COAndy

I don't mean to sound ignorant, but what exactly are the advantages over a standard system?

Miaugi

Pump always generates oil pressure = no more oil froathing at high revs or starvation.

Enabling the lowering of the engine in the frame = lower center of gravity.

Larger capacity oil reserve = less chance for oil "over-heating", less contamination (per volume).

Those are some benefits that come to mind, but I'm no expert.

PeterK

Plus you can position the oil tank closer to the center - improves handeling.
No oil near crankshaft - gets you more HP.
Longer interval between oil changes.

Foosh

Instant oiling at start up too, I believe. Most of the wear and tear on an engine occurs at start-up.

Guru_4_hire

crankcase vacuum

MitchAlsup

Even more important:: in high G cornering situations the oil does not pack to one side of the oil pan and uncover the oil pickup, causing it to suck air. In fact, many dry sump systems are built with big enough evaccuation pumps to suck air much of the time.

Inside the dry sump, the oil is pumped into a circular funnel shaped device that de-aireates the oil so that the oil pumped back into the engine has no bubbles in it, thereby increasing the protection for the engine.

The long oil path, gives the oil more chances to loose energy and arrive back at the engine cooler than a wet sump system.

Finally, with rather large-ish evaccuation pumps, the bottom end is operating at zero or negative pressures, increasing the effective pressure between the combustion chamber and the bottom end, which increases the force delivered to piston and onto the crankshaft, which increases power (by small amounts).

TripleBlack99

has the engine really been lowered in the 2006 z06. i think this may have not happened because i have not heard it being touted by dave hill and co.

32valves

I have been wondering the same thing.

AU N EGL

Yes - I have an accu-sump ( wet sump ) oiling system.

I flip a toggle switch to start the oil being pumped from the accusump though the engine. after about 45-60 sec I turn the engine on or over and start the car. Mimimal pistion slap of the small block chevy

Katana Man

But what is "dry" about it? Why is that word in there?

silverarrow

the reference to dry sump is that the sump i.e. oil pan is devoid of any oil hence the word "dry". i hope that this might clarify the term "dry".

gonzalezfj

You have not heard Hill mention lowering the engine in the frame because it has not been done.

One more time: The clutch housing is the limiting factor in lowering the engine in the frame, not the oil pan. Since this totrque monster needs a big clutch, it cannot be lowered with respect to the engine position in the plain vanilla C6.

geo_z06

This is really the key point. On a race track you could run into situations where you are cornering hard enough that oil doesn't cycle properly through the engine. Having this setup in a street car is rather impressive however it only really comes into play if the car is taken to the track.

DEL_FRC

Below should explain how it works and the advantages:
http://auto.howstuffworks.com/question331.htm

Miaugi

Thanks for the link....I see I wasn't too far off the mark!

runamuk

Also, A dry sump oil system does not provide lubrication before startup because the pump is driven off the crankshaft, the only way to prelube the engine is with an Accusump like what Au n egl has.

Painrace

The number one reason for a race car driver is better throttle response!

Michael A

Two things here I have never heard of before for dry sump oil systems:

1) crankcase vacuum

Those oil evacuation pumps to my knowledge (and I am not an engine builder or engineer for road race cars, so excuse my ignorance), are not designed to evacuate crankcase blowby along with the oil. I have seen such systems used in drag racing, which employ a rotary vane air pump similar to those used on emission control systems, but they are separate from the oil evacuation system.

2) better throttle response

Can't figure this one out at all.

Can someone confirm or deny these, and give us more detail?

Michael

glass slipper

1) I don't know if there is substantial crankcase vacuum with a dry sump system or not, but for the sake of discussion, let's say there is. Doing a "work" analysis, whatever negative pressure is in the crankcase will add "work" (HP) to the crank when the piston is coming down and this would be a good idea if the piston only comes down. But it has to go back up thus negating any gain, factor in the HP required to drive the scavenge pump (taken from the crank) and you actually end up with negative work. Or put another way, it takes HP to drive the dry sump system, but the benefits (already stated above) in other areas make it well worth it. Might even have a net HP gain from reduced windage in the crankcase at high RPM, but again I don't know the numbers...
2) I can't even fathom a guess on this one.

Guru_4_hire

People run crankcase vacuum pumps for various racing purposes.