I have had the opportunity to work for Chris at B1 Racing for about a year now. Observing Chris’ business practices, customer satisfaction is top priority. Chris spends the time with his customers to ensure that the work that is done is RIGHT for the customer’s needs and budget.
Every pump that goes through B1 Racing is cleaned and inspected. On assembly, EVERY clearance is checked and brought within the appropriate limit. Up until two years ago when I met Chris, I thought I had a pretty good handle on what it takes to make a jet boat perform. Like my other passion of cylinder head port flow, I realized that the more I learn about the topic, the more I realize I really don’t know.
I think that it is important to explore exactly what “brought within the appropriate limit” means. No two pumps, from what I could tell, are done exactly the same way. Sometimes this is influenced by customer. Always, this is influenced by the performance level of the boat.
Based on the question of the OP, “How much to blue print a pump for max performance?”, assuming that this is a max effort application involving detail work of the bowl, impeller, etc.; lowest price is not the driving factor. For example, several factors, including horsepower, will influence the shape of the trailing edge of the fins in the bowl. It is these factors that I have been trying to wrap my head around. There is a lot more to “blueprinting” a pump than just setting the clearances. It is the engineering behind any design that sets the work on anything apart. On the topic of this engineering, Chris told me, “I did the development work, I did the machine work, I had the seat time, and I collected and analyzed the data. It is this experience that I think sets B1 Racing apart. Chris is an honest businessman and an industry innovator. You will not be disappointed in his work.
Re: John Mills
I recently had the opportunity to meet John Mills. He is a wealth of knowledge and an exceptionally nice guy. John was actually my first choice for pump work as he has done several for my pumps for my friends Sloan and Joe Bateman; however he was unavailable at the time. I have not been able to see much of his work but I know Joe and Sloan ran real hard. Rob and John were kind enough to share much of the work on the Red Pearl as it was going together and John freely shared a lot of his knowledge with me. Though I still don’t understand the inner contouring design and its effects, John’s work looks very meticulous and looking around John’s shop, it is very evident that a lot of heart and soul goes into all of his work.
Re: Jack at MPD
Jack at MPD is who I chose to do buy my parts from and detail my impeller. Internet search after search led me back to one place, MPD. If you spend any time lurking this forum like I have, Jack’s reputation precedes him. Jack was very good about working with me as I was going to do most of the work myself. He spent a lot of time with me, making sure that I understood all of the clearances as well as understanding all of the work that he was doing. In fact, Jack was the first person, in the performance industry, that didn’t make me feel like I was wasting his time for spending less than $100K at one time.
In conclusion to my lengthy cheerleading rant, anybody spending any time reading about performance engines has at least leaned (hopefully) that a performance engine package needs to work together as a system. Something seemingly as simple as a jet pump is part of a much more complex system which needs to work as part of and compliment that system. There is really a lot of work involved in detailing a bowl and an impeller. The revenue earned from performing the detail work does not really justify doing the work. It is comparable to porting cylinder heads. Keep in mind that there is nothing that can’t be done cheaper by sacrificing quality. Flow benches for jet pumps simply do not exist like those for cylinder heads, so it is not possible to compare pumps from different shops by flow number.
Choose a pump shop that will address your needs and build you a pump that is matched to your application. It is possible that your existing pump may not get you to the performance level that you are looking for, however the performance of any pump can be improved with substantial results that you will feel and see in your time slip. How much money you will spend depends on how crazy you get with work done and parts. The old saying, “Speed costs money. How fast do you want to go?” comes to mind.
Cheers,
Joe