Advanced Engineering Tech - Dry sump pump placement question

Sorry if this is the wrong place for this. Tried reading through the rules of each forum and I THINK this is where this belongs.

I am installing a Peterson four stage dry sump pump on my car. My question is related to the position of the pump.

1. Do the inlets of the oil pump (vacuum and oil pressure) have to be lower that the oil levels? It makes sense to me that for oil pressure, that the pump be below the level of the storage tank. This way the pump is not sucking oil up hill. What about the scavenge/vacuum pumps though? I am under the impression that they can pull anywhere from 9-15in of vacuum. If this is the case, can the vacuum pump inlets be ABOVE the oil pick ups on the pan? Or should they not be trying to pull up hill either?

2. Does it matter which " O'clock" position the oil pump sits at? Meaning, do the oil pump inlets have to be at the 6 O'clock position, or can they be all the way up at say... 10 or 11 O'clock making the outlets of the pump down around 4 and 5 O'clock. I'm not sure on this, but my thinking says that it does not matter how the pump is clocked. Please correct me if I am wrong.

Thanks for the help guys... Normally I am one of the guru's to go to on my 300zx forum, but this is a little beyond the scope of most on that site, and I know there are some very experienced individuals on this site, that have knowledge in this particular area.

So I was doing some research. There are some other guys that have their inlets up top like I am talking about. They have had no problems doing it this way.

did you ever find out if the tank needs to be above the level of the pump? I'm kind of trying to figure out placement on my vehcile, and I have more room down low than up high. let em know what you found. thanks.

Yes the pump should be below the tank. Pumps push not pull. so you want gravity to help as much as possible. And you can clock it really anyway you want to get it to fit. there is enough oil in there to lube everything so clocking wont change that.

Correction. Dry sump pumps are very good at pulling oil. In fact, they are designed to do just that. All be it gravity will help, it does not matter where the tank or pump is located. Although, the closer together they are the better.

Well, I though you needed the hydraulic advantage of gravity to keep it fed. Now, if that isnt true that would be awesome but most manufacturers say they would like the bottom of the tank above the top of the pump. I wasnt sure if that is just for priming or for normal operation. I have an accumulator to prime it if necessary.

It would be nice to have the OIL LEVEL above your pump, but you dont have to. The pumps will pull oil very well from the tank. Most sprint car have the oil pump driven off their camshaft if that help you with your height question. The pump will pull alot of vacuum from your oil pan and your tank. You dont need an accumulator if you dont mind priming your engine before cold fire. If you cant get to your pump after you install the engine then yes i would deff put an accumulator on. Also i have not been a big fan of using rubber hoses on the vacuum side of the pump. I have seen many of them fail by collapsing under vacuum. In NASCAR we cycled out the vacuum hoses every 5000 miles or if the were kinked at one time. Seal your engine up tight and make some HP.

I'm going to be mounting it drivers side, lower two bolt holes, pretty close to even with the oil pan. I am just trying to find a tank small enough, since I have the issue of building a front mount turbo system that eats up a lot of space up there.

You can look at alot of sprint car websites for dry sump tanks. You can even call peterson and they can make you a custom tank. I have personally built two my self. I have seen some that were square and different shapes. It sounds like any way you mount the tank, you will have plenty of head pressure to self prime your pump.

http://petersonfluidsys.com/

http://www.hendrensracingengines.com/716557.html nice tanks

good stuff, ill have to look into potentially rerouting some stuff