Removal of engine bay side air vents ?

[Gordon Crabb]

Hi to all,

I have a weird question, I'm rebuilding a 78 Baywindow Jurgen Autovilla, to anyone not in the know about these, its the one with the caravan bolted on to the back of a baywindow a bit like the Gypsy ! anyway my problem is I'm re-skinning the whole van in plain alloy and want to loose the black engine air intakes at the side cause they look pants to be frank, so I am wondering if anybody has any thoughts on running two electric 4" 12volt inline fans sucking air up from an air scoop underneath, which brings me to the question about air flow, each fan can supply approx 100cfm and will draw about 2.5 amp, will the 55amp alternator/battery deal with an additional 5 amp continuous load and is 200cfm enough for the 2000cc type 4 engine fan cooling and the air needed for the carb pull.
That's it in a nut shell many thanks in advance for any comments.
Gordon

[FreeBug]

You're going to want closer to 3000 cfm, and VW of Australia are the ones who discovered the benefits of drawing air from high up rather than close to the ground.

[Vanapplebomb]

those fans will roast the engine in short order. You have multiple issues here. Not only is 200 cfm a tenth of the air flow typical of a T4 engine, you also will get nowhere near 200cfm out of those two fans. That number assumes little to no resistance to air flow. It takes a fair amount of oomph to push air thru the cooling fins and oil cooler...so when it is all said and done, your "200cfm" fans will only be able to push a fraction of that thru the engine...making the problem even worse. There is a reason that the fan draws a couple ponies from the crank, and it isn't because its inefficient.

Why reinvent the wheel here? The T4 cooling system was a solid design.
_________________
1800 Type 4 Berrien 295

http://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?t=487021

[modok]

You do not need electric fans, they would just become electric generators
You just need sufficient size holes for the air to come in. The holes can be round, square, ovals, whatever shape you want, any size, as long as they add up to about the same as it was to begin with. You could put them where they were or lower down like a older van would be ok too.

Sorry man, but if your first post is can I remove the air vents. heck no!! No. It's an aircooled engine, and the 2hp fan on the back of the engine needs a lot of air!!