an0malous

uh oh.
are you gonna school us?

I tried to be nice when you told us your AC compressor runs constantly....
but im not gonna be nice if your gonna be a smartass......

Ljavy17

lmao.

denlou

holy ego trip. Unless you disconnect the belt from the compressor, the pulley is still turning. The belt is still killing your power to turn the pulley, engaged to the compressor or not.

an0malous

Do you understand that the compressor has a clutch....
and that pully is nothing but an idler until you turn your AC on?
It may take a miniscule amount of power away due to the friction of spinning the pully,
but it only kills your power when that clutch engages, and your engine has to actually turn the compressor pump.

denlou

yes I understand the concept, and yes it is a very negligable amount of power, but it's still lost power.

Halfcent

So

Very

Wrong


The compressor only run when the AC is on. There is a clutch that engages the compressor to the drive belt when selected on. Otherwise, the pulley acts just as an idler. And an idling pulley uses no power.

yellow_cobalt

in theory.

ive tested this with my car since i have the same drive everyday on a tank of gas, and tested long trips as i travel back and forth across the state alot. i see anywhere from 29mpg-33mpg running a/c, while windows down i see 33-38mpg. windows up no a/c im still in the 33-38mpg. and i have used the same gas usually from the same gas station (except when i go across the state) but still use shell.

power wise isnt that badly noticable to me. its no where near like my first car (95 ford escort), because when it kicked on i couldnt get the car rolling. it would stall unless i revved the crap out of it.

but the thing is too, depending on your engine, it can be better to run a/c then windows down. say a big v8, hell you wont even notice it on let alone the change in the already horrible gas mileage . but id say its possibly a 10-15hp drop at the crank, possibly.



and yeah, you dont lose power with the a/c off. it pretty much acts like an idler pulley, it spins freely. pull the belt off and find out.

braineater

this is true, and i have mine changed. i think its 92% stock but mine is set at 70% right now.

YSUsteven

It probably less than 1 hp, which you can't feel anyway.

NJHK

Atleast you guys have 4 cylinders...

My 6 cylinder freakin SUCKS with gas mileage from stock form...it's even worse with the a/c on. On the highway, the needle freakin moves...

chood711

iTrader: (4)

if it knows what its doing, it can blow and suck, oh were talking about a/c......lol

NJHK

I need one of those...

and not a a/c

yellow_cobalt

well since this is kind of on topic, yet off, why does the a/c suck so bad in the car? lol i noticed that one day when it was really hot/humid out. had to roll up windows to answer cell, kick on a/c and the entire time for an hour inside the car was still like 90 degrees, with a cool breeze hitting me. maybe car is horribly insulated. but windows down work for me all the time.

NJHK

Do you mean for me?

My car naturally gets 28 MPG (advertised) for highway. This is of course if you're in 6th gear and baby the **** out of the car. It gets 18 MPG in the city. Putting on the a/c makes it work even harder and get worse MPG...so who knows how much I have with the a/c on.

denlou

The trick I use typically when I first get in the car is crank the A/C and open the windows up, do that for a few minutes while driving and that'll kick the hot air out the window, close the windows and in a minute or two you'll have a cold car.

HunterKiller89

iTrader: (1)

okay..lets see...one horsepower is the equivalent to 33,000ft-lb of TQ per minute....the average human can sustain .1HP INDEFINITELY, and the average human uses almost NO strength (im gonna say 5%, which is WAAY to high) to turn a idle pulley. So then, assuming it takes 1,650ft-lb/min to keep a pulley from slowing down due to friction, your losing .005HP by leaving that belt attached to the pulley opposed to taking it off....still think its significant enough to note?

in conclusion: you would make your car faster by taking off your shoes opposed to removing the belt from the pulley...

denlou

in fact so would taking a ****, I'm just saying

YSUsteven

You took WAY too much effort to pawn him.

hobbie2k

If you want to increase performance by disabling the A/C, then you should remove it completely. You won't gain any real power, but you'll lose a fair bit of weight off the front wheels, that will have a much greater all around effect than a lot of bolt-ons.

RA080424

And hopefully you live somewhere where its cold year round.

Las Vegas heat sucks total ass.

HunterKiller89

iTrader: (1)

im very thorough with my pwning

zsk8er16

u don't lose any power if u just have the fans on do u? jw cause i raced a mustang the other day and looked down after the race and my fans were on.

an0malous

The weight reduction I understand completely....
but I dont understand the reference to removing it off your front wheels?
in a fwd car...i would think if you wanna remove weight anywhere particular....it would be anywhere BUT the front wheels.

Not sayin your wrong....just didnt conceptually make sense to me.

hobbie2k

Better balance.

While more weight over the front wheels results in more traction, it also results in more mass that the traction has to manuever. That's fine if you're drag racing where all you need is straight line traction, but if you want to turn it's best to have a rearward balance. If you reduce the amount of weight on the front wheels, you improve turn-in, improve the car's ability to rotate (reducing understeer), at a loss of some stability.

Part of the reason the Porsche 911 has been such a popular sports car for so long, is the rear mounted engine and roughly 40/60 front/rear balance. While that balance results in a car that likes to spin, it also makes a car that loves to turn.

I didn't get into the physics of it too much because it's nearly midnight and I have to be up for work in about 6 hours, but it makes sense, believe me.

denn454

iTrader: (1)

in theory, yes. the fans draw power from the battery, which uses the alternator to recharge. the more draw there is on the battery the harder the alternator works, and that makes the engine work harder.

in practice, no. if its .005 hp from the ac pulley i would guess its somewhere in the neighborhood of .010hp running the fans. you would see more effect from toating around the exta weight of the burrito you just ate than you would see from running the fans.