Tony D
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Posts posted by Tony D
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With a proper induction setup, 400HP will be available at 15 psi, no need for 'high boost', especially if you plan on camming and porting it to get it to run into the 7500 rpm range.
I would concentrate on making the engine like an N/A port wise, with a cam to match your rpm requirements, then select a turbo with flow capabilities for the HP, and run as little boost as you need to get the power you want.
JeffP is running 380HP at 8.39psi. That was before Methanol Injection. Power gobs to 7500rpms.
This is a FAR better solution for a track car than the 'Corky Bell Boost it till it blows' paradigm.
Coatings are insurance, but so is extra fuel. Tuning will be critical as with any boosted motor, loose fuel partially under boost and it doesn't matter what you have in there, it's going to blow.
IMHO, I'd run a stock Nissan Head Gasket and let it be the safety valve. Blowing a head gasket sucks, but 2 hours and a new gasket same day (between sessions trackside) sure as hell beats saying you got the whiz-bang special gasket and five pistons with sunken rings and watching the rest of the weekend go by...
Then again, a stock L28ET bottom end would make 400HP at only slightly more boost (say 18-20 instead of 13-15) if you swapped the head trackside and did a shortblock exchange to keep it going during the track weekend....
I digress...
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I just installed these seats in a 71 240Z using the stock Miata Brackets on the Z's floor directly (seat rails were removed to get the seats lower by PO.)
Basically, the Miata Seatback is 500mm wide, so using a centerline of 250 as a starting point, you can 'center' and 'get them straight' with a line. Using the stock Miata Brackets the REAR holes need to be 160mm forward of where the 240 Floor makes it's little 45 degree upward bend. This will allow the Miata Seats to fully go back as far as possible. Since the rails are pretty long, getting 'close enough' to the wheel is not an issue, even with the seats all the way back like this.
I made a template of the Miata Seat Bracket Holes (Had to pound the front of the bracket flat-they were about 15 degree angled) before making the template. Got centerline between the holes, lined up that centerline mark with the one I put on the Z's floor, and centered seat, and one that doesn't angle off in some ***** direction.
The brackets on the miata ARE DIFFERENT LEFT AND RIGHT! You need to make a template for EACH seat, you can not simply 'flop' the template for a mirror image hole setup.
They fit fine on the floor like that, and if you are like me with a helmet on the roof is a tad scratchy... so dropping the seats so you have a full hand's width between the roof and your head (in a helmet) is nice.
I used the Miata Brackets as that's what I had to work with. If the PO of the car hadn't tossed the original Z Brackets I probably would have set them on the stock sliders. But then I wouldn't have found the solution to my headroom with a helmet problem!
Nice PDF, I'm sending that to people who ask now...
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Kinda like having a 'proven track record'.... Don't be bitter you haven't done anything they feel is noteworthy, it's just the way it is. I think Alan is making some good points as well. There are a lot of things you simply misunderstand, and therefore place blame wrongly.
That is what I meant by you needing to grow up. Blaming someone without all the information is foolish. Usually that passes with experience and time. Mostly time.
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I wouldn't go back to the EFI setup, I'd just convert what I had to use EFI, remove the chokes, and go. Everything exists to do that you just need injector bungs someplace, and a fuel rail...
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Oh, I just wanted to make sure I read it right, so then, with your latest quote you REITERATED that you said the following:
"I would only sell to well known and successful people to protect my work."
Who was it mentioning hipocrasy in this thread again?
"You have to be big enough to be published in some of their magazines"---you mean like feature articles, or simply one of the many recurrent faces in feature articles? I guess I'm famous there then. I didn't realize it was so hard.
Josh, you really need to grow up.
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If you are running carbs, you don't need a working starter. No manual car needs a working starter!
I worked repo for a time when in my late teens and early 20's. I didn't have a flatbed to tow them away and when the bank gives you the keys it makes it pretty quick work. This was all pre-alarm prevalence. But on older cars we would have to do it 'the old fashioned way' and jack the column to unlock the wheel to be able to drive it away.
The thing that would stop me was when it cranked but didn't start. The LAST thing you want to do is sit outside someones house GRrrrRRRrrrRRRrrrRRRING! GRrrrRRRrrrRRRrrrRRRING! GRrrrRRRrrrRRRrrrRRRING!
People wake up. And in Michigan, those people have shotguns. It is not a good thing to have a car that cranks but doesn't fire. They tend to wake up the deadbeats from their acohol-induced slumber (got money for the beer, but not the car payment...or dental care from what I remember, but I digress...) People get p.o. when you take their car, even if they are deadbeats and not paying for it.
I thank my lucky stars most of the work I did was on GM cars and I had the key provided from the service desk. To this day I don't think most of the people in the little town I lived in knew I was the guy that 'took back' their car!
All this blather is just revolving around my 'take the rotor out' ---- the one time I got shot at was by a car that didn't start, and for the life of me the ONLY thing I can figure is he pulled a wire to the HEI Dizzy, because it cranked, the coil is integral, but it just wouldn't fire off. It was like a blues song: Boom Boom Boom Boom!
So from a semi-retired reposessor, taking that rotor out is quick and clean and leaves nothing seen!
The removable steering wheel is a nice touch, I was considering getting one for my Shark-Car because of cage access issues, I never thought of taking the wheel inside the house with me at night. Put it at full lock and then take the wheel---sweet!Had two punks break the window on my 260 some years back---the door was unlocked. These people aren't mental giants. Just throw up a shadow and most of them will jump it. The determined guys will roll it some place on a flatbed. Determined amatuers will roll it to the end of the block to work on it if they really want it. But when you can't park in a secure garage there's really little you can do. How many of you arm the car alarm when it's parked in the garage? There were guys out here in LA taking cars (BMW's mostly, because they were giving a 3-Series or a Boat with the purchase of a new home there for a while...) by using one of those UHF frequency grabbers, and then opening the garage doors at night. Guys would go up to an unalarmed car, have plenty of time to start it, and just roll away into the night.
The deterrent you don't use....isn't a deterrent!
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If we are talking about a stock head, it's a no brainer: get another one.
If we are talking about a $3000 custom head, I'd still run the hell away from the guy as he's likely to kill the head as fix it... No reputable shop with L-Head Experience would say they can only straighten it to 0.007"! That is 0.001" inside MAXIMUM ALLOWABLE TOLERANCE!
That means your block has to be DEAD FLAT NO DEVIATION WHATSOEVER.
Get what I'm saying about this guy? He's missing the big picture here, in an attempt to get the business. You will have to live with his shortcuts. I'd not go there, I'd go someplace else (if you want THIS head).
If you can get another head, that may be easier.
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In Japan those places are simply names in the telephone book. Okamura tells me I was VERY close to Kameari's office when I was in my exclusion-hell of the Kawagoe Dai-Ichi Hotel over last Thanksgiving.
They are advertizing in the USA due to migrant population and demand. They have their price, and they don't make bones about it. That's the way it is in Japan.
If you want to deal with the Japanese, you have to start acting like them. They don't know me from Adam, but I know how to properly introduce myself in a respectful and culturally proper way when there.
It's like anything else: Deal with an Intermediary (Distributor) and you will get a bad taste in your mouth. That is what my JOB entails, going all over Asia putting out reputational fires caused by Distributors who handle our product. It's what I've done since 1994 as a matter of fact. Unless you are dealing with them DIRECTLY you takes your chances.
And you never answered the question asked: if you were in their shoes, knowing your reputation in a new emerging market could be totally TRASHED by ONE young guy who's quick to fly to the internet and blab how terribly this or that product performed....would YOU sell to him? Or would you sell to someone you have a relationship with, who knows to come to you directly for support and assistance/guidance.
You are doing this crap all 'lone wolf' and they know it. You have no credibility with them, you are, frankly a BIG risk to sell to, and by not selling to you the payoff likely will be less damage than if they DID sell to you and something went wrong that you blamed on them.
Trust me, I SEE THIS EVERY DAY WHERE I WORK! Someone blames our product for being crap. Then I get there, and write up a 23 page report on items that are contained and spelled out in OUR INSTALLATION MANUAL which were NOT FOLLOWED.
So then who's fault is it? Our 'piece of crap product' or the idiot who installed it wrong? End result is the same, a lot of people saying our stuff doesn't work---but it's not our fault we have idiots for customers sometimes (or that our customers hire idiot engineering companies to incompetently handle our installations!)
You are not entitled to buy something if you have the money. It is the sellers perogative to not sell to you, not answer your questions, and to generally be an ass if he so chooses. But you haven't talked to the horses' mouth....have you? But a piece of advice here: Build up a reputation built on SUCCESS first. Till you have a proven track record, there is more potential downside to dealing with you than upside!
Remember the guys who ran early Competition Datsuns with the most success weren't guys with teenagers running the show, they were established racing teams with proven track records!
Hell, I've talked with people on the phone who wouldn't give me the time of day. I gave them a list of things to go check out....and next thing you know I'm having hour long telephone conversations with people I've only read about in magazines.
If you think getting the cold shoulder is a big deal, it has to be because your young. I'm 45 and people still give me the cold shoulder...but I can back up what I'm proposing to do with a proven track record. You don't command respect simply by existing. Nobody does. You EARN respect by your actions and track record. If you have none, don't be surprised when nobody takes you seriously, or gives you any second look. It's the way it is. Better learn to deal with it. Another bit of advice: whining about how terrible they are for not giving you the time of day doesn't glean any alms from them later on, either!
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" I get 12.9 afr at idle and cruze and pretty much every where."
11.1---omy GAWD! Talk about RICH! No wonder you don't have an coughs, you are WAY down on power running that fat. Matter of fact, you are bordering on blowing sooty black smoke out the tailpipe. Terribly inefficient.
Like I said, run it rich and you will never see anything. At idle with EFI I am running 13.2, at 1500 I'm running closed-loop maximum of 14.7, if not closer to 15.3:1. By 2000 in and up to around 3000 if in negative territory below 75kpa, I'm running closer to 17:1 AFR.
Not a hiccup, sneeze, or cough. No surging. Hammerdown and the thing transitions to boost and my AFR goes to 12.2 instantly, up to around 4300 rpms where the fueling pulls back to around 13.8. The difference between my carbs at 5000 rpms and 12.3 AFR, and my EFI at 13.8 AFR is around 28HP, with a corresponding lengthening of the torque curve further up the RPM range.
Try to do THAT with a Carb. I tried for two years solid and countless dyno hours. Won't happen. Talked with the best in the business and even they said "Go to EFI".
When the transient popping at light cruise between 75 kpa and roughly 2psi of positive plenum pressure would NOT desist that was it, I took Corky's "Better" box off, realized I was better off with my home-made HKS replica, and decided to start buying parts for proper period correct EFI for my car. It took a decade before I found all the correct parts. While Ben may have a close approximation of the original Devil Z in his car, I have the engine parts to make the last Akio Build from the first movie... HKS Plenum, HKS ITB's... Oh, and some other goodies. In the interim I spent my time learning EFI by building my own megasquirt and going that route. Once you do it and drive it, you quickly ask yourself why you tolerated the irksome habits of the Carbs for as long as you did!
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"I don't have an egt or iat guage either."
Read what I wrote, something about 'instrumenting that engine up and seeing what is really going on... Jetting fat will cover a bunch of maladies, it always has... It's not 'right' either. Put a WBO2 AFR gauge on there and start driving around to see where you're at and you will be amazed what you find. Having an EGT shot with a skin temperature gun during a dyno run and finding 850 on the turbine housing is not what I would call 'correct air-fuel management instrumentation'...most people agree that these days EGT is about the LEAST reliable 'quick check' of AFR or fueling. It gives you an 'idea' but really is not telling you much! EGT needs to be in the stream, near the valve to be useful. T I T and T O T are measures of work being done by the turbine, and not much else. They for sure aren't an "OK" of the car and it's AFR status. And like I said, a Dyno run is anomalous to running the car on the trailer for a drag strip weekend. If you aren't driving it daily, the 75% functional correctness may seem more like 100%!
Run around at 12:1 all the time and you won't have 'sneezes'...and you will get 12-17mpg. Jet the carb properly for AFR's like it should have and you start realizing the limitations of the controlled vacuum leak! Try getting 25+mpg out of a carbed turbo on an L-6 and you start realizing the limitations of the fueling choice pretty quickly. If I can get 28mpg on my N/A motor, why can't I get close to that on the Turbo Motor? Because the carb is a comprimise, you have to jet up more than N/A optimal to keep it from self detonation and death under boost. It's a fact of life, no way around it (unless perhaps you have Dellorto DHLA 45M's....)
But this is always the reply: "My carb runs fine"---and 40 years ago most people thought that as well. But as instrumentation makes it's way to home hobby-builders, eventually you will find how deluded you reall were!
My Thermoquad ran great on the old turbo Corvair, so what if it puffed a little black smoke now and again... If you don't hear a problem, does one exist?
Answer in some people's minds is "If they don't know about it, then no!" I do not ascribe to that theory. As much as you love your setups, don't delude yourself into buying your own lies to yourself. Instrumentation makes liars of us all eventually. But if you never set it up and check, you never find out what the REAL deal is inside the engine!
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Lighter flywheel helps in drag racing style starts, but in drag racing you want the extra mass for inertia to keep from bogging. Catch-22 Yossarian.
If you are road racing, light flywheel is better. Tomei makes a nice 9# unit which gives wicked-quick response compared to the similar weighted CrMoly HKS unit long since out of production.
9# is a misnomer, really, as that damn pressure plate will add another 24# on top of that!
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I remember one of my mentors throwing spark plugs and the errant nut at your head when you did something stupid. With a thick German accent he would say "Vast is you, un idiot? Do you not tink? Vas ist in your head ven you tink to say such a sthupid ting?"
Getting doinked in the head with a nut now and again got me THINKING a lot more, and talking a lot less. (It also got my peripheral vision acute, with a neck like a chicken to bob my head side to side or duck quickly to preserve my scalp's integrity--and saved me on more than one occasion from taking a shot to the head as someone nearby let fly of soemthing under spring tension or with pressure behind it..."to all good things there is a purpose" those old men, they knew what they were doing, even if you never realized it!)
I guess Shedding is the P.C. quivalent of getting a spark plug thrown at you by your teacher from across the shop bay. There is a reason they gave the connotation they did to 'Stern Taskmaster'...
Sometimes, I wish we could go back to the old ways... just for a little while. I got plenty of nuts and plugs and gawd knows I've wanted to use them now and again. When is it my turn?
I say, when is it my turn???
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My daily driver average was 17, with track usage around 5 mpg.
With EFI, daily driving was closer to 27, with track usage around 5 mpg.
Ben is already hitting on the technical items I got into with daily driving and 'livability'---the car runs great on carbs, and if you are in a temperate climate pretty darned well. But once you start instrumenting the thing and realize 'perfect' is not what you have and start going after it....then it becomes frustration X10!
Don't get me wrong. I would say 75% of the time in daily driving, the Carb Blow Through Turbo (Triple Mikuinis was my preferance over the draw throughs I had previously done) worked great. But when you realized the 25% of the time it didn't was irksome on a long trip, or on a cold morning, or on a HOT day you start working at it.
If I only drove the car on a weekend to a track event, or trailered it to a drag strip on the weekend, I would say it worked fine 99% of the time.
But the realization is (like when you start tuning EFI) is that 85% of your time is spent NOT on boost and many times it's in a vague area around "0" manifold vacuum with very small throttle openings getting the AFR to run well at 2500 and 35% throttle, and have the same drivability at 3500 at similar transitional throttle plate movements gets a bit maddening.
If the car is a weekend driver, blowthrough carb is quick and dirty and easily will net you HP if you have the turbo that will flow the air. You may never notice or get to the point of annoyance that daily driving at 60mph with a persistent 'cough' from the box when you are steady state going up a sliiiight grade on the way to work every day of the week. But do it every day, and you start to say "I got to fix this, it's bugging me for far too long"...
While MPG is nice, not having that niggling "cough" anywhere really is nice!
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the rules are pretty fair, but you cant mess with freedom of speech. if i have a problem or concern i should beable to talk about here on hybridz(only if its about z's).
OMFG did he ACTUALLY make that statement? What is he, like 16???
Someone wasn't reading closely. What was that one passage in the T&C?
You want 'free speech' start your own forum. See how far it goes.
That statement befits the screen name chosen at least.
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Additionally it is IMPERATIVE to use the proper ground reference.
Probe the headlights with the common wire to chassis ground and you will get an interesting result! And I don't know how many 'pros' I see do that and start wanting to rip out wires and run new ones!
I will second what KTM said: connections and backshells in connections.
Though the 260 and 280Z are known for poor butt-splices in the harness itself. This usually is manifested in a 'no crank' situation easily remedied by installation of a bypassing relay from an old 6V Ford Truck. Lets full battery voltage go from the B+ to the Solenoid "S" terminal directly. Functions down to a voltage of 3VDC before the Ford Relay has an issue pulling in!
What speficifally is your issue? Poor Running can be many things.
I've not found a harness yet that wasn't easier to rehabilitate with new connectors and spot repairs than a total rewire. That is a job and a half. You don't want to do that. Take it from me!
If you do, color code it, and or wire mark the HELL out of it. And ANY modifications you make: WRITE IT DOWN!
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Yes, and I appreciate that someone noticed my pains at time exposure with supplemental fill flash to get a semi-frozen fanblade on the alternator.
It's an L-Engine on a Dyno, what's there to show?
Muahahahaha! I have revealed FAR too much already.
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Been there, done that, went EFI. EFI is not as hard a learning curve as you would think.
No moreso than Carbs. Anybody saying 'carbs are easy' needs to talk with someone who really set up one of these to get good drivability and not just WOT performance. Jetting, tip-in of secondaries, metering rods, pressure seals, gas leaks under boost.
It can be done, but when you realize the stock electronics can be replaced simply by a $400 box you buy off the internet and you basically have the ability to go from there to 350HP with little more than upgraded injectors, why re-engineer what is already working in the car?
Skip the internal rebuild, there are at least three people on this thread making 300+HP on stock N/A internals. One of them for over 20 years now (and that number is closer to 350 in his case.)
It's the EXTERNALS that will net you the power. THEN the head and cam. and if you decide you want to go over 400HP, THEN start thinking about internals. Up to that point, you're wasting your time and money on internal modifications.
If you don't have a turbo to support 350HP, you won't make it, period. If you don't have fuel to make 350HP, you won't make it, you'll BREAK it!
Regardless of the internals.
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Yep, even borewater take a while to cook off the soda...
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Yes, refusing to concede they may have a valuable point in their core market is just to way to go. After all, they only go where they were by selling selling selling worldwide, didn't they?
Oh, waitaminit, who is seeking out whom here?
Wonder why?
Bonneville doesn't come into this as much as you want it to, my example of the stock bodies car is simply being ignored either through ignorance, or the realization that a 0.465Cd car with 20+ sq ft frontal area might have a tad more HP than one would care to admit.
And yes, Mickey Thompson did so poorly based on his unrespectable performance at Bonneville. Great Example.
Remember,I'm not the one selling parts here. I have no interest in selling my parts. You can ask me for my profiles and I will tell you the same thing: Bugger Off.
I guess that makes me a bad guy too. Or maybe it means I'm interested in somthing more than money with the things I do mechanically on the car.
There is more to life than money.
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Isky does make VG Cams, it's back to a volume/market thing. Don't waste the ink on a dead engine.
Development proceeds on the other item. It will not be made public for reasons floating around on other related threads. Suffice to say if you want something done, you buck up your money and quit whining...get-er done.
Thing is, if you don't have access to people with experience in this field, likely the development will be nothing more than idle chat on an interweb site. Money is only one facet of getting the development done. That is in the implementation stage of the work. Ideas and thinking outside the box (or as said before, knowing which applications from which to glean applicable bits of technology) are what has to be implemented before the cam is actually ground. Profile selected, ramp rates and etc decided upon, springs... What about a cam with 'stock' specs as you read the cam card...but produces 10, 15, 20% more horsepower? What about a big cam with idle vacuum like a stocker? All it takes is the right approach and a willing cam grinder who knows his business.
Oh, as to different ratio arms, remember that was a big thing in the pushrod set. You change the rocker profile you have to redesign the opening/closing ramp rates to take advantage of the different ratio. You can bolt rocker arms on a VW, for instance and get a power bump, but do it on a hot cam and you run into float problems because the ramp doesn't accomodate for the radically different valve acceleration rate with the new rockers. With Direct Tappet on Bucket designs lift is limited by physical clearance from cam centerline to valve seal and spring binding point. Without complex machining, higher lifts are not possible. Now, if you want to do some spring pocket machining....you can get more lift!
Just a graphical aid for this '400HP' discussion. Remember, those guys went 163... like I said, 'do the math' before lauding a stripper big bore drag engine to something that withstands the kind of punishment top speed trials put on an engine:
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"Sparks hit the nail on the head. Having neighbors with goats, ugly as hell chain link fences, poorly cut, if cut at all, lawns, cars sitting on the lawn going nowhere, boarded up windows in the garage, what have you, is a MASSIVE eye sore. (Those examples are not directed at you, BTW)."
What's wrong with the occasional Goat mowing the lawn? And chain link fences are the only thing that works against roving packs of dogs...
But what works best is Sea Containers in the back yard to keep it all locked up tight and dry!
My $80K SoCal Doublewide is worth far more now than when I bought it, my profit will be the same as someone in an HOA whose price of admission for their postage stamp lot and minimcmansion was 4 or 5X that and who's appreciation, while looking good on paper still only nets them $400K when they sell.
All the while they burned $3200 a month instead of $900 a month. NOBODY lives in those houses for retirement. They sell them and move downmarket. All that fancy crap does is soak your pocketbook for the 20 or so years you pay for it till you sell and move where you WANT to be.
I prefer instead to spend the difference on Lakefront Property back East (second home for less than 2/3 the price of one 'fancy' one here in SoCal protected by an HOA...
Though recently some HOA's been getting sued due to radically dropping property values. Seems a sows ear really IS a sow's ear, no matter what CCR's come imprinted on it!
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"Personally speaking though, I still hold on the regards to if you make very few sales per year, you better cherish the opportunity to grab a customer whenever you can regardless of how I phrase my email or call"
From the Seller's Point of View: Not if the guy is an incompetent boob who will use your part in a misapplied way, then trash the results all around ruining your reputation.
Is this YOUR case Josh? Who knows? Would YOU take the chance at your reputation being smeared by just ONE incompetent person not getting the results they wanted and then started badmouthing the product you KNOW works IF APPLIED CORRECTLY?
OS Gikken sells their heads (reference the SEMA Thread) but you got to buck up $100,000K for the engine that goes under it as well. Why? Same reason: we put our name on it, we won't leave it to you to muck it up and blame us.
Be offended or don't, I don't care. You just don't get it, this is NOT a volume business, it's a reputation business. One joker out there can ruin it for your operation. Prudent conservatorship of a business knows when to refuse service. Not giving the store away enmasse to try to make a volume margin profit.
Sadly, your attitude is endemic of American-Educated Business Majors: Sell Sell Sell.Sell at all costs. Never consider some sales aren't worth the negatives they present.
In Japan, the model for doing business is different, and there is a reason there are shops around still doing this stuff 20+ years after the last engine went off the production line.
Selling is not a panacea. Ask GM / Chrysler what happens when you base your business cash flows on continued volume sales...
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I already informed the hapless honkeys who left my place last Saturday without a lock set about the auction. They need what you got, now if they can only figure out how to work a computer....
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I just had a 45 foot High Cube container dropped in my back yard. What do you think the Homeowners Association would say about that?
Oh, I don't have one...
Sucks to be you. Join the military, then you can have regular lawn inspections as well.
I knew a guy who parked his truck OUTSIDE the housing complex on the street, and WALKED to his house, because he wasn't allowed to park cars in the driveway, only in the garage. But it was a three car garage, but you could only have TWO cars. He liked the rules. He said it helped keep the property values up. I think he stayed within the lines as well, because he knew 'the lines are our friends'...
Been there, done that. Never again!
The removable steering wheel is a nice touch, I was considering getting one for my Shark-Car because of cage access issues, I never thought of taking the wheel inside the house with me at night. Put it at full lock and then take the wheel---sweet!
Feel of HP & Torque
in Nissan L6 Forum
Posted
Oh, we got sooooo close, I think Braap got the closest saying 'lower gears in the butt'---what we are talking about here is a butt-dyno feeling. Everyone worked around it, but in the end it's subjective and most of the time dreadfully wrong.
My classic example was a Fairlady Z I picked up which had 40mm DCOE Webers, a Header, loud exhaust, worn shocks out back with stock springs. Car felt fast as heck! I mean, back end squatting (who said soft springs?), real 'snap your head back launches'. Made all the right sensory stimulations to feel quicker than quick.
When dynoed it had (gasp) 86 RWHP. It's 1/4 mile time was in the high 16, low 17 second range. Sounded great, everybody who was in it thought it was pretty snappy.
Pulled all the go-fast goodies off it, replaced the stock EFI, did basic cleanup and the car felt slower. It was now dynoing at 147HP, wasn't running pig rich, wasn't loud with the extra muffler installed in the tranny tunnel, but dropped it's 1/4 mile times to consistent 15.50's---a solid second + faster in the 1/4 mile. But with the new Tokikos in the back, it didn't feel faster than it did before!
I think the best answer was to put a G-Tech or some such device in it, and actually see what your car is doing as opposed to [/i]feeling[/i] it.
In the world of performance, the highly subjective butt-dyno is very misleading. Having a turbo car that starts slipping the wheels when you romp on it at 65mph in 3rd gear actually feels like it's falling on it's face...until you see the haze in the rearview mirror.
When it catches...lookout!
Low gears, soft suspension settings, and a bump in torque somewhat will give the impression of speed without actually going fast. For everyone who rode in the car and drove it, to a man every single one thought I had 'tamed it down' after the EFI and mods to the springs/shocks out back. The dyno (and actual dyno, not the Butt Dyno) and track times said otherwise! Beware the Butt Dyno, the correction factor is never what you think it is!