08 Aug Dyno-mite!
Today is all about the dyno. And that’s never a bad thing.
First up, before we started strapping cars to the dyno this week, we went through a bit of belated spring cleaning. In the process of replacing a bad bolt on the dyno, we figured it was right about time to clean the thing up, seeing as how we’d be taking it apart anyway. By early morning, the dyno had already been disassembled down to the bare rollers and bearings. A few warning signs here and there didn’t deter us from our goal of making sure the dyno was in tip-top shape, though. Electricity? Ha! Like that ever killed anybody. Also, to back up what we’ve said all along in regards to a car “climbing” onto the front roller of the dyno, here’s a shot or two showing that the front rollers are, in fact, the only rollers connected to the dyno computer that measures tractive effort.
After some thorough power-washing and hand-cleaning (for the parts we couldn’t take outside to power wash), we had the dyno reassembled and ready to accept its first run of the week, which we’d also filmed!
Today’s video is a quick one that we filmed just this week. Earlier in August, a customer had purchased this C6 Z06 Corvette, which came with a few modifications. The issue was thus; the tune on the Corvette’s ECU was not built for the camshaft that it contained, and as a result was having running issues like crazy. It was dying out, surging and running very roughly; it was an incredibly difficult vehicle to drive, nonetheless enjoy.
And that’s where we came in; after realizing that the tune needed to complement the camshafts, we set down to write a proper big-cam tune for this vehicle. It was already making ridiculous amounts of power, and it still is, so our only focus was on drivability. As you can see from the videos, it runs great and still makes crazy power. We didn’t include a dyno graph, but it’s currently putting down 460-470 horsepower to the rear wheels, a far cry from the 505bhp on the Z06 badge. A couple test drives produced the following word more often than not — crazy. All in all, we were pleased with the re-tune, and the customer stated that his car is now “100% better,” so it looks like everything came up Milhouse in this situation!
By the way, if you’re unfamiliar with the construction of a dyno, it’s built so that the wheels that make power rest inbetween two rollers, front and rear. The rear rollers are not connected to the dyno’s computer, and therefore are not part of measuring the tractive effort (which the dyno’s computer turns into torque, then converts to horsepower). By slacking the straps such that the wheels rise onto the frontmost roller only, you’re effectively transferring all the vehicle’s tractive effort to the dyno’s computer without any parasitic loss to the rear roller. It helps to maintain accuracy in power measurement.
If you think your car could benefit from a re-tune, don’t hesitate to strike up a conversation with us via e-mail, and we’ll see if there’s anything we can do for you! Shoot a query to [email protected] to get started! For now, though, let’s watch that video!
If you think that’s all we’ve been up to on the dyno this week, you’re definitely mistaken. Big things are coming from this piece of machinery, or rather what’s strapped onto it, so look out for even more video coming in the near future!
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