Leaf blowers for real power!!

This is a follow up on those lame electric turbo threads.
I have an Echo gas powered back-pack type leaf blower powered by a 4 hp 2 stroke engine. It blows huge quantites of air (1260 cfm,) and substantial pressure, enough to clean off my driveway of leaves, pebbles dust etc in about 10 seconds.

http://www.echo-usa.com/prods_item.asp?Model=PB-751&Category=POWERBLOWER

Now, after some brief thoughts of stuffing it under the hood of my 4 cyl Mustang..............(lets see, punch a hole through the firewall for the pull-cord, extend the throttle cable to the car's console)..........
or mounting it on the roof for easy pull-cord access through the sunroof

Black and Decker makes a high performance 12 volt leaf blower that might do the trick.
The Leaf Hog: http://eshop.msn.com/marketplace.aspx?pmpType=1&mpId=0&pcId=3012&catId=350&page=0

A smaller Poulan blower is rated at 405 cfm at 140 mph air speed, I cannot find any airflow specs on the B&D unit, but it will blow at 200 mph.
The B&D is affordable at about $80. I can wire it through a dashboard switch to a relay and run it off the cars electrical system.
A foot switch may be adaptable, to kick in at full throttle.

Sure this may seem funny, but I am serious. My daily driver EFI Mustang only has 90 hp or so and is SLOW!!. If I can blow a few more HP for $80, its worth it. I doubt it would be too effective on a more powerful engine.

Anyways, when the weather warms up a bit, I'll give it a shot and post the results. If it works maybe I can make a kit and sell on ebay!!

holy crap. if you actually that ill be happy. you should be careful witha gas powered leaf blower ...

As part of your research, I suggest you block off the outlet nozzle of the blower and put a PSI gauge on it. My guess is you won't get more than 0.5-1 psi. They work on flow, but if you stop that flow, usually they make very little pressure.

Engines make flow well enough on their own, hence why forced induction methods focus on pressure.

But NOW you're talking about some good ideas. No more tiny little heater blowers as "electric turbos." A dedicated 4hp blower on its own power supply might do some good :) Granted it might only be 5 hp, but on a four-banger it might be quite noticable.

Not sure about the 12v blower. It might take as much power to run the alternator as it makes by blowing.

The only other snag I see is that if its a carbed car you'll need extensive carb mods to work under positive pressure, and if its an EFI car you'll need to hack the ECU and use a positive pressure MAP sensor.

All are good suggestions and I had already considered them.
Gas powered leaf blowers produce substantial pressure. The vanes of the impeller are more than 6 inches long so as they spin, they are able to fling and thus compress the column of air substantially.

Obviously they are impratical. It would be quite entertaining to go to the track in my GTO with one on the front....and have to get out of the car in the staging lanes just to fire it up.

The 12 amp units draw about 150 watts on 12 volts, which is less than a 4 lamp headlight system in high beam. Most alternators are at least 50 amp, and many are over 100, so the electrical draw is easily sustainable.
My concern is cavitation. As you suggest, if flow is stopped, such as when the throttle blade is closed, air pressure in the blower drops ot almost nil because the impeller is cavitating. However, if there is substantial flow, (ie, at full throttle) air flow should improve.

My goal is 5 psi of boost. Many older turbos (early GM from the 60's)and centrifugal blowers (McCollough brand) rarely got about 5 psi anyways but had a substantial effect. ....any more than that would harm the mighty Ford 2.3L engine.
People use leaf blowers to inflate those big oversize toys and wading pools for kids. They get several psi in those,

So, I may beg/borrow a few and see what kind of pressure I can get.

IMHO it can work, but perhaps the current crop of 12 volt blowers are just not sufficiently powerful.

My Mustang is EFI....I have considered what might happen to the MAP sensor, but I believe at WOT the manifold pressure is about zero anyways so some positive pressure might not make any difference. If it does end up running lean, a boost in fuel pressure might compensate.

Using a blower on a carb may be easier. All thats required is a sealed airbox for the entire carb and a fuel pressure regulator, with more pressure when required.

that wont work. . . your using a gas blower, you know where the exhaust comes out of on a gas blower? It comes out with the airflow. So your going to be choking your engine with carbon dioxide. So any gains you would see from the extra air will be negated.

that wont work. . . your using a gas blower, you know where the exhaust comes out of on a gas blower? It comes out with the airflow. So your going to be choking your engine with carbon dioxide. So any gains you would see from the extra air will be negated.
I did mention the gas blower would be impratical (but amusing nonetheless)

However, only a tiny portion of the blower's 1260 cfm would be exhaust. Car engines already ingest exhaust gases through the EGR valve, so exhaust gases likely would not make a huge difference.

I did mention the gas blower would be impratical (but amusing nonetheless)

However, only a tiny portion of the blower's 1260 cfm would be exhaust. Car engines already ingest exhaust gases through the EGR valve, so exhaust gases likely would not make a huge difference.


Have you tired to obtain a fan curve from Echo?

Anyways, when the weather warms up a bit, I'll give it a shot and post the results. If it works maybe I can make a kit and sell on ebay!!

Best of luck, been tried many times. As Curtis mentioned, No real boost is available. Actually it will reduce engine peak HP. At WOT, max drive the engine will be turning the leak blower and not getting any boost.

Now... you might get a little HP (close to 1 maybe) at less than WOT at low RPM. But why not just open the trhottle a bit. :smile:

We have tried all this on the chassis dyno. A better use for the leaf blower is to cool the intercooler. :smile:

Interesting enough we did find a few HP by building a venturi at the end of the exhaust pipe and feeding it with the leaf blower. On a 1600cc engine at 6000 RPM we went from about 80 to 82 HP (wheel power).
Just goes to show you that on the track, if the exhaust tips are designed correctly in the cars air flow you might get +2% HP. (BTW, in our tests the measured speed of the air from the blower was about 85mph. So again at 150mph, scavange effects could be significant.

Jim
SR Racing

At WOT, max drive the engine will be turning the leak blower and not getting any boost.

Thank you for the input. However, one idea for this is that the power source for the blower (gas or electric) can be seperate from the engine itself inducing no parasitic losses (especially with an alternator cut-out)....unlike a conventional supercharger.

that wont work. . . your using a gas blower, you know where the exhaust comes out of on a gas blower? It comes out with the airflow. So your going to be choking your engine with carbon dioxide. So any gains you would see from the extra air will be negated.


most leaf blowers (gas powered ones) actually have an exhaust pipe right by the engine. Most of them do not have the exhaust come out with the airflow :biggrin:

...You have GOT to be fucking kidding me...