Avanti water pump

[Nelson]

Why do non Avanti water pumps fail when installed on Avantis? Are the bearings different between the two?

Edited December 31, 2022 by Nelson

[mfg]

26 minutes ago, Nelson said:

Why do non Avanti water pumps fail when installed on Avantis? Are the bearings different between the two?

The Avanti water pump body is reinforced with three gussets, but I think the bearings themselves are the same.

[Nelson]

You have the bearing part correct but gussets aren’t the important part of the equation.

[mfg]

18 hours ago, Nelson said:

You have the bearing part correct but gussets aren’t the important part of the equation.

UNCLE!!  ( again!)

[brad]

Side loading from the supercharger tension arm is one reason. That and the fact the pulleys are so heavy and cast iron instead of stamped sheet metal.

 

[Nelson]

22 hours ago, Nelson said:

You have the bearing part correct but gussets aren’t the important part of the equation.

The reason the gussets are on the neck of the pump is because the neck is significantly taller. It is taller in order to move the bearing set forward. There are two bearings in the bearing unit. The belt load is supposed to be shared equally between the two bearings as the belt configuration is further forward than a standard Stude V8. A standard V8 water pump is short so only one bearing, the front one, ends up taking ALL the load. The distance from the mounting surface to the pulley flange is the same between the two but the bearing location relative to the pulley flange and mounting surface is different.

Long answer to a simple question but the information is worthwhile.

Edited January 1, 2023 by Nelson

[mfg]

1 hour ago, Nelson said:

The reason the gussets are on the neck of the pump is because the neck is significantly taller. It is taller in order to move the bearing set forward. There are two bearings in the bearing unit. The belt load is supposed to be shared equally between the two bearings as the belt configuration is further forward than a standard Stude V8. A standard V8 water pump is short so only one bearing, the front one, ends up taking ALL the load. The distance from the mounting surface to the pulley flange is the same between the two but the bearing location relative to the pulley flange and mounting surface is different.

Long answer to a simple question but the information is worthwhile.

That is interesting.....Never knew about  the two bearing vs. one bearing difference!

Thanks for posting!

 

[Nelson]

Yes, There are two bearing in the water pump assembly. The bearing assembly has one outer shell, one shaft and two ball bearing sets, one in the front and one in the rear. When the Avanti pump became unavailable in the late 70’s I started rebuilding the standard Studebaker pump for use in an Avanti by using a special bearing assembly that had a roller bearing toward the front to carry the load and a ball bearing at the rear to handle the thrust load. A roller bearing will handle infinitely more load than a ball. It worked pretty well. Fortunately they started reproducing the Avanti tall pump again and things got better.

Edited January 1, 2023 by Nelson