Where to buy small mass air flow sensor?

[JamesWolak]

Our team's electrical engineer has been having trouble finding a mass air flow sensor that is reasonable in size for dyno testing. The smallest one I have seen is the 2.3 inch dia one that Auburn FSAE posted about. We were in the market for one around 1.5-1.75 inches. Does anyone know of any around this diameter?

[JamesWolak]

Our team's electrical engineer has been having trouble finding a mass air flow sensor that is reasonable in size for dyno testing. The smallest one I have seen is the 2.3 inch dia one that Auburn FSAE posted about. We were in the market for one around 1.5-1.75 inches. Does anyone know of any around this diameter?

[Drew Price]

Can you go look up and down the rows at a pick & pull junkyard nearby? That's how I scored a little Hyundai throttle body for dyno testing intake manifolds.

Some of the chain ones even have half price days, the ones around Chicago are all on Wednesdays, makes for a busy day.

Alternatively, could you take one and make a false inner tube around the wire element to reduce the area? Or a venturi entering and exiting? Are you having trouble getting resolution from the small displacement engine through the large sensor?

Best,
Drew

[JamesWolak]

This will be our first attempt to try to run a mas. I just didn't feel like jerking around with something too big or trying to make something work from the wrong application.

If I can't find one small enough I guess I will have to but I would like to avoid it if possible.

[Damon Pipenberg]

I've seen a very small mass airflow sensor that was used in a secondary air injection system. I think it was Bosch, I don't know what car it was used in though. It was really small, maybe 1" ID, so it might actually be too small for your purpose.

[JamesWolak]

I searched through bosch motorsports website and found no mass airflow sensors.

[BeaverGuy]

You don't want to look on Bosch Motorsports. I don't remember where specifically but abotu 2 1/2 years ago I found a PDF catalog of Bosch's mass air flow sensors that listed part numbers and calibration curves. Like most of the sensors you find on a car, Bosch is one of the leading manufacturers.

[JamesWolak]

Yeah i found a PDF catalog like that and its smallest listed was 2.3 inches small.

This is what we have come up with so far and its WAY to expensive. http://www.omega.com/ppt/pptsc.asp?ref=FMA900&Nav=grec07

[Discretely elite]

With all the toys its almost less than a grand, quit crying.

[Pete Marsh]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by JamesWolak:
Yeah i found a PDF catalog like that and its smallest listed was 2.3 inches small.

This is what we have come up with so far and its WAY to expensive. http://www.omega.com/ppt/pptsc.asp?ref=FMA900&Nav=grec07 </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

That has got to be way too slow to be usefull?
0.4 seconds to 63% accuracy!
It also looks like it reads velocity instead of mass as well, what use is that?

There must be dozens of EFI road cars around that have 100 HP or there abouts, like anything 1.6 to 2 litres. Any second hand mass sensor you calibrate on a flow bench will work perfectly on your dyno. At least ours does.

Pete

[Damon Pipenberg]

One other thing - since a MAF sensor generally just measures the velocity of the air moving past the element (hot-wire), you can take a standard one and reduce the diameter to suit your application. You will have to calibrate it, but you'd probably need to do that with a stock one too. As part of this, you could integrate a better device for creating laminar flow, which would make the readings more accurate.

[jd74914]

The Omega stuff is nice (and actually relatively inexpensive in comparison to its competition). No flow meters like that are really designed for extreme transient operation. If you notice it also has a 40 second stabilization time. We would use flow meters like that where I work (a lot of gas metering is done) as sanity checks.

In my humble opinion (after spending a large amount of time researching flow meters for work) your best bet is getting something a bit too large off a car or as Damon suggested, re-bodying a standard sized one. The recalibration should not be too difficult a procedure if you have access to some other device that can meter air.

James

[JamesWolak]

We have a flow bench so calibration shouldn't be that bad. It is really looking like we are going to have to use one that is oversized.