Electric water pumps are a part of a growing number of newer vehicles with high efficiency engines. With the launch of our
e-Cool™ water pumps, Gates was already responding to this trend a couple of years ago. But vehicles obviously continue to evolve, and so do we. That is why we are proud to announce that, putting our years of OE expertise in building electric water pumps to good use, we have now expanded our water pump range to include no fewer than sixteen new part numbers. Read on to find out what that means for our market coverage, how these new electric water pumps will fit into our systems approach as well as into our hybridization strategy.
Gates e-Cool™ water pump.
16 new part numbers and an optimized pricing
First of all, with our sixteen new electric water pumps we cover still more vehicles running in Belgium and the rest of Europe. The expansion of our range has even given us leading coverage amongst all suppliers of electric water pumps in the market. We have also optimized our pricing, to be completely in line with the market – so you can benefit from a competitive offer in this respect, too. Lastly, we have reengineered some water pumps to solve known issues in their OE equivalents. For instance, the OE component of a leading German car manufacturer frequently failed in the first twenty to thirty thousand kilometers already. Together with our partner, we redesigned the after-market equivalent of that electric water pump so that it lasts much, much longer.
System coverage saves your customers money
Gates has always regarded different system components together in order to provide the best technical solution. Take our synchronous belt drive system kits and accessory belt drive kits, for instance. They tackle the problem from a systems standpoint: all components work perfectly together, giving the best value to the customer. Furthermore, Gates electric water pumps, unlike the majority of the electric water pumps in the market, have had their internal electronics designed to work in sync with the Car Electronic Control unit (ECU). This means they only switch on when asked to by the ECU, which increases fuel efficiency and extends the life of the cooling system. When it came to our new electric water pumps, we created an ecosystem analogous to those kits. More specifically, we made sure to include a bracket whenever the electric water pump in question needed it.
It is a best practice to change the bracket along with the water pump, because the mere act of taking out the bracket is likely to damage it. By providing both the water pump and the bracket in one package, Gates saves your customer money. After all, he or she is spared the trouble of returning to the shop when the damaged bracket gives out shortly after the water pump replacement, often at the first bump in the road. In addition, it saves you the trouble of ordering the bracket separately online (at the risk of not finding the right one in your country) and the inevitable delays that
come with it.
To give just one example of what the Gates system approach can save your customer: it takes approximately two hours to reinstall a bracket. If you charge 50 euros per hour, this obviously comes down to a labor cost of 100 euros. But then there’s also the additional expense of delivery and waiting, which we are assuming will be around 20 euros. The total cost you can save your customer in this scenario, by replacing the bracket along with the water pump, is
120 euros on average.
Gates diversifies into electric vehicle markets
Our new water pumps are part of a bigger portfolio for hybridization. Traditionally, Gates, as a company, has been focused on internal combustion engines (ICE). But because the European vehicle market is slowly but surely shifting towards hybrid and electric vehicles, we too are moving in that direction to continue to support the market and our customers. Our electric water pumps are an important part of this bigger strategy in terms of product portfolio, but so is our Electro-mechanical Drive (EMD) system, for instance, which allows the incorporation of an EMD system in an engine without modifying the current production drive pulleys or accessories, thus saving costs to convert a vehicle
into a mild-hybrid.
In short, if you want to be prepared, going with Gates is the smart move to make!