
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I never liked the move to driving water pumps from the cambelt, trouble very rare on those driven by the auxilliary or fan belt as in most chain cam engines.
Replacing a leaking water pump driven by auxilliary belt is usually an easy enough job, and given a bit of care on a cool day a bit of leap frogging could you safely get several miles with a failed pump to somewhere able to repair.
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I wouldn't be surprised to find one in your W124 gb - mounted alongside the duo-valves.
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>> I wouldn't be surprised to find one in your W124 gb - mounted alongside the
>> duo-valves.
That i'm not sure about, but the main water pump might be coming up for renewal soon, i have the most infernal auxilliary belt squeal, its had several new proper belts and there is no detectable wear anywhere, may just have to try a new pump for the hell of it unless you have any good suggestions....belt dressing makes it worse far worse.
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It may be worth checking to make sure that the tips of the poly v belt aren't touching the bases of their respective grooves on any of the pulleys. If you hold a length of belt against its pulley, and shine a torch through from the back, you should see light at the tips of the ridges in the belt / base of the grooves.
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you should see light at the tips of the ridges in the belt
>> / base of the grooves.
Thanks, so possibly a worn pulley is your thinking?, its even got my indy stumped and he's tried all sorts of different belts, not just on my car either he's had some other noisy ones in too.
I did wonder if there might be a slight bit of wear of the pump bearings allowing the pulley to be imperceptably offline.
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Yes, I mention the slightly odd method of checking the pulleys not because I've seen many that have worn, rather that I'm sure you've already looked at and eliminated the usual causes and problems.
Back on topic, as you might imagine, I can see the benefits of an electric water pump! - although most strongly for long engines like the inline sixes in our cars. The rearward cylinders do struggle for cooling, and an electric waterpump mounted towards the middle of the engine - so that the length of the water path from pump to furthermost cylinder would be reduced - would be an improvement.
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Slight thread drift. We are told that parts of an engine are running without oil for a short time after starting, before the pump get it round to all parts. Might an electric oil pump, to prime the oil system and build up some pressure, serve any useful purpose or is the problem not that bad?
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you'll be pre warming the oil next.
Given that engines are assumed to 200k miles plus without wear these days, that is a solution without a problem.
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Coo, i seem to be into Yoda turning am.
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The aviation fraternity don't like cold starts and associated wear but their piston engines only do 2000 hours between overhauls anyway!
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2000 hours at 200mph = 400,000 miles - not a small distance.
In a car 2000 hours may well equate to 100,000 road miles - if a car engine failing may mean your imminent death, perhaps a 100,000 mile overhaul would be considered appropriate ;-)
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Mini recall - Slidingpillar
