hi guys i was wondering if you could explain what is the purpose of an oil catch tank is , and where does it connect up to , ive seen them available for minis , and other cars thanks in advance
ollie
Can Some One Explain The Purpose Of A Oil Catch Tank?
Started by
oliver122
, Mar 14 2011 11:25 PM
5 replies to this topic
#1
oliver122
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Posted 14 March 2011 - 11:25 PM
#2
Cooperman
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Posted 14 March 2011 - 11:28 PM
hi guys i was wondering if you could explain what is the purpose of an oil catch tank is , and where does it connect up to , ive seen them available for minis , and other cars thanks in advance
ollie
They are a mandatory requirement for all competition cars to prevent oil spills on the track which would be a serious danger to other competitors. They are not intended for road use.
#3
oliver122
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Posted 14 March 2011 - 11:35 PM
hi guys i was wondering if you could explain what is the purpose of an oil catch tank is , and where does it connect up to , ive seen them available for minis , and other cars thanks in advance
ollie
They are a mandatory requirement for all competition cars to prevent oil spills on the track which would be a serious danger to other competitors. They are not intended for road use.
cheers cooperman , but could you explain what they do , the name gives it away , but where does it catch the oil from , and does it put it back into the system ?
ollie
#4
Cooperman
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Posted 14 March 2011 - 11:40 PM
hi guys i was wondering if you could explain what is the purpose of an oil catch tank is , and where does it connect up to , ive seen them available for minis , and other cars thanks in advance
ollie
They are a mandatory requirement for all competition cars to prevent oil spills on the track which would be a serious danger to other competitors. They are not intended for road use.
cheers cooperman , but could you explain what they do , the name gives it away , but where does it catch the oil from , and does it put it back into the system ?
ollie
Competition cars don't normally have enclosed breather systems, so a pipe or pipes are run from the breather points into the catch tank to catch the oil fumes or indeed the oil. I always make my own on my rally cars with a blown rigid plastic container into which I cut holes for the breather pipes and a 1/4" dia vent hole in the container cap. the breather pipes I run just into the container by about 1" or so to prevent any 'suck-back' of old oil if any suction happened.
I mount the tank on an aluminium 'shelf' under the LH front wing with the pipes going through holes in the inner wing just behind the radiator.
#5
samsfern
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Posted 15 March 2011 - 12:28 AM
so, out of interest cooperman, whats the minimum capacities for them? Am i right in thinking 2 litres for competition use?
#6
ibrooks
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Posted 15 March 2011 - 09:50 AM
It depends on how much oil your car blows out and how often you empty it. A car that blows lots of oil and does a long race will need a large tank (so you don't need to stop mid-way to empty it). A car that doesn't blow much oil or that only does short races between service stops where it can be emptied can get away with a smaller tank.
Still not seen an explanation of what they do so here goes.
Modern cars tend to run a closed breather system which is a bit of a misnomer really. The crankcase has oil in the bottom and air at the top - it also has a lot of things thrashing around that the oil is forced through and sprayed onto. These things get hot and so the air expands. It it's truly sealed then it will become pressurised and inevitably it will leak through oil seals, joints or gaskets.
What modern cars really do is run a vacuum pipe from the crankcase to the intake manifold. This creates a slight vacuum in the crankcase and as it heats up and the oil gets splashed around any oily vapour is drawn into the cyinders and burnt with the fuel/air mix.
On a highly tuned car this system is not desireable as we want to control the fuel/air mixture very precisely and feed it cold dense air with lots of oxygen rather than hot thin air with a load of oily rubbish in it. So the breathers tend to be run open to the atmosphere and as the engine heats up it blows a little air out and then when it cools down it draws some air back in. All well and good so long as it's only air that goes either way but in the real world what goes out contains oil vapour plus any combustion products from piston blow-by and what is drawn back in is whatever you've driven through (dust, water, whatever).
You need to run a catch tank when you run open breathers. Basically you just have a pipe on the breather and this goes to a tank somewhere which is usually filled with wire mesh. The tank also has a pipe that s open to the air and it's ideally sited somewhere cool-ish. As oily vapour is blown into the tank it passes through the wire mesh and because it's hopefully not as hot as the vapour any liquid condenses and falls to the bottom of the tank. When the engine cools it draws air back through the mesh and hopefully any particulates or liquid droplets are caught on the now oily mesh and again stay in the tank.
Minis as standard tend to run with breather canisters which contain the mesh but are also connected to the air intake so the engine digests the hot air coming out of the crancase but hopefully most of the vapour is caught in the mesh. The canisters are positioned so that when they cool down oil that has been caught in them runs back where it came from and into the crankcase. Many people just remove the pipes and stick small air filters on the ends of the canisters to prevent rubbish being drawn back into them. The canisters arealso known as seperators as they are supposed to seperate liquid from air.
Race cars often are required to run a catch tank rather than just a breather canister and filter so that if it ends up shiny side down on the track there is less chance of oil running straight through the canister and out onto the track but most classes are allowed to just run a seperator canister of some variety so that they aren't constantly venting oily vapour onto the track and into the air that then next car is going to have to drive through.
Iain
Still not seen an explanation of what they do so here goes.
Modern cars tend to run a closed breather system which is a bit of a misnomer really. The crankcase has oil in the bottom and air at the top - it also has a lot of things thrashing around that the oil is forced through and sprayed onto. These things get hot and so the air expands. It it's truly sealed then it will become pressurised and inevitably it will leak through oil seals, joints or gaskets.
What modern cars really do is run a vacuum pipe from the crankcase to the intake manifold. This creates a slight vacuum in the crankcase and as it heats up and the oil gets splashed around any oily vapour is drawn into the cyinders and burnt with the fuel/air mix.
On a highly tuned car this system is not desireable as we want to control the fuel/air mixture very precisely and feed it cold dense air with lots of oxygen rather than hot thin air with a load of oily rubbish in it. So the breathers tend to be run open to the atmosphere and as the engine heats up it blows a little air out and then when it cools down it draws some air back in. All well and good so long as it's only air that goes either way but in the real world what goes out contains oil vapour plus any combustion products from piston blow-by and what is drawn back in is whatever you've driven through (dust, water, whatever).
You need to run a catch tank when you run open breathers. Basically you just have a pipe on the breather and this goes to a tank somewhere which is usually filled with wire mesh. The tank also has a pipe that s open to the air and it's ideally sited somewhere cool-ish. As oily vapour is blown into the tank it passes through the wire mesh and because it's hopefully not as hot as the vapour any liquid condenses and falls to the bottom of the tank. When the engine cools it draws air back through the mesh and hopefully any particulates or liquid droplets are caught on the now oily mesh and again stay in the tank.
Minis as standard tend to run with breather canisters which contain the mesh but are also connected to the air intake so the engine digests the hot air coming out of the crancase but hopefully most of the vapour is caught in the mesh. The canisters are positioned so that when they cool down oil that has been caught in them runs back where it came from and into the crankcase. Many people just remove the pipes and stick small air filters on the ends of the canisters to prevent rubbish being drawn back into them. The canisters arealso known as seperators as they are supposed to seperate liquid from air.
Race cars often are required to run a catch tank rather than just a breather canister and filter so that if it ends up shiny side down on the track there is less chance of oil running straight through the canister and out onto the track but most classes are allowed to just run a seperator canister of some variety so that they aren't constantly venting oily vapour onto the track and into the air that then next car is going to have to drive through.
Iain
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