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Shane T on Mastering Boost, 2000+ HP 4 Cylinders, Ekanoo 2JZ, and Tuning Secrets
Shane T on Mastering Boost, 2000+ HP 4 Cylinders, Ekanoo 2JZ, and Tuning Secrets
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About this episode
Shane T shares his extensive experience in automotive tuning, focusing on high-performance builds like the 2000+ HP SR20 and the legendary Ekanoo 2JZ. He discusses tuning secrets, the importance of air density, and the intricacies of managing boost and fuel systems. Shane emphasizes the collaborative nature of tuning, the significance of proper engine management systems like MoTeC, and the evolution of tuning techniques over the years. His insights into the racing industry and the engineering behind powerful builds make for an engaging listen, especially for those interested in the technical aspects of automotive performance.
Topics:
high horsepower builds
tuning secrets
air density
boost management
fuel systems
MoTeC
SR20
2JZ
collaborative tuning
racing industry insights
In todays episode we sit with Shane Tecklenburg who his insights on making huge power with boost, from 2000+ HP 4 cylinders to the legendary Ekanoo 2JZ. He also breaks down tuning strategies and tips that help unlock maximum performance.
Shane T. Official Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/tunedbyshanet
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Welcome back to another episode of the Street Alpha Podcast. I'm your host, Tuques,
and today we are at Bradenton Motor Sports Park, a week before FB2K,
and we have the pleasure of sitting with Shane T.
Now, this has been highly requested for about probably the past year or so.
I think I spoke to you maybe a year ago on Instagram, reached out to you to do a podcast,
and it's just been super tough to get schedules aligned, but we're finally here.
Now, before we start, I do want to give a huge shout out to Victor for making this happen.
He allowed us to make this podcast happen here, literally as of last night at 11 p.m.
Yeah, like 11 p.m. We're looking for a venue where...
because I'm here for the offshore race in Greerwater, which is the west side,
and you're from basically the east side, so we're trying to find a way to meet somewhere in the middle.
Somewhere in the middle, yeah.
And I think, you know what, maybe let me message Victor real quick and see if we could do it at the track somewhere.
So, literally at 10.45 last night, you know the story, obviously, and I'm just telling it for everyone else's benefit.
And I message him, and he responds, and he's like,
because I said, can we do it at your shop, possibly, or maybe at the track?
And he's like, well, don't come to my shop because I don't want you at my shop right now with what's going on over there.
So, you go to the racetrack, you can either use my race shop, or you can use the tower.
And I'm like, well, which one's got air conditioning?
He's like, the tower.
So, we'll use the tower then.
Yeah.
So, he offered it up, and you know what, that goes to your point earlier about contacts, right?
Mm-hmm.
What's really amazing about the racing industry is it's actually relatively small.
But, dude, when people go out of their way like that to help you in your situation,
and Victor, and it's like, that's why you've got to kind of like pay it forward, right?
100%.
So, but it's just, it's really cool.
Super huge shout out to Victor, and as you said, induction performance,
and obviously Braden in Motorsports Park for hosting us.
Yeah, Victor always looks out.
In the last year, you know, I had a booth here last year.
I'm not sure if I'm going to have a booth here this year because my car is not ready yet,
and that's every car guy story, right?
Thank God it's not my fault this time.
It's all right to be on this side of it.
Either way, we have Shane T.
Now, Shane T. has been tuning for probably over, what, two decades now?
20 years, probably?
Yeah, I start, well, yeah, I started professionally in 2001,
but I was tinkering with my own stuff, I mean, from pretty much the point
when I could pick up a screwdriver.
Right, so 20 years of tuning though.
20 years of professionally, I started in 2001.
Right.
So we're 24 years, almost 25.
Yeah, 24 years.
A long, a long time.
So he's been tuning before, like, what we have now.
We have luxury, we have all these ECUs that are doing cool stuff,
and you probably weren't, didn't have all those things back then.
So the very first, well, yeah.
I don't know how far back on the story or when you want to start this,
but I actually built my own ECU when I was 16, 14, 15, 16.
I didn't even know that, I'm not going to lie.
Oh, yeah, so I didn't do it myself.
So let's just cut that to the chase of that.
One of the guys that worked for my dad was like an EE,
an electronics engineer.
And I built this go-kart, and I used to bring a Straton engine.
I went to the SWAT mean I bought like a little scooter, basically.
Okay.
And I took it all apart and turned it into a go-kart.
I welded the chassis up as long as 14.
So I welded the chassis up, put the scooter together.
I used like literal push scooter front wheels and handbrakes off a bike,
like for front brakes.
And then put this little brakes and Straton engine on the back of it.
And I drove it around.
So that was the summer when I was 14.
I did that.
Maybe it took me a month or I don't remember what,
but I went and drove it around for like five minutes.
Okay.
And then I'm like, this is a slow hunk of shit.
I need to make it faster.
Well, we had all these parts also in the shop.
And I saw this smog pump laying on the shelf.
So it's a little air pump that pumps air into the exhaust,
like on a 70s, 60s, 70s and 80s streetcar to help with emissions.
So I'm looking at it and I'm like,
it looks like a little supercharger to me.
So then I thought, I wonder if I could adapt it.
So that's what I did.
I set out to adapt it onto my go-kart, my Briggs and Straton engine.
Well, I don't know if you've ever played around with a Briggs and Straton engine,
but the carburetor is like, yeah.
So the carburetor is, look, it's meant for two things,
like rabbit and turtle.
Right?
It's not meant for supercharging and, you know, transients.
So I put the supercharger on it and of course it won't run worth a shit.
And there's a guy down the street that does quarter-majored engines.
And he's like, oh man, you're never going to get it to work that way.
You need the carburetor on the front of the supercharger.
So here's a little carburetor that we use on our quarter-majored engines,
mounted on the front of the supercharger and do it that way.
It's like, okay.
So I changed it around to that.
And that was, that was way better.
It would run, but it would have a huge hesitation.
Like when you went after the throttle,
it would like stumble like crazy and then blow black smoke
and then it would finally take off and go.
So I was trying to get the carburetor to work right
and one of the guys that works for my dad, Jeff Ellis,
he comes over one day and he's like, hey, you know,
why don't you put electronic fuel injection on that?
It would make it run a lot better.
And I'm like, okay, what's electronic fuel injection?
So he's like, oh, here, let me show you.
It gets an injector and he's like, look,
if this is an injector and fuel goes in here
and then it comes out of there.
So why don't you get this mounted in the intake manifold?
And here's a little Bosch fuel pump and a regulator
and the fuel comes into this and out there to the regulator
and then back to the tank.
So you need a little tank and the injector goes in the middle.
Get all that rigged up on your go-kart
and I'll come over later this afternoon and after work
and we can build a little circuit that can trigger off
of the points and fire that injector.
So I'm like, oh, great, sounds awesome.
So like two years later,
we're still trying to get this to run.
By now, I've gotten rid of the go-kart.
I mount the engine on a stand.
We've got the supercharger.
Him, me, and my dad are spending hours on this engine
because it evolved into full ignition control.
We're using a DIS coil pack, had twin spark plugs.
I welded the cylinder head up
and put a second spark plug in the top of the head.
I mean, dude, it just goes on and on.
I welded the camshaft up.
I bought another engine and I took the camshaft out of that
when welded the lobes up with a stick arc welder
and then ground them on the bench grinder by hand.
I put so much lift in that the valve hit the head
and then I just ground the cam down
until the valve didn't hit the head anymore
and then just put it in.
And it was nasty.
Things sounded like a Harley, right?
And so anyway, so the fuel injection part of it,
we ended up with a photo-OPTIQ crank trigger
because we could not figure out
how to get the noise from the ignition
to not interrupt the signal going into this.
So this computer we built,
it really wasn't a computer,
it was a 5.5.5 timer circuit
and it had two adjustments on it,
two screwdriver adjustments,
one for idle and one for off idle
and then it had a switch that told it
when the throttle was closed
so it would switch to the idle circuit
and then go to the not idle circuit
when you open the throttle.
So yeah, we ran this thing on 100% nitromethane,
built our own circuit boards for it,
hand assembled all this stuff
and yeah, so that was my start
when tuning and EFI was when I was 14, 15, 16.
Well, I'm sure that start
is a lot more than most people would have.
Well, so I get this all the time.
People are like, man, how do I,
where can I go to school to learn what you learn?
I'm like, you can go,
there's lots of schools you can go to,
I can recommend them.
Like, right, HP Academy
and obviously Ben Strader, EFI University.
But you're not going to be able to know what I know
because I've been doing this
since I was 15 years old, right?
This is how I know.
When I started at MoTeC,
I realized like I'm doing what I'm meant to do
because every skill I had developed
leading into that,
I was using to great effect, right?
So I know I'm doing what I'm meant to be doing
on this planet other than being a dad,
which is the new thing.
It's own set of challenges,
but also super rewarding.
Just so people know, right?
Because that was a fantastic intro
into how you got started, right?
Interesting, really interesting story.
It's all bullshit.
I made it up just now.
Really?
Yeah, yeah.
It's all AI.
So you,
just so people know who you are.
Like, you have been involved
with several different pro mods over the years, right?
Sure.
High horsepower, four cylinders, right?
SR20.
Still record holding?
SR20 or at the time it was?
No, it's not.
No, because they've outdone it.
They've been 580s now with the Hondas.
Oh, look, it might be a record.
Maybe an SR it might be.
I mean, look,
I'm pretty sure the same car
that I just did a couple weeks in Australia
so I'm fairly sure that's the most
anyone's ever made with one.
So 2000 plus horsepower
and SR20.
2175 at the wheels.
Right.
So SR20,
six cylinder,
you had Econu,
you were involved with him as well.
Yes.
Which,
obviously even watching his videos.
We could spend a whole podcast on that, yeah.
So,
and there was a white Supra
that you were involved with?
Yeah, yeah,
that was the Econu car.
That viral video that you guys saw
probably,
I don't know how many years ago now
of that 2J ripping it down the track
was that car, right?
Yeah.
Well,
it didn't start out white.
The involvement with Econu
started
in 2000,
I think,
for
at bullish.
So George,
George and Ara,
Ara was the owner
and George was the tuner.
George and Ara split
and so George went and opened
his own shop or something like that
and Ara kept bullish open.
And
they needed a tuner for this car
that they had just finished
building,
which was this yellow street Supra
for
what turned out later to be Econu,
Ibrahim Canu.
So,
from Bahrain.
So anyway,
they told me,
look,
they hired me from Motec.
I flew out to bullish
and they said,
look, this is for this guy in Bahrain.
Means nothing.
I don't know where that is.
Ibrahim
and it's a street Supra
and blah, blah, blah,
whatever,
fine.
So we get it on the dyno
and it makes like,
I think,
if either 1,045
or 1,075 at the wheel,
which was
insane for that time.
And so I got it all done
and off it went to
Bahrain
and I never thought about it again.
Then I met two guys
that used to have to the twins,
twins Turbo.
So they used to have a TV show
called Super Tuner
and I met them because
they, in fact,
they worked for Vinny 10
and they moved to California.
Yeah,
to do some work in California.
So they moved out there,
opened their own shop
and then they got this TV show
and then they were building
a car for the show,
a Supra
and they want to put a Motec on it.
So they get a hold of Motec.
I worked at Motec
obviously in California,
which was maybe only
25 minutes away
from where their shop was.
Right.
And so they wanted to use a Motec
but they wanted to promote it
so they were like,
look, give us a discount on it
but we'll promote it heavily
when you guys come here
beyond our television show.
So my boss is like,
yeah, it's a good opportunity.
Let's get involved.
So they got the Motec parts,
wiring shop did the wiring harness
and then I came over the day
we're going to put it all together
and make it run.
So when I get there,
it is woefully
nowhere near being done.
Right.
I get there at like whatever noon
and this thing's like
knock out the engine in
and I mean, they're still assembling.
Right.
But they're doing it.
I can't remember what they must have been.
They must have had film days or something.
Like I don't know,
remember why there was a reason
why it had to be done super quick
or we could not just come back.
But anyway, it was like,
oh, shit, these guys don't need.
I can't use the laptop for hours.
Right.
But what I can do is use my hands
because I know how to work on cars too.
So then I just jump in the foray
with them and start thrashing
and we stay up all night
and get it done
and I don't leave, right?
Because the car's not done
and then we get it done in the morning,
do all the electronics, test, check,
fire it up, put it on the dyno
and run on the dyno.
So that was like,
then from that point on,
they're like, you're our guy.
We are only ever going to use you
to tune our cars
because no one's ever
put that level of dedication in.
Right.
Right.
And then I can't even remember
if the thing made it
to the television program or not.
But anyway, that was,
in fact,
But that was the start
of your involvement with them.
With them, yeah.
Because with the twins,
they're like, dude,
check out this Supra.
Look at the video of this Supra.
And there's this yellow Supra
in the Middle East,
you know, racing out in the desert
and like smoking,
well, it's probably GSXRs then
or maybe it was Hayabusa's.
But anyway, like,
it's just out running
and like crazy.
And we're like, dude,
that Supra's sick.
That thing's killer.
And you would see in the videos
on YouTube, like,
all these people wearing phobes
and, you know,
the Middle East garb
and they're like standing out
in the middle of the desert
on a freeway.
And they're like,
this thing's run through the crowd.
And it's like,
these guys are crazy, right?
Those videos are legendary, though.
Right?
Yeah.
All right.
So 2006 rolls around.
I get a call from someone in
Dubai.
Hey, we want you to come
to our shop.
We have a Supra
and we have all these hill climb cars
because that's kind of their motor sport
where there's climbing up sand dunes.
And we want you
and they all have Motec on them.
We want you to come and tune them.
And so we're going to do,
we're going to have race cars
and we're going to do racing.
And so you just move here
and we'll just,
you can get a house here
and you can live here.
Is this, are you for real?
Like this motherfucker
must be out of his mind.
I'm like, no, no,
I don't want to do that.
But they're like,
they call me several times
and every time they're
cutting the time frame down.
And so in 2006,
I quit working at Motec.
I'm now under contract
with Christian Rado, right?
For his,
for his front wheel drive drag car.
And I can't leave
because of my contract with him.
And I don't want to,
I'm not going to fuck
my contract up in the U.S.
to go play with some piece of shit
and I don't even know
where it is, right?
So, but every time they call me
and I say no,
they call back
and they keep raising the price,
right?
They keep running the number up.
So I think the last offer
was something like,
okay, we'll fly you first class.
We'll put you in a first class hotel.
We will limo you back
and forth from the hotel
to the dyno.
And we will pay you,
you'll leave on a Saturday
or you leave on Monday
and you'll come back on Sunday
and we'll pay you $10,000 cash.
And I'm like, listen,
it could be $100,000.
I don't have the fucking time,
right?
It's not going to work.
Fine.
They go away.
2007,
I'm at Test Days at Daytona,
actually with the IMSA team
I worked with that year.
Okay.
And I get a phone call
and it's George from Bullish
and he's like, hey,
remember the car you tuned
for the guy in Bahrain?
Yeah.
He bought our race car
and he's now got it in Bahrain.
He needs somebody to come over
and tune it.
They put an automatic in it.
Do you want to go do that?
Well, I'm thinking, okay.
So I have a better contract
in 2007 where I have more freedom.
Right.
So I'm like, yeah,
I could do it.
I haven't called me.
So he calls me and I'm like,
I just lay the same line of shit on him.
I'm like, I want first class.
I want fucking this much money
and you know,
I want to leave on this day
and come back on this day.
And I know that's crazy
and you're not going to do it.
So see you later.
And he's like, no, no, no,
that sounds fine.
When can you come?
Yeah.
So I'm getting married
at the end of January.
He wants me to come
like immediately after that.
So I do,
I get married
and like the next week
I go for 10 days to Bahrain
to tune this car.
They were trying to get the car to run
in the nine,
sorry, in the 10s.
Wow.
It went 9-12.
Damn.
So they were trying to go for 10s
in 1-9-12.
Yeah.
They went 9-12.
So they were like,
it almost went in the 8s.
Right.
Now they were trying to go in the 9s.
Sorry.
So they were trying to go
under 10 flat.
But that's how the hook got set.
So that's when I started
with Econu.
Interesting.
And I was happily working for them
and did way more than that.
We set multiple world records
with that team
and almost every category
we entered.
And that was an 11-year run
and that was fantastic.
And I can't thank those guys enough
for putting me basically
on the world global scene
and having the focus be on me
for the whole entire world.
That is awesome.
So what did that car run?
What was the fastest it went?
The drag car
or the street car?
The white drag car.
The white drag car
proper Supra with IRS
I think went 7-12.
7-12.
With IRS.
Maybe it might have been 17.
Somebody else might have went 12.
But then we switched
we took that car
and then switched it.
So by the way
there was multiple white Supras.
Yeah.
Right.
So the one got
so right around
when that thing became
I think it went 7-98
and right
and right around then
which I think was probably
2010 or 2009
he commissioned Titan
to build him
another Supra
that was basically
like would have been
like a promod Supra almost.
I mean it was
a three quarter chassis.
Yeah.
It was a proper Supra
like shell
right and then
they put a full tube
chassis inside of it.
It would have been called
a three quarter chassis.
But you know
Liberty clutch
I mean they basically
took the Titan format
that they were running
ADRL with
and kicking the shit
out of everybody with
and we turned it into
a Supra.
Yeah.
Right.
And the concept
with that was to have it
over there
and be able to run in the
sixes.
Well that car
was the first
five second import.
That ran 597
was that car.
It went
all the way from
we want to run the sixes
to now we're trying to run
in the fives.
So that's the
that's the first import
five second pass was that car.
Yeah.
And that was the white Supra
that's that's the car
I'm talking about.
Well so that
so the original car
was gray on its gray
or whatever that color is
and that's the one
I went over for in
2007
it was the second car
that Titan built
that was the first
in the fives
and they looked identical
but one and to be completely
honest like that
the original one
at one point
our goal
became to run in the sevens
and then our goal was
well I wonder if we could run
quick enough to beat
Titans number
which was 759.
Yeah.
So we had gotten to the
point where we were
right at the cusp of that
and we went 759
but the other car
had shown up
and one car
is an old car
and it's half stock
suspension shit
I mean it's not
a real race car
and then there's this
bitching thing
that we've just been
using
every piece of electronics
I wanted to use
and do all the
like most outlandish
crazy things
we had paddle shift in it
and program all of it
and do all this stuff
and have all these sensors
and all this data
and obviously it makes
a bunch of power
and it's methanol
and I mean it's
everything I want to do
and then there's this
other one that I'm like
I'm kind of bored with
and is not nearly as fun
Yeah.
So when the
new Supra shows up
and debuts
I'm like
fuck this thing
I'll just blow
this motherfucker up
so I don't have to work
with nitrous
and we would spool with one
and then switch to the other
and then turn it off
after the thing
made boost to make runs
so I'm like
well I'm just gonna leave it on
for like I don't know
three seconds
and see what happens
so I do
and it goes
744
and it's like
holy shit
okay
it's staying on the entire
way down the racetrack
and you know what else
it's getting the other one
all the way down the
racetrack
733
we made a jump
in fucking
two runs
from 759
744
and then it was like
okay now
I'm interested in that one again
what's interesting about that
and this will lead into your question
is
that I learned something there
which was really weird
they were the ones that wanted
to run two stages of nitrous
back when we started in like
2008
they wanted a 250 shot
and a 150 shot
I'm like
you are fucking
smoking crack
this thing is gonna blow up
all the time
there is no way
you're gonna run
a 150 shot
and a 250 shot
and not break it
no no no
you'll see everybody does it
it broke itself
all the fucking time
we would run like
I think we started out
with like
40 pounds of boost
you know and then
over time
we're running 50 pounds of boost
and then 60 pounds of boost
and then 7
because you keep putting
more turbo on it
turn it up
this is C16
right
this is the gasoline engine
and so you'd
spray it for little ways
down the racetrack
but eventually
the nitrous always
was a problem
and it would blow itself up
when the nitrous was on
and then when we got
the other car
with the clutch
and it's like
it breaks
running on methanol
right and then
you've got all this nitrous
and all these problems
and all this shit
and it always blows itself up
and so I learned
when I went to blow it up
intentionally
and it wouldn't blow up
because by then
we're running a 94
whatever it was
and a like
fucking 85 pounds of boost
what I learned was
counter-intuitively
it's actually safer
to run more nitrous
when you're using
more boost
because
if you look at it on
a percentage basis
let's just say it
very simply
let's imagine
we have an engine
that produces
1500 horsepower
with no nitrous
so you know
a 150 horsepower
shot on that
is a tiny percentage
of the total power
that the engine's making
based on nitrous oxide
now if we start
putting a
1500 horsepower
shot on it
half of the power
we're trying to make
is coming from nitrous
there's no way
that's gonna live
but the more you
dilute the nitrous
with air
the more nitrous
you run
before you get to that limit
you know
it's the same in pro-nitrous
this is why
pro-nitrous drag car engines
are almost a thousand
or some of them are
over a thousand cubic inches
because if it's a 632
you get to a limitation
where you start
trying to put enough nitrous in
where it just blows up
all the time
and the way to solve it
is make the engine bigger
because then
that same amount of nitrous
on a larger air volume
or air mass
is less
is less oxygen percentage
right
there's more
there's more oxygen
obviously because
there's more air as well
but if you dilute the nitrous
with air
it's the same as using
imagine using
like a 12 horsepower
shot on something
so how do you find the limits
of how much nitrous
you can run then
well you learn from
experience right
and every engine is different
but that's what's so amazing
about these little 6 cylinders
I mean
you have to spray them
when you use a converter
and not a clutch
to get them to drive
through the converters
so you can get them to
launch right
and the most dangerous time
is not when it's
making boost
and you're spraying
it's when you're spraying it
at 2,500 RPM
against the converter
and you only have
the displacement
of that little bitty engine
which at that RPM
let's just imagine a 2J
right
a 2J with no boost
at 2,500 RPM
probably makes
65 horsepower
and then you're going to
spray it with a
150 horsepower
shot of nitrous
that is way
way backwards
on the nitrous percentage
of horsepower
versus engine percentage
of horsepower
right
that's what you're saying
basically what your theory is
right
so you'll see
you'll see them always
like it's
half the time
they're backfire
shut off
like burn a fucking piston
do whatever damage
they're going to do
they're going to do it
right then
because you're making them
operate
in this way
unbalanced way
with the amount of nitrous
you're using
so back to what I was saying
counter-intuitively
the more boost
you can run
the more nitrous you can run
so to your point
that car you saw
that I was working on
that I think it made
2560
with no wheels
with no nitrous
when we sprayed it
with both units
that's where the ring gear
explodes
and it kills the converter
catch on fire
and everything that's
AI generated or whatever
so it made 2770
when it broke the flywheel
it would probably make
more than that
if we got a chance
to tune on it
but that was like
a 67 and a 72
it was probably
like about
100 and
no it was probably
more like
300 horsepower
with the nitrous
and that one
the other one
you saw
with the horsepower
with the nitrous
but I believe it
because
I think they run
107 pounds of boost
on that
so that engine
on its own
probably makes
I don't know
2800
so now you're
gonna only add
500 to 2800
that percentage
is tiny compared to
trying to add
1200 to 1200
see what I mean
you're far
further away
from the danger zone
when you add more air
since we're on the topic
of that
one of the things
that you had mentioned
in a previous
was
air density
right
and the importance of it
and how it can
lead to more power
right so
there's air density
and there's also
fuel density as well
which is important
which people don't really
speak about too often
but can you talk
about the importance
of air density
and how it plays
a role in making power
yeah I mean
air density
is key
you know in the end
so
what determines
the power output
of any engine
is its mass
flow rate
and mass
is the combination
of volume
which is what the
displacement of the engine
is volume
okay
and the density
of the air charge
that it's consuming
right so
density is
a combination
of air pressure
and air temperature
right
and water vapor
okay
so the best
density
is no water vapor
as cold as it
can possibly be
temperature wise
okay
and the highest possible
pressure
is the standard atmosphere
at sea level
where they consider
at mean sea level
not high tide
low tide whatever
there's a standard
which says
that the air density
at sea level
is 101.325 kPa
at a standard temperature
of 15 degrees C
or
59 degrees Fahrenheit
right
and so that's considered
1.0
if you want
or your reference
okay
so wherever you exist
on the earth
compared to that reference
gives you
a direct percentage
of the amount of power
the engine
any engine
will be capable
of making
under those conditions
okay
understood
so let's take
let's take the first example
you're going to go to
Pike's Peak
the top of Pike's Peak
is 14,115 feet
above sea level
right
okay
the air density there
is roughly 61%
of what it is
at sea level
when you compare
to that standard
sea level day
now listen obviously
at sea level
some days it's
atmospheric
changes
due to weather
that change
the barometric pressure
right a little bit
up and down
but that standard
101,325
and 15C
or 59F
is the standard
with dry air
okay
so then what happens
if you get
moisture in the air
like you have in Florida
the water vapor
raises
the pressure
of the air
the temperature
like lets the air
expand
so there's less
molecules
in any given volume
right
so
wet air
is less dense
another counterintuitive thing
wet air is less dense
than dry air
but it's because
water vapor
occupies something like
I don't know
a thousand times more
volume
than liquid vapor does
so when it's raining
it's like
oh it must be really humid
it's raining
no it's actually not that humid
because the rain
is concentrated in a big droplet
instead of being
vaporized
into little molecules
that push the oxygen
out of the way
right
okay that's it
so anyway
back to pike speak
so
you're at 61%
of the density
that you would have at sea level
so what that means
if you take a thousand horsepower
engine at sea level
right and go to the top of pike
speak
if it's tuned
exactly the same
right so you don't let the
mixture change
because the air density is lower
you do a good job there
because you got a good ECU
right with the right compensation
in it
and you run the correct amount
of ignition timing
that it requires
at that pressure
right
that engine
makes 610 horsepower
up there
right
tuned in perfectly
it makes even less than that
right
but that's
so that's the struggle
and so that's exactly how it works
in every engine
it doesn't matter what engine it is
because they all
they all run under the same
laws of physics
right
you don't have to believe me
you can go argue with Newton
right
so
so then it comes down to
the engine's capability
or power capability
is going to be dependent on how much
of that air
it can effectively move through itself
over a given amount of time
mass flow
right
so we take
a given volume
which is the fixed displacement
swept volume of the cylinder
okay
and how much air
can we actually process through it
so an engine
is actually a volume flow device
it doesn't guarantee
that it flows the same mass
every cycle
when you pull air in
and if
because you have restrictions
like ports
and things like it takes longer
when you have the engine
revved up
there's less time to get air in
right
so you have all these things
that affect its efficiency
right
so
we did the math
without running the engine
it would be very simple to say
we have
we know what one cubic foot
of air
weighs at sea level
right
and we know the displacement
that this engine
can sweep through itself
and if we assume
that the engine's a perfect pump
there's no inefficiencies
then it's literally just
the weight
of the air
that the engine
displaces
there's its air mass
right
okay
so we know that
now we're trying to mix fuel
in proportion
to the air mass
by the fuel mass
right
so it's very simple
like we'll use an easy term
everyone knows
it's going to be gasoline
right
so stoic on gasoline
is 14.7
that means
we require
to completely combust
one pound of
fuel
we need 14.7 pounds
of air
right
so
and we want it in that proportion
14.7 to 1
so if we
have a known mass
of air
the volume displacement
of the engine
being perfect
and we know
what the air density is
we know exactly
the amount of air
we're using
we can then easily
do the same thing
for the fuel
what's the temperature
of the fuel
what's the density
of the fuel
and once we know
the density
we want to mix
it a 14.7
to 1 mass
we know
what the fuel
density is
so therefore
we can easily
calculate the fuel
volume we require
to get that
mass
I don't think anyone's
ever broken it down that way
but I feel like I'm in school
right now
I like this
it's been a while
so I feel like I should
be taking notes
again AI I just made it up
so now
fuel
these fuel pumps
draw a lot of amperage
right
and they can
especially with a lot
of power
making now
it's 85
and so on
so with these
fuel pumps
drawing a lot of amperage
wouldn't that lead
to more heat
technically
so look
this is like
one of my pet
for lack of a better term
standing get fucked policy
on anybody
who's trying to make
more than about a thousand
horsepower
with an engine
and trying to use
an electric pump to do that
because the amount
of mass
fuel flow that you need
and at the
because typically
things making more than a
thousand horsepower
or something boosted
it could be something big
that makes almost
a thousand horsepower
could be normally aspirated
which maybe wouldn't be a
problem but
anything making
more than a thousand
horsepower would be
highly boosted
right
and so then you're going
to be requiring a lot
of pressure
right fuel pressure
in order to keep up
with that boost
and so
the more pressure
you make a fuel pump
make
the more current
it draws to be able
to make that pressure
and so the first
problem is
you're like
fucking drawing
50 amps out of
your electronic
system which
you're trying
or the battery
which your
electronic system
is requiring to
fire the ignition
pumps that are
capable of making
actually capable now
not advertised
because all of them
are advertised to do it
but not many will
actually do it
it just doesn't make
any sense not to use
a mechanical pump
I mean so you
put a small
primer pump on it
run a mechanical off
the engine
and now with a
mechanical pump
because it's
a positive displacement
it requires
I don't know
whatever three
horsepower
six horsepower
to make
whatever pressure
you said
so instead
you let your alternator
draw 50
50
or 60 horsepower
out
smoke all the wires
trying to charge the
battery with
so you can see
like this is starting
to get me a little bit
heated right
like I cannot
literally
okay and so
the only
actual pumps
that will do
that job
correctly
are
and it's actually
really not about the
pump
I mean it is
the pumps
got to be
controller that they spent
literally like
Paul look dude
we needed this 10 years ago
and you talked about it
10 years ago
and it's like
just barely
out in the market
even with that though
don't you still have to run
a high fuel pressure
100%
but you have
a controller
and a pump
that's actually capable
of delivering the volume
because it monitors
basically pump speed
and keeps the
pump speed up
anything that's not
monitored and controlled
the more you load it
in other words
the more pressure
you try to make
the slower
it's trying to keep up
but it can't
well this thing revs
the pump up to a
specific RPM
and holds it there
so the volume never
changes
it's a closed loop system
and that's why it works
and that's why it's
so expensive
now back on this
on this density situation
right now
that was just on
the electrical side
there's
draw right
so now
what about on the
mechanical side
when you have
pressure
goes back to the same
thing again
like you have
a mechanical
fuel pump
it's hooked to the engine
so it revs up
with engine speed
and it revs down
with engine speed
so when you're
at an idle
it's turning the slowest
it can possibly turn
and it's volume
that it's delivering
is the least amount
it'll ever be
so you're cycling
from the tank
to the engine
into the pump
and returning back
maybe two gallons
a minute
because your engine
only requires
a tenth of a gallon
a minute to idle
I'm just making up numbers
okay now
when you rev
the engine up
and you make
volume
but the fuel pump
speeds up
in proportion to the engine
so the volume goes up
now the demand
and the requirement
match
or the supply
and the demand match
so now it's moving
eight gallons a minute
but you're only doing it
while you're making
that power
now when you run
a standard electric pump
that just runs as fast
as it can run
as soon as you
put power to it
whatever its maximum
capacity is
it's always
moving that volume
through the system
it's going up to the engine
and turning around
and coming back to the tank
now listen
on a drag race car
or a Bonneville car
that doesn't matter
but in a sports car
or any endurance thing
that's running or a street car
if you just
go out there
and turn your fuel pump on
and let it run
the tank will get hot
I mean it's just how it works
did you ever put your hand
on the outlet of the compressor
I'm sure everyone has
and burned your hand on it
because when you compress
things they get hot
which is the whole problem
with the air density
side of it
on the boost side
the supply supercharger
is so shitty
compared to a turbo
because a turbo is far
more effective
at making high pressure
than a compressor is
a roots compressor
right
so is it safe to say
that you technically should
on an endurance vehicle
right
should maybe run a dead head
set up
as opposed to
no the problem with dead head
is you end up with
with air in the line
I mean undoubtedly
you end up with air in the line
because if it doesn't hold
pressure on that dead head system
when you turn the car off
the heat so
vaporizes the fuel
because it gets too hot
and it boils
so it literally
just turns into foam
and then it won't start
any kind of high performance
thing I would never run
a dead head system on
the great part of a return
system is it'll pump
all that fucking air out
and put it back in the tank
also it's the air thing
yeah it's more of an air thing
there's also problems
when you start trying to use
big volumes on a dead head
system
of pulsations in the rail
that aren't damped out
because they're on the end
of this fucking stove pipe
that just lets
the pressure spike
all over the place
I mean luckily
no one puts a pressure
sensor in there
that's fast enough to read it
and logs it fast enough
to know or else
it's gonna be in our lives
ever
because it's super scary
so okay
so when do you
recommend a dead head setup
because a lot of 5G applications
don't they come
dead head somewhere?
I don't care
if they've done it that way
they've done it because
they can save money
doing it that way
packaging
yeah
the OEMs
unless it's a performance
look I don't even know
maybe a factory GTR
has that
and that's fine
somebody's engineered
that to work correctly
but most of the stuff
that comes from an OEM
is done
on either because
they have to do it
because some dick
penny pincher
that sits in the back room
that never comes out
and they feed pizzas
under the door to
says wow
if we just go to a dead head
system
we can save $12
on every car we build
and since we build millions
of cars
this is a way better
way to go
forget all the problems
it's gonna cause
because all he's concerned
with is how do we save
money
right
so then it's gonna be
like here
engineer the right system
to do the job
and then
okay now do it cheaper
now do it cheaper
now take some shit off
even if there's gonna be
cars that we have to fix
it'll still
we'll still make more money
fixing the ones that fuck up
than putting the right shit
on to do it
correctly
so now
this is just a little theory
cause you said air right
now if you have a dead head
set up
it's the regulator
is pretty much just feeding
the fuel to the rails
and then it's not returning
it's just feeding
whatever needs to go
to the rails
into the engine
so wouldn't that
make it cooler
because you're only using
the amount of fuel
that's in the rail
hang on
you're making a mistake
you're assuming
to the engine
that you're not using
the same amount of fuel
but think about what I said
about the pump
now I'll give you this
for sure running fuel
up into your engine
compartment
around the intake manifold
and back to the engine
sorry back to the fuel tank
we'll put more heat
in the system
than only letting it
go to the engine
the fuel that actually
goes in the engine
it's gonna be every bit
as half
on a thermal side
but here's the key
unless the pump
speed
is varied
in proportion to the
demand
you still have
the same problem
pressing it sorry
now Paul's gonna
be fucking laughing
because I said
you could compress the liquid
but what I mean is
you're gonna build
heat into the fuel
by pressurizing it
and puke it right back
into the tank
through the regulator
so that you can have
your stove pipe
go into the engine
and let it heat up
on the way to the engine
but that way
the pressure is constant
from where the pump is
and it's just going
around in a circle
in the tank
so that is
gonna generate less heat
than sending it up
to the engine
and letting it heat
up there
so if it runs at max output
which any pump
you hook power and ground to
that just takes off
and isn't speed regulated
that's what it does
so if it doesn't run the pump
in proportion
to what the demand is
you're putting excess heat
in all the time
the pump's running
interesting
and they don't put pump
controllers on most cars
from the factory
guess why because
it costs too much
just hook 12 volts
to the pump
let it run all the time
and it's just
sort of part of it
but they're also
not trying to make
2500 horsepower
and drive on the street
so if you're trying
to make
if you're running those numbers
right
a lot of injectors
are based off of
43.5 psi
that's the base fuel pressure
we could say
wouldn't you run
at that base fuel pressure
and then just
increase the size of injectors
no because
there's not enough
injectors on the market
to be able to get
one for every
single application
so what you do
is you get one
that covers
the maximum
flow rate that your engine
is gonna require
so if you're gonna
have a 2000 horsepower engine
you clearly
no matter what fuel you pick
you gotta have 2000 horsepower
with the fuel capacity
correct
and that starts at the tank
right how the pickup works
the pump you use
the lines you use
how many 90 degree bends
you put in
how many fucking hardware
store fittings you put in
that have
you know have a quarter inch
hole in the middle of them
even though they're a number 8 fitting
right how much shit
you buy off of ebay
that has junk
fucking fittings
and restrictions
and all that junk in it
right so you have an
efficiency of a fuel
supply circuit
and return circuit
all of that has to
match your power demand
right and then you have to
have injectors
with an EFI system
you typically need
because you're always
returning right
yeah so you need to have
enough capacity
that you have about 25%
of the fuel volume
always returning
to the tank
so if I have
1000 horsepower engine
I need to have a
1250 horsepower capable
fuel supply system
right so that I never
get to the point
where I'm fuel starved
right and all of those
things I talked about
in the way
cause a problem
which you don't even
really usually know about
it's totally obvious
but you don't even
really know about it
until you get
to the car
and you can see
what amount of power
it's trying to use
to deliver fuel
to the engine
and when it's trying
to deliver
a massive amount of power
to run the pump
and there's no demand
from the engine
it's telling you
that your fuel system
is a piece of shit
with a bunch of 90s
and Chinese knockoff
Amazon fittings
and all of that shit
in it
so anyway
getting back to the other
part of the equation
the fuel demand
that the engine
requires has to be matched
by every other piece
of the system
and then you need
injectors
that have a little reserve
capacity over what
you're asking for
cause you don't want
to run those wide open
but there's not enough
injectors on the market
to fit every single
one of those applications
so you oversize
the injector
you have two choices
you either
undersize the injector
and then over
pressure the injector
to get the
because if you
increase the pressure
on the injector
you get an increase
in flow rate
by the square root
of the pressure
differential
so you can take
an injector
and run
and be a little bit
over and just raise
the fuel pressure
and that fixes
the problem
for the injector
but it creates
a whole new problem
for the fuel system
because the fuel system
now has to be able
to deliver
increased pressure
and with increased
pressure with anything
other than a mechanical pump
or an ID controlled pump
increased fuel pressure
puts more load
on the pump
which drives
the pump speed down
which means
the volume goes down
so a pump
that is not
speed controlled
its output
this is obvious right
you put your finger
over the end of it
and block it entirely
there is a ton of pressure
and zero volume
flow
because you've got it
blocked
so it's just building
pressure against your thumb
like at the end
of the garden hose right
and if you turn
the hose down enough
you can seal it off
completely with your thumb
there is no water flowing
pull your thumb out of the way
it flows like crazy
give it no resistance right
that's how it works
it's really
literally that simple
but everybody
falls in the trap
and look
this is part of my
whole
tech
I mean there's a number
of reasons I like to use it
but one of the main reasons
is because no one ever buys
motec
because it's the cheapest
solution
they usually buy it
because they think
it's the best solution
now whether they're right
about that
or they're wrong about that
a person with that mentality
maintains that same mentality
from the front bumper
to the rear bumper
of their car
they go find the best
parts they can find
they go
find the best guy
there is to
put the engine together
the best guy to do
the transmission
they go to a project
with someone that's trying to do it
the best way they know how
if you see something like
hey that fuel pump
is a fucking piece of shit
we need to use this other one
instead they go
oh okay and they just get it
right so those people
are the kind of people
that you can be successful with
not because you're using
motec
but because the entire
system
just like the fuel system
the entire car is a system
right so that entire
system
when it works
in harmony
you can be successful
now
it's also
in my opinion
the same the opposite direction
people who buy
the least expensive
ecu
they have that same mentality
from the front bumper
to the rear bumper
and they go by
the cheapest
amazon knock off
chinese fucking parts
to put the car together
go find the cheapest
motherfucker that'll bolt
the engine together
and you have in the end
a pile of shit
that I don't know
it doesn't make any difference
what fucking engine
management system
you try to run
you'll never get it to work
it's a
never ending fucking
supply of problems
and listen
any race car
that's what a race car
is a race car
is literally
a series of problems
to solve
but when
you do this
long enough
at least somewhat
proficiently
you learn all the traps
to fall in
and that's why people
go to people
with experience
that have big names
that have been doing it
for a long time
because you don't get
to have a big name
and be doing
anything for a long time
if you suck at it
right
and not sucking
means
you've fallen
in every fucking trap
you could possibly
fall in enough times
not falling them again
and that's literally
my philosophy on life
because it doesn't matter
what
like
what genre
or what
what area
you're talking about
it's the same
experience matters
okay
so
you primarily work
with Motec
that's all you work with
and clearly you just stated
why
the reason I work with
Motec
is because
in my business
people are mostly
looking for me
I've unfortunately
made myself
the product
and so
that's why
we can't even get a schedule together
right
because I'm constantly spinning
places and running everywhere
because I'm selling myself
I'm selling my life
so
they want me
involved with their project
because of what I'm
able to
deliver
and
of course
I started at Motec
right
and I have deep background
with Motec
and I understand it
very well
and also
the people that buy
Motec
and they want the best
typically have
the money to spend
and then
tuning Motec
when I tell May
I need $1500 a day
to make this work
on the dyno
and they're like
yeah of course no problem
versus
man are you serious
my ECU costs half that
why would I pay you 15
because guess what
I still have to fucking know
everything I know now
to make your shit box
ECU
it'll never work
because all the junk
you have around it
and then
they don't want to pay it
so anyway
but Motec is just the tool
right so
someone comes to me
and says
hey I want to set
a world record
doing this
and if you want me
involved with it
I'm gonna use this tool
that I know
I can achieve the result
you're looking for
if I use this tool
you know
you don't go to Gordon Ramsey
right
and say
Gordon I want your best steak
and then show up
with a bunch of ingredients
and say
yeah you gotta cook it
on this fucking grill
over here
and I want you to use
this piece of meat
it's like
get fuck
no I'm not doing that
I can't
you're not
it's a waste of my time
in your money
you're not gonna get
the best result out of me
Jerry Bickel
and say Bickel
I want the best pro-mod
you can build
but I want you to use
this fucking
Harbor Freight welder
and all this shit
from Harbor Freight
the billy's gonna say
go no get fucked
hey Harbor Freight's
not bad though man
listen
I buy shit from
Harbor Freight
look it's one thing
for me to say this
right to the industry
and I'm really good
at telling everybody
else what they
should be doing
but I fall in
the same trap
as everybody else
does
I'm a human being
I buy the
the Mitsubishi one
is 3500 bucks
and the who the fuck
knows whatever
Chinese brand name one
is 350 bucks
like
at what point in your life
have you ever
gotten something
that costs
a tenth
of what it should cost
that actually does
what the thing
it's being compared to
does
which almost leads itself
right back into the
whole Motec
and compared to every other
ECU thing right
like well we do everything
Motec does for less
like no you don't
we can both agree that
it is one of the best
it's at the top
of the food chain
right
of components
and it's there because
it's a bunch of
highly motivated people
who are focused
97% on quality
I just went to the factory
again after like 20 years
and I guess
at some point I had
just assumed that the stuff
was being produced
and manufactured somewhere
no
every single piece
that you get
that has a Motec label
on it
and assembled
at the factory
in Australia
by like 5 or 6 guys
that's what they do
they build electronics
and every single piece
they'll get the motherboard
there is a manufacturer
for that right
but it comes in
it gets tested
then it gets
fitted into its case
it gets tested
every single step
of the process
that they do
it gets tested
and that's part of why
it costs so much
because you have to keep
going through all this
effort while you're
assembling it
checking it
if it's wrong with it
so they can be
and then it gets tested again
before it gets shipped out
and then it goes to
a dealer
but you never ever ever
I mean I've been doing this
24 years
and I worked at Motec
for 5 or those years
4 anyway
and like I'm telling you
the number of times
we had a dead on arrival
Motec anything
I'm not even sure
I can remember one
I'm not just
blowing smoke
I'm telling you
you never get one that's
dead on arrival
because it's been checked
100 fucking times
you're paying for
you're paying for
that level of quality
that QC
there are other ECUs
of course
you can have someone
bone in a fucking sweat shop
in China
or fucking Brazil
or wherever
you know kids that
fucking don't even know
what they're assembling
and next week
they're going to be
digging ditches
and they don't give
two shits about your
ECU or running a car
they're just
trying to get paid
to feed their family
like you can have
that person
assembling the stuff
you're going to put
in your fucking
$100,000 race car
is to produce
high quality
right
and 100%
functional
pieces of equipment
just like the Mitsubishi
versus the
knockoff XYZ
Chinese knockoff TVs
that I
fall in the exact same
trapping in my own life
really good at telling
everybody else what to do
not so good at
following my own logic
right
so okay
so now
if you
want to
work with Shane
right
what would that look
like if you
wanted to
or if I wanted you
to work on my car
do you ask me questions
do you have to
qualify to work with you
like
no it's super
it's a super simple
and it's just for general people
if they want to
yeah of course
I get this a lot
and I'm not sure why
but people
I feel like they're
afraid to contact me
or afraid like
oh I can't get Shane
man he's
like too high level
or what
I'll work on anything
I don't care what it is
if we've got a
Motec on it
if you want to put it
on a lawnmower
no problem
you want to build
a sprinkler system
for your backyard
like
I have a drag racing background
right
but when I got to Motec
I couldn't be like
no I'm only going to
work on drag race cars
I had to work on
anything that anybody
wanted to have
an engine management
system on
whether it was a bike
a car
a plane
a boat
off-road
off-shore
drag race
land speed
sports cars
pick a subject
right
anything
professional level team
guy doing in his
backyard
sand rail for
glamorous street car
I learned how to do
lots of different things
and see things
that would happen
in one genre of motorsport
that I could use
to solve a problem
in another genre of motorsport
that no one had ever thought of
because they never
had been exposed
to this
thing
whatever it was
so back to
what does it take to work with me
it takes
getting in contact
with me
telling me
what your project is
and what your goal is
and then I'll tell you
the best way
we can go about
solving that
problem
of getting to your goal
and then
I'll tell you how much
it's going to cost
so you know up front
and then you can make a decision
and you'll be like
either I want to do that
or wow that's way more than
I thought it would be
but I'm pretty quick
I'm a really bad salesman
I mean I don't want to
waste my time
or yours
so
normally speaking
when someone calls me
cold calls me and says
hey I want to do this project
you know what
am I looking at
I'll run the numbers
in my head for what they
want to do
when I kind of get
what they're supposed to do
say it's going to
probably be
I don't know
if we're going to put a PDM
it's probably going to be
at about 40-45 grand
so do you still want to
talk about it
or should we just
stop now
because I don't waste my time
talking you into
all the benefits
of Motec
only to have you
tell me at the end
when I tell you how much it is
go what are you crazy
I would never pay that
and hang the fucking phone up
I went through way too
many of those calls
when I worked at Motec
so I just cut
right to the chase
here's what it's going to cost
do we keep talking about it
or no
because if I tell you 45
right
and you don't
shit your pants
and fall back in it
there's no conversation
about it
because you're going to be
that doesn't
like blow you out of the water
right
so that's it
like I said
I'm a terrible salesman
so now on average
what does it cost
for you to
to work on a car
or to work with somebody
tuning wise
so my daily tuning
rate is just
1500 bucks a day
plus expenses
airfare
hotel rental car
plus the travel expense
days right
so I charge for
out of office days
okay
and that's
I have a couple
of different programs
I mean
when I worked with
speed demon
that's george paid
that rate
and then I worked
only on that car
and so that was
just the known deal
right
but like now
I'm not working
with speed demon
after george passed away
and so I'm working
on multiple
like how I was
before I worked
on speed demon
I got multiple customers
well you're
not going to be able
to charge those guys
1500 a day
times three
or four of them
like that's not
going to happen
so what you have
is where everyone pays
the expenses to get me there
okay
because the other thing
about bonneville is
this is not
it's not professional
in that
it's not a professionally
promoted series
where people are dedicated
to only doing that
and they don't do any
other job
it's more of a
grassroots
sort of racing
right
it is professionally
done
as far as the quality
right and the way
they race
but there's
almost no one
whose job it is
to strictly work
on a bonneville car
all year long
right
so
that's not
the level
of clientele
that you can
you know charge that
amount of money for
and they just can't
afford to do it
they'll just basically
say well we're going to
go run it ourselves
and then they won't
be successful
so you spread the level
around a little bit
at bonneville
special case
but I mean look
it's
it could a little bit
be case by
case basis
if someone calls me
and I'm busy
they're either
going to get told
you got to wait
waiting me
right
like hey
if I'm buying parts
from somebody
when am I going to get
these parts
I'll have them
two and three weeks
okay cool
are you sure
like if someone's
shipping the parts
that's parts on a shelf
right
right
but if someone's
building something
like a wiring harness
a wiring harness
for a car
with almost
any contractor
is at least
probably going to be
a six week
waiting period
for anybody
that's quality
they're already building
two or three
and they got a couple
right now
as soon as I can fit you in
is
I'll get you your harness
in six weeks
because I got to finish
the ones I'm doing
get you on the schedule
do the design
build it
and then ship it
build it
test it
and ship it hopefully
so those kind of guys
it's like
look
am I going to have it
in six weeks
or is it going to be
12
I don't give a fuck
if it's 12
just tell me it's
12
and tell me how much
and bullshit
I can't stand that
and I never do that
I will always
I would rather
just not do the project
I would rather tell you
listen dude
you're this going to
take 65 grand
you want to do it or not
yeah I want to do it
and then we'll lay out
the actual number
that it's really going to
take
right and I will try
to adhere to
either that number
or I'll inflate it
a little bit
so that we come in
under
I never ever
I cannot fucking
stand
going back at the
now listen
in the middle
well then
that's a change order
right so that
you know this
but the same deal
like what we can do that
but man
you're going to
we just built all this stuff
you're going to
okay but
the way I work
super simple
I'm just going to tell you
up front
what I'm going to do
for you
and in return
I expect you
to do what you say
you're going to do
for me
it's a very simple
back and forth
process
and that's why
look dude
I don't
have very few in 20
so let's see
2006 I guess I'm at
19 years
yeah
19 years
sorry I was told
there would be no math
19 years in business
and I've had only a
handful of people that
have stiffed me
you know
it happens
because you basically
qualify the customer
right off the bell
like you just
and you know
I've had a couple of
situations where
I get in
I don't read it
right
and I get in the
middle of it
I realize
this isn't going to
but I realize that
I'm not going to be able
to achieve the goal
they want to achieve
because they're
doing something
they're not allowing me
the freedom
to do whatever
I want
and I'll just back out
and say listen
I think I'm not your guy
and I don't
I don't want to cause
any problems
so I'm just going to
give your money back
and we'll agree to
go two different
directions whatever
and I've done that
a couple of times
and the couple of
times I've done it
that person
has recommended
someone to me
that I ended up
actually being successful with
because I
took that approach
and they appreciated it
and they said
you know what
this didn't work out
with this guy
but he's a really good guy
and he's capable
I recommend
and honestly look
I don't advertise
like that's
that's what
like this
this is the only advertising
I do other than
word of mouth
and no matter what
you do
you cannot fucking
spend enough money
to build credibility
the way you can
by a
personal recommendation
from someone you trust
that's true
hey where do I go
to get this done
you need to call this guy
yep
he's badass at it
and that's it
this is the guy to go to
so now
that person
is pre-qualified to you
by the person
you trust who gave you the advice
that's the best way
to do business
100%
I think it's better than
just advertising
depends what you're doing
right
what you're selling
what I'm doing is
just a service basically
there's almost nothing
I'm telling you
there is nothing better
than a word of mouth
100%
like over any other
like other
type of marketing
or anything like that
that's the best way to do it
now
you mentioned your prices right
cool
the reason I asked that
is not to be nosy
and see how much you're making
it was more so because
there's a lot of
I don't want to say misconceptions
but
a lot of people have this thing
there's things that go around the internet
about how much it costs
to tune a mo-tech
and how much
tuners charge for this
sure
now
I've heard some crazy prices
which kind of
steers people away from
even wanting to get a mo-tech
because of the tuning prices
right
what do you feel
like these prices
equate to the amount of work
that you're doing
with a mo-tech
to be fair
I'm probably on the
on the cheap side of it
okay
in reality
but mostly that's because
I'm not just
I don't just
tune
right
almost everything I'm involved
with is a big project
so I'm selling
hardware
I don't get in the middle
of the wiring harness
just let that happen
because I don't want to be
in the middle of it
like here's the guy
get the wiring harness
done by him
I'll feed him what I want
I don't want to be in the middle
I'm not going to make any money on it
right
and I don't try
and that's the other thing
like when I work with a wiring
contractor I go tell him
like look
I'm not trying to make money off
you
I'm going to put the customer
directly with you
you tell them and I don't care
make whatever you want
whatever you think is fair
just make sure
you come in at that number
yeah
right
don't come back
with another number
and do a good job
and we're good
right
and then
we don't have any issue
because
why do I want to be a manager
in between the customer
so anyway
um
yeah
look
I think you should charge
according to
the product you deliver
and if you are delivering a good
product
with value
someone isn't going to have any
problem paying that
that number
right
as long as it's got value
it doesn't matter what the
number is
but yeah
I don't
normally
I do some tuning
right
the thing
here's the other thing
if someone's just calling me
with a bunch of shit
they got from somebody else
and they want me to
save my wand
because I'm shanty
and it's got a mo-tech
and I can
I can't fix all your fucking
problems
that you've already created
that you want me to solve
so because I can't control
that
it depends what it is
if it's a fucking high end
product
like project
I'll just be like
no
I'm not doing that
because
in the first case
I'm selling mo-tech
hardware
right
and when I make the sale
and I do the tuning job
I'm making
all of the money
on the hardware
right
and support you
right
because I've already made that money
mm-hmm
so if you go buy a mo-tech from this guy
because he's your buddy
and he fucking sells it to you cheap
and you come to me
and you say
I want you to tune it
depending on what it is
I might tell you
well here's the deal
if you want me to tune it
it's this much a day
and then you're going to pay me
what I would have made to sell you
that piece of hardware
mm-hmm
because I'm now going to be tied to it
as soon as I tune it
I'm responsible
right
so in order for me to support that
in the same way
it's not fair
it's not fair for my customer
that buys the shit from me
right
that gets my level of knowledge
and support
it's not fair to you to shortcut it
and fucking
I mean
did you ever go to a restaurant
and go buy a steak
from the cheap place down the street
and go
here can you make this steak
like do you think that's going
to fly up Morton's
hey I brought a steak in
from fucking Walmart
will you make my steak
and I just want to pay
for what you're part of it
yeah yeah yeah
they're going to go
yeah get fucked
mm-hmm
okay
so we got that done right
mm-hmm
now one of the things
on the technical side
mm-hmm
which I don't even know
if you really want to
we're not going to say any other
ECU brands right
I don't care
you say whatever you want
they're all good
they're all just tools
in the end
they're just tools to do a job
right
and you take somebody that's
a super
you know
super tuner in a different brand
like
like I've got a buddy
Marco Pesante
we were talking about him earlier
Magnus Motorsports
right
and he works on a lot of GTRs
and honestly
Marco will tune
anything
right
and
and I could tune anything
I could tune anything I want
but I can be successful
with this one brand
that I like to use
and almost with
with certainty
guarantee the result
okay
and so I
I feel like
it's better for
it's better to be
an expert at one
right
than mediocre at many
mm-hmm
and so that's why
and and
knock on wood
I've been able to
stay busy doing it
right
and gamefully
unemployed for 21 years
oh no
sorry sorry
yeah
19 years
once again
I told Paul
I'm going to take in shorts
from Paul on this
he's going to be like
stupid mother doesn't know
how to add and subtract
okay
so with that being said
right
there's
other ECUs
sure that
kind of try to implement
everything to make it
easier
all in one
kind of situation
right so
let's say
Haltech right
yep
now
a lot of people are
in Haltech
sure right
that's probably
one of the more
common ones nowadays
FuelTech has everything built
into the display
yeah
which is a pretty cool feature
yep
and Haltech has a lot of
like a PDM built in
yeah
also has a map sensor built
in as well right
so now
one of the things
on the Haltech side
which I find interesting
is that
that you said
was
MoTech kind of separates
everything because
I guess it's just
the good practice
to kind of have everything
separate right
it's a
it's a racing based
right they're not
MoTech's target audience
is in streetcars
that doesn't mean that
they're in streetcars
but their target audience
is the highest level
of motorsport motorsport
and so they're looking
for a level
of reliability
right and
and their philosophy
has always been
you do not combine
your ignition module
which is likely to
fail if the coil
fucks up
with your ECU
because then that
junks your ECU
you now have to
send your ECU in
to get the ignition
module repaired
so their ignition
modules have always
been external
right and they
continue to be
right
and then when the
dams came out
okay that's
your power distribution
module
you do not want
that
possibly prone
to fail
your component
as a combination
with your ECU
because when it
fucks the ECU
fucks at the same time
and now you
got to replace
the whole thing
and the same thing
with a dash
you don't build
fucking an ECU
inside of a display
because then
when the display
fucks up
your ECU's junk
or with the ECU
fucks up
your entire car
in a motorsport
application
and that's their focus
they are not focused
on how do we do it
they never are focused
on how do we do it
cheaper ever
okay so then
they are not trying
and they are not
interested in the
stereo wars
right
you know to a level
to a level
like listen
I'm basically like
I like using
the shit in drag racing
look I use it in everything
but I basically
force it up
the customers
ask that we're
going to use it
because if you want
this result
it's the tool I'm using
whether you like it
or not
or whether it's
it's well suited
to that type of racing
right like
they are not interested
in getting involved
in that fucking race
to the bottom
that these other guys
are in
trying to make a cheaper
product
and fucking sell it
to everybody on the
street corner
because they also
recognize
that to do this
properly
at a high level
it takes an extremely
intelligent person
integrating
the electronics
into the vehicle
that I had in myself
on the back
so let me just say
it takes a capable person
to integrate
this is not meant
this stuff is not meant
to be sold
to an end user
that does this
on an occasional
or one time basis
it's too complex
there's too many pitfalls
to fall in
they know
that there needs to be
an integrator
in between
what they produce
and the end user
and that's perfectly
suited to me
because guess what
if it was so easy
you could just
hand it out to everybody
and it would work
I wouldn't have a job
yeah
so thankfully they've
taken that approach
and that's why
like I'm
I'm loyal
I'm stupid
but I'm loyal
right so
I could obviously work on
any of this other stuff
I want to
but
everything I've ever
achieved
professionally
since 2001
has been a direct result
of my involvement
with Motec
and the people at Motec
and the philosophy
Motec
and I am
extremely loyal
not to the brand
necessarily
but
the people
and the mentality
everything I have in my life
without only a couple of
exceptions
my family right
and my wife
and my daughter
is a direct result
of that company
and their mentality
and so that's why
I'm so loyal to Motec
and I don't listen
we don't have to have
an argument about that
there's other systems
go ahead and use them
I'm not going to use them
I was just curious
because
you mentioned that
on the Mac Daddy
vlog
when they were doing the wiring
you were mentioning
that
oh the PDM
yeah we had this
yeah yeah
which is interesting
because it's
I've heard this before
about like
having too many things
all in one like that
and if one thing
fails it could
cause issues somewhere else
not talking bad
probably could be debated
and both people
have valid
points and arguments
and it's kind of cool
that it's all integrated into one
but I'm just saying
the Motec
way
is not that way
and I'm not saying
that way
but for motorsport
high level motorsport
that's why they
they're focused on that
we don't want
we don't want something
that shouldn't cause a problem
with the ECU
to cause a problem with the ECU
because it failed
and the ECU didn't
okay
or I mean the ECU
has never failed
you have to do something
none of the hardware
the hardware doesn't fail
you have to fucking
do something wrong to
to get it to screw up
when it comes to
this is very specific
right
kind of
we're not in the general
Motec area
but when it comes to
in a previous interview
you had to mention something
about using drive shaft speed
for a lot of the drag racing
applications right
yep
now
you did mention that
the reason why you use that
is because a lot of the
times the front wheels
are off the ground
and you can't use that
as you know
as a reference
so
is this something that
you should implement
into maybe street cars too
specifically only useful
in drag racing
for the reason I mentioned
it's got the front wheels
off the ground
and typically traction control
is done
by measuring the difference
between the rear wheel speed
and the front wheel speed
and controlling that difference
to some goal
and like in land speed racing
where it doesn't have
we don't have wheelies
we don't need to use
a drive shaft sensor
we can
it doesn't matter
in that case
because they're locked together
there's no diff
but in the case
where you're doing
traction control
and say something
like a road race car
if you've got a diff
you've got a difference
of wheel speed
inverses out
you don't see that
on the drive shaft
in an application
where you're trying to do
wheel based traction control
which isn't in drag racing again
because you can wheelie
now if you're not wheeling
in drag racing
no problem
game on right
happy days
you can use the front wheels
and use the back wheels
and that works no problem
so in drag racing
firstly
if you could get a
wheel speed sensor
mounted on the axle housing
or read the actual wheel
that would be beneficial
but it's a lot easier
to just clamp a collar
around the drive shaft
where it comes into the
pinion on the diff
right
like I've got cars
where we read the ring gear
top fuel cars read the ring gear
so they don't have to
have a drive shaft collar
it's the same
because it's all hooked together
there's nothing can slip right
and the ring gear's got
a shitload of teeth on it
and in a top fuel car
they never change the rear end gear
because it's always 320
locked in mandated by the NHRA
and like whatever
1990 fucking seven or five
or two
whenever it was
and so it's just
sort of common practice
in a drag car
and in a drag car
what you do is you drive
you draw over time
you start a timer
at the beginning of the run
with a trans brake release
the clutch comes out
whatever it is
you start a timer
and you draw
what the drive shaft curve
should be
right
and then you measure
what it actually is
by looking at the drive
shaft sensor
and then you control the power
to try and keep it at that
running that curve over time
right
but the idiotic part
of that is
you don't actually
have a reference
for where you are
on the racetrack
right
so the time sequence
can get out
I mean
I'll give you
a really interesting example
on something I got
exposed to
from a friend of mine
Scott Palmer
and he's just an awesome person
all around
but one day
I was working for
a customer at Gainesville
for the Gator Nationals
and it rained really bad
and it was the first time
we had run the car
and we were actually here
testing it
like leading right up to the race
and we were going to get
one qualifying run
to run the car
and we didn't think
the track was going to be good
because it had rained
and he didn't
we weren't sure
we had the car
sorted out yet
because when we were here
it was going all over
the racetrack
and we were trying to figure out
why
and it had a suspension
and so we thought
you know what
why don't we just not
even try this
because we don't want to
bomb it down there
at 180 mile an hour
and figure out
we didn't solve the problem yet
and you crash it
it's brand new
we're just starting
so let's just sit it out
the track's not going to be
good anyway
and the track eventually
ended up being good
and they all hauled ass
and we probably could have
but we didn't want to
take the risk
anyway this leaves me
in Gainesville
with nothing to do
the next day
and Scott was there
and so he's like
well you could come over
here and help us
come and look at data
from a top fuel car
I'm in
I happen to go on the day
when the weather
it was super cold
that next day
it was like
40 fucking degrees
that morning or something
and it wasn't going to warm up
for the whole rest of the day
and literally
everyone is pulling
their hair out
in the pit area
because what they do
is they look at the weather
and they decide
what the engine build
is going to be
based on the weather
that's how you tune
a top fuel car
it's so backwards
we take the laptop
and we tune
the air fuel ratio
and the timing
we match or adjust it
based on the weather
and the engine stays the same
and in a top fuel car
they have all that opportunity too
but normally what they do
they leave the fuel system
alone
and barely change it
and they change
the supercharger overdrive
and they change
the engine's compression ratio
to change
according to the weather
they leave the fuel the same
and they might do something
with the timing
to power manage
but for the most part
that stays the same
and they build the engine
and change the boost level
to suit
that change in
barometric pressure
water vapor
it's like so foreign
and backwards
right from what I'm used to
yeah
so anyway
so they all have this spreadsheet
that they use
where they take in all the
weather components
and it says put this head gasket
in and by the way
you have to measure
just think about that
now you're tuning with parts
right
so now the combustion chamber
volume
because one got
one of them
got the valve
seat ground a little bit
so the valve
sunk in the head
and the chamber volume
changed on that cylinder
so now you have
to basically make
the cylinder heads
have exactly the same
combustion chamber volume
on one side
and the other
if the block's been
decked on one side
you have to know that
so you can put more head gasket
thickness in it
otherwise you're changing
the compression ratio
on that side
right
so now the parts
and their dimensions
become extremely critical
because that's your tuning
device
right
so they have like
fucking 10 sets of heads
every one of them
is marked
combustion chamber volume
so you need to enter
the chamber volume
and enter the
weather data
and it tells you
the engine's not the same
it's insane
right
and like the rod stretch
so the rod stretched
or compression
in the rod
as you run a rod
in a top fuel car
it gets shorter
just from compressive force
so they don't get
many runs out of them
because eventually they'll
fail
but they have to measure
the dimension
the pin dimension
pin to the big end
dimension
in a fixture
to get
the dimension
of what that is
to enter into
the compression ratio
calculator
so they can work out
whether or not
they've got the compression
right down
the left side
or the right side
and to this level
I mean like
the guy
I'm friends with a guy
that is one of the higher
end crew chiefs
and he worked for
Calida
and he's like
yeah
we figured out
that
we have to
wear
like cotton gloves
and we put
all the
fucking connecting rods
in a metrology center
a place with
measuring devices
inside the shop
that's air conditioned
to a specific temperature
all the time
the temperature
and not touch them
with your hands
because they're
checking things
to the ten thousand
of an inch
and just the temperature
in the
building
if it varies
the aluminum
grows
if it's warm
and shrinks
and it's cold
so if you're trying
to go to the ten thousand
to make sure
you've got
the compression ratio
accurate
that matters
it matters
imagine this
it's like
mind blowing
it's fucking
way harder
right
other than the fuel pump
which is hooked to the engine
and delivers fuel
based on the engine speed
there is nothing
that senses
what's going on
with the load of the engine
doesn't have any idea
how much boost it is
all it knows is RPM
okay
so nothing is controlling
based on the
operating condition
that the engine's under
what they do
is they use
a timer
that starts
when the throttle
goes wide open
when they leave
the starting line
and the timer
controls both
the clutch application
and it controls
a timing curve
that's over time
and it controls
the fuel volume
that goes into the engine
okay
it's got the
the fuel pump
connected to the crank
so it's going to deliver volume
the higher you rev it
the more volume you're going to get
so you have to cut that off
and match
you understand
how EFI is
with a volumetric
efficiency curve
the VE curve
is meant to match
the amount of
mass airflow
that the engine
consumes
sorry it's actually
the air density
on a typical basis
match it with an amount of fuel
that's why you have that shape
right
top fuel car doesn't have a shape
their it's shape
goes straight up
with engine speed
so you have to get that shape
by trimming the fuel
back and returning some
back to the tank
right
but to get that shape
to match
you would have to run the engine
through the same
you know
our shapes are based on
engine RPM and load
their shape is based
on RPM
and time
time from
when we hit the throttle
so
so here's the problem
if the sequence is out
now keep in mind
think about what the engine
RPM is going to do
as it goes down the race track
it's going to go up
then the clutch is going to
come in and the RPM
is going to come down
and then it's going to go
one to one
and then it'll climb up the
drive shaft
the engine in the drive
shaft will be one to one
as it goes to the finish
line
but imagine
if the grip is different
on the race track
so the tires slip
so
the point in time
where the engine
is at the operating point
that it's at
may not be the same
run versus
one run versus
the next
it's going to be
by time
to accurately
fuel the engine
based on its volumetric flow
rate
try and use a timer
you get out of sequence
so something very
very simple
that's crazy
the brake pressure
that they use to hold
the car on the starting line
because the car
on the starting line
the clutch is out
you're off the throttle
you stage the car
with a handbrake
if you
pull too much brake pressure
this is an 11,000
horsepower engine
can you imagine
you pull too much
because there's too much
brake pressure
and the clutch is centrifugal
in a top fuel car
you hit the throttle
and the engine jumps up
to like 8,000 RPM
the time that it takes
to climb to 8,000 RPM
is based on the resistance
from the car
and the clutch
and the tire
right
and the brake pressure
so if the brake pressure
is too high
the sequence gets out
right from the get go
right
it doesn't
it doesn't move
to the right place
in the same amount of time
and so now your
fuel curve is off
compared to what the engine is doing
and
something as simple as brake pressure
I wouldn't have believed it
but I saw it
that makes sense though
everything matters
right
so the drag race thing
they use a timer
because it's simple
and the front wheels are in there
a far better solution
is something like
an inertial navigation system
or an IMU
or IMU with a GNSS
so it looks at the satellites
and it knows
where its position is
on earth based on that
and then uses
inertial measurement
roll pitch and yaw
and accelerometers
to figure out
where it's gone
from any given starting point
but the problem with that is
to be
absolutely accurate
and not include
a bunch of other errors
it takes
a very high level of precision
otherwise you're basically
just using bad data
right
so you can get close
but not dead nuts
right
so there's only one
currently on the market
which is a weapons grade
GNS
INS unit
with an IMU
from a company
called Obsidian
and it's about
$5,500
that will then give you
the speed
the accurate speed
and position
to do
wheel based traction control
like on a sports car
whether the front ends
in the air or not
because it'll generate
the correct speed signal
any other way of trying to do it
is basically guessing
so a lot of gray areas
still
well it comes down to
what's your level
of acceptability is
right
what error are you
willing to accept
and listen
that's not to say
that it's impossible
to do it any other way
and honestly the problem is
with that amount of money
will the car actually
have a elapsed time improvement
by using that device
versus the timer
because you can get pretty damn
close and really consistent
with a timer
so that's why it's hard to
say we have to use this device
but I do have one customer
who is getting ready
to implement it in their car
because I'm like
look if you want to go to the moon
we have to have a rocket
so what about street cars
that are making big power
like a lot of these GTRs
are making 2,000 horsepower
a lot of them
are running Motec
so they're able to use
the traction control
from Motec
kind of get them down
anything that doesn't
accelerate fast
a GPS works perfect for
like all my Bonneville cars
they have 10 hertz GPS
doesn't accelerate fast
so if you're accelerating
less than about 1G
a 10 hertz GPS
is fast enough
to give you
accurate ground speed
and position
okay
once you get over
about one and a quarter
one and a half
you start having
a positional problem
where you're moving
so quickly
that the GPS
can't accurately
tell you where you are
by the time it figures it out
you're already in a new place
you're already in a new place
so there's an error
but as long as you're going slow
they can be very accurate
very useful
all of my Bonneville cars
use GPS for ground speed reference
they still have front wheel speed
and rear wheel speed
and I might even choose
to control off front wheel speed
and rear wheel speed
but like
yeah
all the cars I work with now
because I've got enough experience
to know the GPS is accurate enough
I just don't even run
on front wheel speed
unless we have to
I just use GPS
for ground speed reference
reference that to the rear tires
and you could do the same thing
in a road race car
or a street car
anything that's not
quickly moving from a standing start
or accelerating quickly
so it moves to a new position
before the GPS
can recognize it
it's fine to use GPS
so like in an all-wheel drive car
sports car or anything
just use GPS
as the ground speed reference
and you can then
at that point
if the front and rears are locked together
you can measure any front or rear
or
if you need to drive
one different than the other
you have to measure the front
and the rear
just slip right to the front
versus the rear
so you can do split control
or whatever you're doing
if you've got diff control
or whatever it is
that's with the Motec though right
well that would be with any device
so you can use GPS on other platforms too
with other ECUs
to be honest
I don't know
I don't research other
I can only imagine
I can only imagine
but yes
specifically with the Motec
100% you can use
GPS to ground speed reference
in fact it's native
in the
like the newer M1
series ECU
and it's general purpose firmwares
it goes through a sequence check
and it looks at
the movement of the vehicle
which you define
based on engine RPM
and throttle position
in other words it's like
hey
how do I know
when you're starting to make the car move
now listen
if it's in neutral it doesn't know
right
but it makes the assumption
that if it's moving
above this throttle and RPM
and it sees a rear wheel speed input
it's looking for a front wheel speed
input to compare to
right
and if it can't find that
then it'll fall back
and look for GPS
and if it can't find GPS
then it'll fall back
and use the rear wheel speed
as the front wheel speed
okay
which is no good for doing traction control
because you're comparing to the thing
that's generating the signal
but what's really good about it
is you at least still get
a vehicle speed reference point
instead of having nothing
because the sensor didn't work
right
what you're trying to compare
is the vehicle speed
right over ground
to whatever the driven wheels are
so when you have all four wheels driving
you have no
when you don't have
the front wheels driving
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on the ground
you've got a reference
but as soon as you
pick them off the ground
or they're driving now
now which one
how you can't use
front versus rear now
because they're all driving
right so you have to
have a reference for
how because the
the concept is
what is the rate
of difference
between
where the
tire is on the ground
and where the
actual ground is
right and we
want the rear
tires to slip
X amount
or the accelerating
tires need
they need to have
slip angle to create
and without a proper
reference to what
the actual speed of the
vehicle is
you can't work out
what the slip angle is
but once you
have that reference
it's very simple
to then say
okay what's the
slip angle
that provides
the highest
g
and you just
aim for that
slip angle
and try and
maintain it
you know in a
drag race car
or a land speed car
at some
point down the
racetrack
almost without
fail
maximum acceleration
angle or slip angle
the tire requires
at some point
you run out of horsepower
to keep it at that angle
and your acceleration
drops off
right so a
turbo car
pro mod
especially if you're
running to the eighth
is close
but by
two and a quarter
or two
probably two and a quarter
depending on the track
conditions
you're all in
and whatever it does
at that point
is whatever it does
you can't
generate enough power
to keep the tire
at its maximum
acceleration
is beating up
but when you're looking
at it from an acceleration
standpoint
the acceleration is
falling
not going up
let's talk about
some four cylinder
action
you got this SR20
that you were working on
it was for years
pretty big deal
this SR20
that was making
over 2,000 horsepower
and I'm pretty
sure at some point
it held the record
too right
well for sure
it had the record there
but it actually was
the quickest
and fastest
four cylinder
drag car
at that point
it worked
Team Techno Toys
the S15
it was a
SR20
Mazzworks SR20
billet block
and I always
lose track of the
alphabet soup
that is the cylinder heads
but I don't remember
which cylinder head it is
but
it's a factory casting
and it's
2.2 liter
we ran
a single
88 millimeter
turbo
and obviously
watered air
intercooler
and methanol
and it made
when we started
with the original
turbo
and we went from
670s
to about
640s
with that setup
and then went back
to the dyno to try
the
compound version
right
we tied it together
with a test session
for a different
brand of turbo
like a precision
so we were
going to go to the dyno
with the precision
and compare
like we're trying to
pick which turbo
we wanted
so we had the one we had
we got a new
version from them
and then we got
a precision to try
and like we're going to
try this
with the precision on the dyno
put all this
compound turbo shit on top of it
and see if that's viable
right
so we did it down here
in Florida on the dyno
and
the engine
made
1800 horsepower
with the old turbo
it made on the dyno
I think like 62 pounds of boost
now it has a snorkel
going out of the front
of the turbo
to the body of the car
it makes more boost
down the racetrack
because it gets
ram air right
and because we're
all in on the turbo
we're not controlling
to a specific boost level
the boost goes up
when the air pressure goes up
the faster we go
the more boost we make
on the dyno
you don't have that
you're all in with the turbo
and it makes what it makes
based on what it can draw in
it can't
it doesn't have any ram air
to work with
right
so it made like
I want to say
62 or something like that
pounds of boost on the dyno
and it made
1800 horsepower
we went back
tried
the other
turbo that was
from that same company
and it was like
I was slightly better
64 pounds
it made a little bit more
power
okay
then we put the precision
boost
and it made
2010 horsepower
and it was like
yeah
that's the turbo
we're going to use
right
yeah so then
at that point
we were able to run the car
up to the point where we
crashed it
I think we went
622 at 220
I think it was 226
on that pass
but we later
ran one at 229
so those were
our aggregate best
numbers
ET and speed
and at that
moment
in time
it was the
quickest and fastest
four cylinder
have you ever worked with
any other four cylinders
other than the SR20?
yeah sure
actually
I'm involved with a project
right now
a racer named Jason Ostrom
he's got an all wheel drive
Honda Civic
with a B series engine in it
and
so
I think that one
is 2 liter
maybe it's 2-2 also
but it's a similar
package
but the difference
is that the class
that he runs in
you're limited to
an 83 millimeter turbo
okay
so that engine
is only making about
1800 horsepower
at the wheels
okay so
now
what did you notice between
the SR20
and the B series
in terms of how those cars
are
how they make power
between the two
there's a lot of brand
specific like banter
that goes back and forth
but I mean in reality
there's nowhere in the ECU
where I enter
this is a Nissan
this is a Toyota
this is a Chevy
this is a Honda
it doesn't know
it literally goes back
to the discussion
we started with
about air density
and mass flow
you know
given any engine
if it's
physically capable
of containing
whatever the power
adding device is
normally a turbo
if it's able to
the power is generated
by the turbo
right
not the fucking engine
because you take the
turbo off
the engine makes no horsepower
right
because it can only breathe
what it can get
from the atmosphere
so the turbo is what determines
the power level
okay
almost period
and if the engine
is capable of containing
what the
turbo can deliver
a Honda
or a Nissan
of equal displacement
and RPM capacity
are going to make
the exact same horsepower
it doesn't know
the air doesn't know
it doesn't know it's in a Nissan
doesn't know it's in a Honda
doesn't know it's in a 2J
doesn't know it's in an RB
it doesn't know the difference
now the only difference
could be
the amount of boost
you're running right
because that could be based on
no if the displacement
and the camshaft
dynamics
and the ports are the same
okay
I mean imagine
we just build two engines
I mean but
one just has a different brand
if everything else is the same
they're going to make
the exact same horsepower
head flow doesn't
no no head flow matters
what I'm saying is
if you match all that
shit between the two engines
then you can't come up
with a different result
be like building
two of the same engines
right
so between the two engines
what's different
is the Nissan
port
and this is almost
across the board
with Nissan
they seem to do more
effort in airflow
and porting
and port angle
than say Toyota
does for the 2J
right and the B-Series
Honda is kind of the same
like it's not as good
as the port
as the Nissan is
but it's damn close
the 2J is a terrible port
it's like a fucking tractor
it comes in
and makes a 90 degree turn
the ones on the end
come in on an angle
it does all this weird shit
but the platform is good
and robust
and bulletproof
and the RB
I've not done a lot
of RB in the past
I've done a few
right
and then I've done
the recent ones
the RB has a
by looks of it
anyways and probably
a flow bench number
cylinder head
but in the end
the power adder
is really the turbo
so what happens
if the engine's more efficient
at moving air in and out of itself
is it will move the same
mass airflow
right
but it'll do it
more efficiently
so the boost pressure
that it requires
to move that mass airflow
through less
it's almost like the fuel pump thing
if you have less restriction
right more goes
more goes in
at less pressure
then you can make
the same horsepower
but in the end
it's just how hard
does your compressing device
have to work
so if it has to work
on a 2J
in other words
it makes more boost
because it can't get the air
into the cylinder
then by building pressure
you're going to build heat
right
and by building heat
you're going to
have
obviously less efficiency
because the higher
the pressure is
the less the efficiency is
the hotter the air is
the more you have to work
at getting the heat back out of it
and the less dense it is also
right
the less dense it is
but
like in a drag race application
where you have a liquid
to air heat exchanger
as long as you get the air
cooled back off
to the same temperature
doesn't fucking matter
you're losing on the efficiency
of the turbo
which means if it takes more pressure
to get to the same
mass airflow rate
on the intake side
it has to be driven
by the exhaust side
so that means
the RPM on the turbo
has to go up
and to get the RPM up
you have to put more exhaust through
and it won't go through
so the back pressure is higher
right
so then you have a mismatch
on the back pressure
and the boost
so yes
it's an efficiency thing
and I'm talking about
all-in engines
because engines
where you run 30 pounds
of boost
if you look at almost
any compressor map
that's going to be
as long as a turbo
is sized properly
you're going to be sitting
almost dead
in the center of its
efficiency island
where it takes the least
amount of horsepower
to make that pressure
at that mass airflow
and generates
the least amount of heat
it can possibly generate
so it's super efficient
now you don't need
a watered air intercooler
right
you can get away with
an air air intercooler
because you can get the
temperature down
because it's not so
fucking hot to begin with
right
or you can get away
with running it on gasoline
the charge cooling effect
that methanol offers
to get it to live
because you don't have enough
intercooler
because a compressor
I mean it's the balance
of everything
everything's related to
everything
and the whole entire car
but all-in engines
are easier
because you're not
trying to sit in that
you're running off
the end of the map
somewhere that
if you tell the manufacturer
what you're doing
like they don't
like you'd never
want to tell your
manufacturer
what turbo speed you're
running
right
and if they tell you
oh don't run over
Robert
Robert Young
he was on a podcast
oh was he?
Oh yeah
Robert's awesome
I love Robert
he's great
so cool
but the thing is at Robert
like the level that I'm at
he or the level of
projects that I work on
that's not his normal
person that he sells
turbos to
so you know
but whenever
I have it
like
Robert's the reason
why there is a compound
turbo
Celica
because I went to
Robert and said
Robert am I
out of my mind
I need a turbo
which doesn't seem to
exist
and if it is it's something
so big I never want to
put it on a race car
because it weighs 300
pounds
so why can't I just
take two somethings
that have
half the mass flow
that I need
at two to one
and use both of them
to feed a third one
right
the compound part
of it wasn't the question
it was just
can we get away
with two
88's
because that then
sets two
compressors in the
middle of their
happy efficient spot
at two to one
or two and a half
mass flow
because one's only good
for like 150 pounds
an hour
sorry 150 pounds
a minute
but two is good
for 300 pounds per minute
which should be enough
mass flow
to generate 3,000 horsepower
which is what I'm trying
to do
right
so can I just
use two 88's
and he's like
I don't think
he goes
and then he goes
you know let me think
about it
calls me back
the next day
he's like you know what
so the first
of all the answer
is yes of course
two 150's
I'm going to go by
two more pro-mod
88's
and hang them
in front of this
pro-mod 88
and so he's like
I think
yes in general
but it would be better
if I could build you
exactly
you need
a little bit smaller compressor
and you need
a lot smaller
turbine housing
because you're
splitting the exhaust
through two turbos
and you'll struggle
to get the turbos
to run the right speed
splitting it
off between the two
so how about
I build you
a custom turbo
that's I think
I'm going to go by
the side
so they spin easy
because you have
to spool this
on the starting line
before you go
so anyway
that's how that worked
so I worked on this project
where we had this
dinky little bitty engine
it was a 670 CC
600 basically
sized Suzuki engine
in this little
sports car
it's called a
de-sports racer
and SCCA
and I had this
insane
owner that
wanted to
he had
all the money
in the world
and he took his
Inza team
and said
we're going to build
this little de-sports racer
and go do this
at the runoffs
this year
and I don't care
what it costs
I want to go less than
two minutes a lap
and I want to win the race
and so it was
literally
an F1 style
like
seriously
insane amount of money
to be able to
build all this
custom shit
to do this
and they built
two cars
so when they brought
me on
the rules said
you could use
a star engine
whatever
and or
670 cc
turbo which I think
they picked that number
because they figured
no one's crazy enough
to build
there isn't one
you can't go buy it
and who the hell
is going to build
a 670
okay
it's like
hold my beer right
so
when they bring me on
they say
look here's the
here's the deal
we're building this
turbo project
and we want to know
if you want to be
involved with it
whatever
yeah of course
you have to be able to buy it
at the
at the track that's it
so the tracks
were supplied with
Senoko I think
and they have 118 octane
gasoline
it's like C16
it's like okay
well we use that gas
and there's no turbo rule
so they're like
yeah here's the deal
the normally aspirated
engine
we went and bought one
from every manufacturer
that makes one for this
race series
brought them all here
put them on the dyno
we ran every one of them
so we know what they make
the best ones make
225
do you think we can
make 225 with this
turbo motor
because I don't want to
shoot myself in the foot
but I'm like
ah you don't know
we'll see
but in my mind
I'm thinking
200 with it
like the thing makes
100 on its own
it'll make
215
pounds of boost
but I don't want
again I don't know
and the only
turbo they had the
turbo already
and the only
turbo they could get
was the one that
going by the compressor
map on the
Garrett website
said
it was some
tiny little thing
like a GT
24
it's not big enough
to do shit
but whatever
it's what you have
so let's just try it
so we ran the thing
the first time with the wrong
turbo on it on the dyno
it made 289
we needed to make
221
289
with the wrong turbo
so then I got involved
with Robert at force
performance
Robert here's what
we're trying to do
and I'm trying to make
well we can
make however much
we can possibly
make but here's
the engine we have
right and we need
a balanced
compressor
and exhaust side
based on what
turbo's that were his
like here's what I think
try all three of these
and see how they work
and we'll see what happens
so we ran all three
okay so it made
375
with the best turbo
and then we went
yeah that's good
what's your next guess
okay try this one
this one this one
and in the end
it made 425 horsepower
and the engineers
that were working
on the two cars
and the race engineer
said
stop with the
normally aspirated project
we're going with the
turbo
and then they did simulations
up at multi-matic
because multi-matic
actually built the car
in Canada
they have an F1 simulator
so they put the driver
on the F1 simulator
and simulated the car
that we were building
and ran around
road America
and figured out
that they only would need
about 320 horsepower
to be able to
achieve our goal
of less than two minutes
allowed
so then we went back
to Robert
and said Robert
okay we made all this power
but in the end
we only need to
make 325
so we could turn
the boost down
when you go back down
on pressure
the compressor efficiency
goes up
because the compressor
efficiency goes up
the exhaust pressure drops
now the pressure ratio
across the engine
gets more favorable
with more boost
less back pressure
so the volumetric
efficiency of the engine
goes up
the temperature increase
goes down
because you're
compressing less
now you need less
area for intercooler
and then
that means there's
more room for radiator
and that means
you're dragging less
shit through the air
so now you're
refining
more power
and then with Robert
it was like
here's where we're at
I had turbo speed
and pressures in and out
and everything
so he had basically
all the data he needed
to be able to go
right here's where you're at
and here's where you want to be
you need this compressor
right and then he did
up and down on that
and then we ran that
at 325 horsepower
and then we did another one
a series of three
on the exhaust side
and then whatever
the best combo was
is what we ended up
building and using to race
and we ended up
in the end
we did go less
and we won the race
by like 45 seconds
but it was a full
it was literally
we're racing against
SCCA club level racers
where it's like
a guy and his wife
and then we're a crew of 20
all wearing headsets
all dressed the same
put the car up on
fucking air jacks
on the grid
put tire warmers on it
right and then
drop it on the ground
and go to
the grid position
and take off in the race
we were ahead by
like 20 seconds
at turn one
that car would go
178 I believe
down the front straight
at road America
probably one of the favorite
projects that I
ever got to work on
it sounds fun
a lot of stuff like that
is fun
that was everybody on that
team
was extremely high level
I mean dude it had
an order of shocks
it had F1
shocks from Red Bull on it
I mean it was
it was like
insane
insane high level
and
it was a super team
from the standpoint
that everybody believed
and had respect
for everybody else
to the point
where we were all
moving in the same
direction
there was no friction
so if we had
it was really quick
to come up with a decision
there was an expert
for everything
so if you just believed
in the expert
you asked them
what do we need for this
you need this
okay bang
you put it on
yep it works
it was magic
by far
I would say
probably my favorite team
that I've ever been
involved with
especially with Robert
shout out to Robert man
super informative
I love Robert man
he's such a good dude
super informative
couldn't agree more
stupid question
blow off valve
well it depends
what you're doing
and it depends
what your
a willingness is
to buy turbos is
right so
so
if it's a pro mod
and it's a precision
turbo
do you need to run
a blow off valve
no you don't
really need to
you can get away
with not running one
up to a point
when you
rev the turbo
up high enough
and don't have
a blow off valve
you will break
the turbo
by closing
the throttle
you know
a 20 to 1 pressure ratio
just unscrews the turbo
right
it breaks itself
because it's
it's like sticking
it's like sticking a screwdriver
and it would break it
it just
destroys itself
so I know from
experience
on a big turbo
when you're all in
like on a 2J
or an RB car
if you don't have a blow off valve
you will for sure
break the turbo
at the other end
of the racetrack
when you close the throttle
don't ask me how I know
but
so there's
various reasons
to run a blow off valve
for instance
on the pikes peak car
there's a lot of transient
throttle action going on
or any road race car
or even a street car
there's lots of times
where the throttle isn't just
pinned wide open
or completely closed
you're going in between
and so
running a blow off valve
allows the turbo
to maintain its RPM
as you start to go
close throttle
because it leaks the boost
pressure off
that's trying to stop
the compressor
you know remember
if you turn the turbo
and screwed all this air
into the intake manifold
and you don't keep
turning the turbo
then the air leaks backwards
out through the turbo
and you just lost it
but the blow off valve
allows it to leak out
to atmosphere
without going backwards
so it then doesn't try
to stop the compressor
which means the turbo RPM
will stay up
which means when you
go back after the throttle
it doesn't have to rev
so far back up
to get to boost
because if you only
drop it halfway
then you only have
to climb back up halfway
so that's one reason
the other reason is
on all of those
cases where you're running
you know something that's
something that has to run
for a long period of time
you can almost
again almost without fail now
any turbocharger you get
will generate way more
fucking horsepower
than you can cool off
yeah right
so your trouble
isn't how to generate power
it's how to
thermally manage
the heat that you're
gonna generate by doing it
so if you
use a blow off
if you use a blow off valve
and let that hot air
leak out
before it gets to
the intercooler
that you're not
gonna use because
the throttle is closed
and if you don't heat
your intercooler up so much
and if you don't heat
your intercooler up
then your air density is higher
going into the intake manifold
when you go back after the throttle
right and the charge
isn't as hot
right so it doesn't
wanna knock
right so there's a lot
of reasons to run
a blow off valve
that are
maybe not so completely
it's not just so it goes
when you let off the throttle
so you can be cool
like you know
back in the day
but it's
it's really about managing
what's going on
with the whole car
thermally and
as far as the compressor
efficiency goes
now in the case of a pro-mod
the turbos are sized
in such a way
that you can get away
with not running
a wastegate on the exhaust side
because the total
mass flow that it can generate
when it's all in
happens to match
the capacity that the
turbocharger
turbine side of the turbo
can deliver to the atmosphere
so you want all of it
you can get anyway
if you're gonna close
the wastegate
if you match the turbo
to that total mass flow
then it
doesn't matter if you
the back pressure will be
what the back pressure is
and that's it
and it won't be super high
as long as the exhaust side
is a match for the compressor side
and the engine
so on a pro-mod
it's easier to manage
the boost pressure
going to the engine
by revving the turbo
all the way up
and just leaking the pressure off
that's going to the engine
to control what the engine consumes
you're all in on the exhaust side
and it's way faster
when you're ready
for all the power
you can literally switch it
back to all power
by closing
the blow off valve
or whatever you're using
as a blow off valve
could be a drive-by-wire throttle
or something like that
but I mean a throttle
that leaks to atmosphere
not the actual throttle throttle
so it's way faster
it's also far more precise
because you don't have the lag
of the turbo revving up
to get back to full boost again
it's already revved up
and it's sitting there
you're just letting it leak
so you get the boost number you want
and then you close it
and bang it straight back up
to the power you want to make
now that's a super inefficient way
to do the job
because the compressor
is making all this fucking heat
and you're wasting it
and giving it away
and letting it blow off the blow off valve
but you're drag racing
so it gives a shit if it's inefficient
you only need to work for 3 seconds
or 4 seconds or 5 seconds
or 10 seconds
or whatever it is
so you can get away with a lot
different things
depending on the application
of what you're doing
it's safe to say then
in that case
it depends on what you're doing
for 1 and 2
compressor surge is bad then right
so listen
that's the other reason to use it
when you have a compressor
that's big enough
to make 5,000 horsepower
on a pro mod
and you try to spool it up
and the engine's only at 4,000
to make 20 pounds of boost with it
the turbo is way off to the left
or you're way off the left
of the compressor map
or you're at least
riding the left side line
so it's wanting to surge
one way you can force it
not to surge
is simply move the mass flow
at that pressure
further to the right
so it goes into the center of the map
where it's sufficient
won't surge
off the surge line
so how do you do that
you need to be able to move
more air at the same RPM
but the engine
is setting how much air
it will consume at that RPM
based on the cylinder head
camshaft
intake manifold
exhaust manifold
all this shit
so you can't make the engine swallow more
unless you raise the RPM
so that's one way
except when you raise the RPM
guess what it hits the tire harder
so that's going to unload the chassis
or the other option is
you just give it a leak to atmosphere
literally just let the air
leak to atmosphere
through a leak
I mean they used to
in the old days
they used to
well like the GM team
back in the old sport combat days
they had like four
AN caps
on the side of the plenum
on the intake
so it was on the boost tube
between the intercooler
and the intake manifold
and they would fucking literally
unscrew a number eight cap
or a number ten cap
or a number six cap
the other ones would be capped
and they just let that leak
all the time to atmosphere
because that would allow them to run
a turbo that was too big
on an engine too small
and not surge
and by running the big turbo
on the little engine
letting it leak
and moving the mass flow out
to the middle of the map
they could go higher up the map
and make more boost
efficiently
efficiently
speed demon
perfect example
speed demon is a special case
race car
that speed demon too now
I'm talking about the gold car
this one they just stacked up
the speed demon uses
the same chassis
and driveline components
and turbo chargers
88 millimeter turbo chargers
for because out there
the category is
streamliner
blown fuel streamliner
so they all run methanol
they all turbo
so they're blown fuel streamliner
but the engine size
determines the class
so there's double A
that's bigger than 500 inches
and then there's A
that might be 450 to 500
and then there's B
and it's like 400 to 450
it's a different breakdown
but generally that's how it is
so the smaller
the further down the alphabet
you go on the engine size
the smaller the engine gets
so they run
four different engine
classes
and they have the record in
double A
A
B
C
D
and F
and not E
right so double A is the
555 I think it is now
and then we had a
447 that was an A
that was an LS
so the 555 is a big block Chevy
and then we had a 444 I think
LS
and then there was a
390 inch actual traditional
small block
and a 370 inch actual small block
and a 320 inch actual small block
and they turned that engine
there was a 300 inch small block
and they turned that into a 256
to go for the E record
so it's 256 cubic inch right
running the same turbos that a
555 is trying to use
so on the one hand the 555
is upside down and backwards
because it's a massive engine
compared to a small turbo
it's like a fucking streetcar
turbo on it
but still because it's big
it makes 3500 horsepower
and the A engine
is a really good match
and it also makes 3000 horsepower
but it does it at a more efficient point
in the operating range of the turbo
so it'll rev up higher
so that's actually a better package
than the big engine small turbo was
even though it made more power
and then we've got this dinky little 256
so the problem with the 256 is
and the 256 make 3000 horsepower
like no problem right
because it'll just make it
it just makes 3000
it's 70 pounds of boost
or it's 60 pounds of boost
so we're running the car
at Bonneville
and the problem we have
is when it makes the gear change
with that little dinky engine on it
it pulls the revs down enough
that the mass flow drops
to the left of the surge line
on that 88 millimeter compressor
and we get compressor surge
and then as the engine revs up
and it struggles its way through
that part of the gear
it finally has enough mass flow
to move off the surge line
and the turbos start doing their job again
because we've mismatched the engine
and the turbo right
because we want all this power
we can make it 10,000
but when it makes the gear change
and yanks the engine
out of its happy spot on the turbo
it falls to the left of the surge line
and surges
so we're at Bonneville
how are we going to solve this problem
I'm like I got an idea
take the boost reference line off
for the waste gates
that's coming off the compressor housing
on both turbos
and put a T in it
and run it to the intake plenum
so we get the pressure reference
from the intake manifold
not the compressor outlet
because obviously it's easier
to come off the compressor outlet
when you're doing multiple engines
because you don't have to hook it
to the intake manifold
but in this case
move those off of there
unscrew the fittings out of the turbos
and let's go run
what do you mean
I'm like let it leak
let it leak out of the two holes
in the compressor housing
that will stop the surge
because there will be enough
extra mass flow
and we'll go make a run
so we did
and guess what
doesn't surge anymore
we just moved the mass flow
out to the middle of the compressor map
and it leaked to atmosphere
through the two fittings
in the compressor housing
now are we going to be able
to make as much overall boost
with that leak
of course we're not going to be able to
but it doesn't matter
we're not running all we can make
we're running what we can use
and we have no other choice
see that or let them surge
until it breaks the turbo
the right way
it would have been
get the right turbo match
for that size engine
but we're at Bonneville
what are you going to do
I know that's the right way
but we're here at the race
and we're not coming
for another year
so shall we go home
or shall we
let it leak to atmosphere
I've already done this
I know it works
it's a random topic
but the Haltech has the map sensor
built into the ECU
so there's a vacuum on it
now one of the things
that I saw on the forums
was people were saying
that you want to put your map sensor
as close to the intake manifold
as possible
right now
what are the downsides
to running the map sensor
off the ECU
if you have a longer line
it's in the cabin
so there's
this is like a loaded question
because there's like 20
different things to talk
topics to talk about
regarding that
so once again
go back to this
now I want to say never
because they did originally
like in the 80s
and I think they learned their lesson
don't mount the map sensor
in the ECU
for two reasons
number one reason
if it fails
the fucking ECU
has to go back to get fixed
right
and number two
if you have that map sensor
on board
and someone wants to run
a higher scale
than what you've built in
they're fucked they can't
let's say I have to run
some external input
so MoTeX philosophy
we're never putting
the map sensor again
on the board
again with the screwdriver
boxes in the ADS
they were built into the ECU
and then after that they stopped
so there's that
the reference line
length
should be relatively close
to the intake manifold
so that you don't have a huge delay
you're trying to fuel the engine
based on what you're measuring
going on in the intake manifold
correct
and what it's RPM is
right speed
density
if you don't have a reference point
that's accurate
then when you change
throttles
or have transient conditions
you're likely to be
erroring
by under or overfueling
the engine
because the operating point
isn't being measured
at the same time
because you got a delay
right
right so it's
literally goes right back
to the top fuel car
you're at a time
the time sequence is wrong
and the trouble is that
the engine
is consuming air
and fuel
at a really high rate
and when it changes
and you're fueling it behind
it's a massive error
for a while
and it's difficult
to get any engine
to actually
on any sort of consistent basis
have combustion
cycle to cycle
that doesn't vary
all over the place
between complete misfire
and
pre-ignition
and then knock
and normal
and it's just
an engine is almost
chaos
when you start looking
at what's going on
cylinder pressure wise
and you start comparing
one to another
it's not chaos
it's understandable
but still
it's really difficult
so
the best case scenario
would be
sample the pressure
in the plenum
on the specific cylinder
that has currently got
the intake valve open
and use that reference point
as your calculation
for the air density
going into that cylinder
so in other words
crank synchronous
or engine synchronous
sample
of instantaneous
or average
from a number of
sample points
done quickly
during the intake
process
when the valves open
say this is what
the average pressure is
therefore deliver
this amount of fuel
to
that cylinder
okay
when you're doing it
by average
out in the center
of the plenum
you're always making
some kind of mistake
it's just a matter
of how big it is
and if you then
move the sensor
25 feet down a vacuum hose
to measure it
well the signal
will be really smooth
but it's not really
going to be timed
to what the engine
is doing
if it's running
full throttle
never has a throttle
transient change
and you're sweeping
the engine through
RPM curve
slow enough
it doesn't matter
based on this little
conversation that we've had
it depends on
what you're doing
right now
we're not talking about
listen
you can literally
stand on the hood
of an engine
if you could
piss the right amount
of liquid into the engine
it will run the same
it doesn't care
when it's right
it's right
and it does
not matter
how you deliver it
and that's why
in the end
there's not a
super huge difference
between
a perfectly executed
EFI engine
and an executed
mechanical injected engine
and or a carbureted engine
and in some cases
like in the carburetor case
it's really common
to take something like
a well tuned carburetor engine
like a pro stock engine
for example
and put EFI on it
and lose horsepower
because you now
move the fuel
to a place where
it doesn't have
as much opportunity
to atomize
and cool the charge
you change the charge
density
so the power goes down
right
so there is
there's
EFI engine once
right
and if you give it
what it wants
it doesn't matter how you do it
this is why
it's so fucking annoying to me
and listen
I'm guilty of it
myself right
because I promote myself
and I have
promoted myself
and I learned that
from the twins
they're the ones that actually
told me dude
you need to have a tag
like you can't just
be Shane Tecklin
promote
you need to be some name
you need to come up
with something
like just maybe Shane T
and I'm not creative enough
to have ever come up
with anything different
that I'll be tuned
by Shane T
and then Vinny 10
is the first one
that actually
cause he was right on board
with it
and he's like
yep I'm putting that on my car
I'm gonna put that
so then unfortunately
they came to Pomona
that was like 2004
and they came to Pomona
because I went there
to help them
tune the car
and he's like
I wanna put your decal
on the car
send me your decal
I don't have a decal
he's like
well I'm not putting
motec on them
I know you work for motec
but you just came here
and you spent two days
helping me fix
your name on the car
not motec
so come up with a tag name
and the twins are like
tuned by Shane T
fine
so I said tuned by Shane T
you've made a decal
put it on the car
they brought the car to Pomona
ran it at the world finals
he went off the end of the race track
into the sand trap
destroyed the front of the bar
the body
but he gave me
that piece of the fender
that had my
decal
I still have it
I still have it
hangs on the wall at my river house
so
I'm guilty of promoting myself
because
that's what it takes
I mean the twins
were the ones that told me
don't feel bad
it's not bragging
right
most people pay someone else
to do this job
and basically
promote them
if you can do it yourself
no one is going to promote you
like you're going to be able
to promote yourself
it's important
you need to start doing it
so that's when I learned
okay I'll do it
so of course
I've been
you know
showcasing
the things that I've been
working on
and saying like look
this thing made all this power
but in the end
it really
tuners that say
oh I showed up with a laptop
and I made power
you don't make power
as a tuner
the engine
makes power
based on
the mass
flow of oxygen
it can get through its cylinders
and if you fuel it
correctly
and you spark it
at the right time
it will make the same power
no matter
who is doing the tuning
no matter which engine
management system is on it
and indeed
whether you're using
mechanical injection
EFI
direct injection
carburation
or standing on the
front of the hood
pissing down the hole
that it's ingesting air from
the end result
will be the same
no matter who does it
you know if you have
10 tuners
show up to do
if they're competent
they are all going to arrive
at the same horsepower number
so stop
for the love of God
bragging about
how much fucking
horsepower you can make
as a tuner
you do not make
the horsepower
the person that
designs the engine
and puts the hardware
together
and the power adding
device
maximums
that's what decides
what the ultimate
maximum capability
the engine is
not the jockey
with the fucking keyboard
man
okay
get over yourself
yeah
it's true
but now
the one thing that I did
that did come to mind
is the tuners
who really don't know
what they're doing
right
well so
the key word there
was I said
competent
competent tuners
right
so
and there's
technically competent
with zero experience
and if everything goes perfect
then they're going to come up
with the same result
but the bottom line is dude
race cars
and racing engines
and these are all
series of problems to solve
right
I worked on a car here
yesterday
that has a problem
with a cam trigger
okay
and we can't work out
what it is
thankfully I'd run
two of the other engines
right
and we measure
and working with
I'm working with
Abe rated R right
on this project
and so
I was in Australia
working on
the same exact engine
for a different car
Mac Daddy
right
yeah trigger problems
cam trigger problems
yeah cam trigger what
cam sensor
what was wrong with it
no I know what it is
oh
I'm saying
what was the issue
okay so
can we talk about it
yeah yeah yeah
so
because that's the common thing
with the RBs
is these
companies battling over
who has the best crank
and cam trigger
all this stuff
and so here's the
here's the reason
that's the case
you know in the case
of a 2JZ
and this was always
our philosophy at Motec
if the factory
has a cam
and a crank sensor
inbuilt
we're going to
change the firmware
to be able
to use that pattern
because
the factory
obviously spent
millions of dollars
developing
the sensor
and trigger
wheel combination
and pattern
same thing
with the cam
sensor
and they researched
it and it's worked out
better
to use that
than just
hang some random trigger
wheel off the front of the crank
you know in a bracket
that bounces all over the place
and changes gap
and fucking position
and then hang
who knows what
maybe read the cam lobe
through the valve cover
with a hall effect
or some other
you can get away with that
but if you're racing
at a high level
and you want precision
you need something
that's going to be
foolproof
and not be a problem
so we were always
again a philosophical
thing at Motec
we're going to read
the factory triggers
when available
a proper way
to generate
the profile
on the tooth
of the trigger wheel
to suit
the sensor
that you're using
right
and in very
simple terms
if it's a mag
sensor
a variable reluctance
sensor
the tooth
width
as it goes across
the end of the
sensor pickup
shouldn't be less
than equal to
the diameter
of the pole piece
in the pickup
of the sensor
and should not be
more than
two times
the pole piece
in the sensor
to provide a proper signal
I mean that is like
the number one basic rule
right then it's
height profile
compared to the gap
next to it
right needs to be
correct so it's not
doing weird shit
but that's the basic
that's the basics
of it
you have a pole piece
that's the
diameter on the sensor
you have a target
on the tooth
that's that same
that same size
or no more than
twice that size
and then obviously
you have to have a gap
that's
at least equal to that
otherwise you're
gonna be in the next
tooth over before you
get done seeing the last
tooth
right
okay so
properly designed
crank triggers
and or cam triggers
don't have problems
properly designed
unfortunately
people just throw
shit together
they don't really
understand what they're
doing and they just
throw shit together
and it works
and then they
put it on some guys
some mouth pieces
high horsepower engine
and he's bragging
about how good
he is at tuning
right
so it must be good
so that's not the case
in the thing I was working on
this is a work
setup right
that worked on two other
engines yeah
but in the end
we were able to figure
out that the magnet
was incorrectly
installed in this one
only one
of three
trigger systems
cam or crank
cam the crank was working
but it was losing the
cam and it was only
on this one engine
and it took
both of us
quite a while
but it's only because
both me and Abe
think the same
and we're used to using
Motec
whenever we start an engine
right particularly when
we're doing something
new too
we capture the
cam and the crank signal
so you have a reference
point to go back to later
so when I did it
in Australia
I captured mine
he did it here in the
US because it was this
cool development thing
we ran the engine
on the dyno
I'm talking about
Big Mac now
so Big Mac's engine
was on the dyno
here in the States
at Abe's
package that we put in it
okay
and meanwhile
I had gone to Australia
and I was working on
a sister engine
in Mac Daddy
with Alex Birong
down in Sydney
so he took the tune
from that car
because it's
literally the same
fuel system
everything's the same
same turbo
it's a sister
it's not
the header
is a little different
it's a different car
it's a VL
it's not a pro mod
but the engine
package is identical
so he takes the
tune sends it to me
I stick it in
I have some trigger issues
with the crank trigger
that's on it
and so we switch
to a PRP
crank and cam trigger
and I do the setup
and we run it on the dyno
no more trigger issues
like bitch and this is perfect
I do everything I'm doing
on the dyno
on the VL
it makes
the engine here
in Big Mac
made 2568
the engine there
in Mac Daddy
twin sister engine
right
same mo-tech ECU
same
same tune
not the same software
because each one has
the same firmware
that I wrote custom for them
but the same tune
tune-up
volumetric efficiency curve
all that shit
2564
over there
right
which is okay
not a surprise
same tune-up and same engines
they should make the same
okay so
and no more
so then
they're coming over here
to do testing
with Mac Daddy
so I fucking send
all of that shit
that I figured out
about the crank
crank trigger over there
the
filtering settings
whether it's rise or fall
I send all that shit
back to Abe
he loads it in
Big Mac over here
they put that trigger on
over here
and go run it
yep cool
everything works
so we've done it twice
I captured it there
he captured it here
get to here
with the third engine
in the car the other day
and it's got trigger issues
and it's like
what the fuck
we just ran two of these
two different continents
right back to back
and they had no problem
so it turns out
the magnet's in the wrong
way around
and
it
only happens
because
the engine
most people don't know this
but there's usually
a couple of spots
in the cycle
where the
the valve spring
opening
and position
and drag
and whatever is hooked
to the crankshaft
manages to stop it
in the similar
position
it's either going to be
on this half of the cycle
or that half of the cycle
where the other half
of the engine
lines up and stops it
so if you turn the engine
by hand
there's a point
where it gets
the resistance is high
try to open two valves
once one's got
the exhaust opening
one's open the intake
and it gets tight
and then rolls past it
and it gets loose again
and it gets tight
not with even the plugs in
just from the valve springs
and let alone the plugs
being in the compression
trying to stop shit
so there's usually
two halves in the cycle
on every engine
where on this cycle
it's these two cylinders
and on that cycle
it's that two cylinders
so it either stops
on this rev
or that rev
but it almost always
stops in a similar place
so getting back to this
the magnet's in backwards
on the cam sensor
on this one
the sensor is hanging out
in front of the cam gear
the fucking thing stops
with the magnet
straight underneath the sensor
when the engine shuts off
when you power the sensor back up
right you turn the sensor on
because the magnet's in backwards
it like forward biases
it's a hall effect sensor
it's got its own magnet
but because this magnet
is opposing that magnet
it forward biases the sensor
before it powers on
and the sensor then
starts switching
the opposite fucking direction
right so normally
on the car in
once again this comes down to
me having a scope capture
because that's how I do it
and Abe having a scope capture
because that's how he does it
so we have the two to compare
to this third one
our two match
and this motherfucker
is working backwards
so in other words
when there's no target
in front of the sensor
the voltage is high
and when the target
goes in front of it
it goes low
and then after the target
moves back out of the way
it goes high again
but the one on this car
is low
and when the target
goes in front of it
it goes high
and then when it moves
past the target
it goes back low again
it's flipped
and it's fucking
blowing our mind
because how can it be
on a sensor like that
it's a powered sensor
you can't reverse the wires
to get the pattern backwards
so how the fuck
is it doing this
so just by plugging it in
like first of all
I've seen sensors
where they care
which direction
the target moves through them
when it sees
the pattern it sees
as to whether
they produce
a rising or a falling edge
when that enters
like a GT 101 sensor
it cares about
the direction
that the target
is going past the sensor
if you go this way
you get a falling edge
if you go this way
you get a rising edge
right
and so
that's why you don't
use a GT 101 on the crank
you use it for a wheel speed
because on a wheel speed
sensor
it doesn't fucking matter
if you get a little jitter
it doesn't make any difference
you get one little tooth
out of
however many you're measuring
and you're not trying
to do anything with it
other than measure speed
but when you're trying
to accurately derive
where the crankshaft is
importantly
and you're using
a trigger
and the crankshaft
by the way
isn't nearly smooth
if you were to look
instantaneously
at the speed
instantaneous speed
of the crank
throughout the cycle
it's all over the map
because it's slowing down
speeding up
then it's got
one cylinder misfires
and the next one
makes 3,000 horsepower
so it accelerates
like crazy
and then
there's also a vibration
and flex
and I mean man
the more you look
the scarier it gets
but you're trying to
accurately derive
the pattern switch itself
true
right
because the crank
did
this real quick
past the tooth
and made it trigger
more than once
right so anyway
so yeah
turns out what's going on
after we fuck with it
for hours
we recognize that
okay
if you hold the sensor
in air
and take the connector off
and plug it in
and put it back
in front of the target
it does one thing
right
if you put it
in front of the target
unplug the connector
and plug the connector
back in
in front of the target
it's flipped itself backwards
so it's got something to do
with that fucking magnet
right
and that's how we worked it out
so we put the old
trigger tooth
on the end of the cam
problem solved
so the point of that story
you're a guy with no experience
you ain't got a fucking chair
that's a figure in that out
you'd be screwed
right that was
that was dumb luck really
and then
and then you're complaining
about the product
and how it sucks
oh yeah
it's a piece of shit
they don't know how
to build a cam trigger
and fucking I'm so much smarter
than they are
except for some of this ability
for any kind of a problem ever
that's how it is
that's how it is
why do you think the RB
is only operated off
just the cam though
because they only had a cam
they only came with the cam
so I'm sure this came down to
the Nissan bean counters
going well
we could just put
one trigger that does both
on the cam
and then we don't have to
have anything on the crank
and then we can save money
because we don't have to
have two separate sensors
so we'll just use this
optical sensor
on the end of the cam
which that was a problem too
because on the street car
version of that
because there was
there was 360 slots
or 180 slots
or something around the outside
they were tiny
and this little bitty laser
etched piece of
like stainless or whatever it was
and you would have
they were like
almost slightly bigger
than a hair
the little teeth
that it was trying to read
and it was an optical trigger
reading through that tooth
like sending
light through one side
and receiving it in the other
and that's how it knew
that's how it resolved
crank position
but it's not really on the crank
it's on the cam
and there's slop
between the cam and the crank
because you got a belt
that's running one
on the cam
only sometimes
because then you got valve springs
that are doing this
and forcing the cams
to speed up and slow down
and the crank speeding up
and slowing it
because you can imagine
this is not a good idea
so only a bean counter
would say
yeah let's just put it on the cam
because we can put it all
in one unit
but anyway
that's what they did
and then those little slots
would get shit in them
just from being old
and then it would lose
the trigger
and it wouldn't run
and then you go in there
with a Q-tip
and like break clean
and clean them out
and bang out runs again
and then you also have to
the belt stretch
this stuff is all moving back
and forth
this is not a smooth
running signal
right
in general
the crank is what's
the thing that is dragging
the cams around
behind it with the belt
so you could probably say
in general
that the crank
is going to be ahead of the cams
because the belt's going to stretch
and they're always going to lag
that the crank
is what's driving
but in reality
at any given point
during the engine cycle
you've got
all of these things happening
the belt stretches
and then it slacks
and then it stretches
and it slacks
and so the cams are going forward
and back
and the crank's accelerating
and slowing down
and so you've got lots of room
for error
as long as you're not trying
to be precise
no problems
but if you want to be precise
it doesn't work
man if you stand far enough
back from a mountain range
look smooth
get up close
and it's dog shit
right
so smooth is relative
is this the first RB
at this level
that you've worked on
the first one that I worked on
it was kind of at a high level
was actually with
one of my customers
from New Zealand
heat treatments
and they had a proper
actual cast
no you don't want to take it back
the very first one I did
was like
2003 or four
Carl Stevens Jr
they built a 350Z
and they were using an RB26
originally in that engine
and so I tuned it
for them on the dyno
and so this is how J did
it was a 350Z
yeah it was a 350Z
but they used an RB26
yeah
single turbo
and what year was this
like either
2000 I'm thinking
three probably
wow
or it could have been two
is there videos of this
oh I'm sure
yeah the R&T there's a video
because the first thing that
happened is
this is back to the boost
numbers right
I was working on a twin
turbo V8
pro street car
yeah
and so we ran 30 pounds of
boost
well made
2,000 or 2,400 horsepower
something like that
so to me 30 pounds of boost
was a fucking big number
you don't need to run
more than 30 pounds of
boost
yeah
so I never worked on
an actual import drag car
up to that point
and the deal was
him and his dad
had a mo-tech booth
and worked for mo-tech
so
that means that it was
either 2002 or 2003
and I'm thinking
2000 I started in one
so
two would have been
yeah it might have been two
so because I was working
on that
drag race car
with the twin turbo
actually the first one
was twin turbo small block
and it was someone that
I knew personally before
I started at mo-tech
and they had a mo-tech
and they're one of the
reasons why I went to
mo-tech because they said
man this engine management
system is awesome
you should see if you
could get a job over there
so anyway
they triggered problems with it
and they keep coming back
and it was an old M48
which was the DOS version
before the M800 came out
that became
because the M800 was
DOS at first too
but like 2002 or 2003
it went to
it went to
Windows based software
anyway
so the M48 is on this car
and it keeps
cutting off
like it shuts off
going down the race track
can't figure it out
he's bringing it in
I first started at
mo-tech in November of
2001
and my buddy's coming in
with his ECU to let them
pull the data
and like look through the data
to try and find the problem
and no one can find the problem
and so
after about
six months
I now start to
understand enough
and know enough
that I can kind of
work my way through stuff
a little bit
and he goes man
is there any way you'd
consider coming out
to the race track
at Bakersfield
and trying to figure out
what's going on with my car
because it just keeps
like it'll make three runs
and then just on the fourth
one shut off
they're like alright
I'll come and check
well I get there
I get the laptop on it
and one thing that's wrong
is the Barrow Sensor
has
it's in error
right so I'm looking
at the pressure
for the Barrow Sensor
and it's reading 104 kPa
and I'm looking at the
map sensor
and it's reading 93 kPa
and we're at like
12 or 1500 feet
so I know it's
we're not below sea level
right so something's
wrong with the Barrow
now I'm not smart enough
to know if that's
really a problem or not
but I know it's a problem
and my background
was you know
working on regular street
cars and diagnosing
problems on street cars
for a hotline center
that my dad operated
for 20 years
I know when you have
a complex problem
and you're searching
for the answer
a problem that you encounter
that seemingly
can't be related
to the main problem
you can't just
fucking leave it a problem
because it doesn't seem
like it could be related
you fix it
right and then
you come across
another seemingly
unrelated problem
and then you fix that
and then you find
one more unrelated
and then pretty soon
your whole fucking
problem's gone right
but if you fall
in the trap of
this is fucked up
but it can't be the problem
with this
so I'll just leave it
fucked up
you'll never get it
okay so anyway
so Barrow Sensor's fucked up
well it turns out
that the pin pushed back
in the connector
it wasn't seated
all the way
in the connector
so when you plug it in
it pushes the pin back
so it's got no signals
so the sensor's an error
and the default is
104.3
or whatever it was
fine push the pin in
bang that's fixed
alright what's next
well I learned
that it's important
on an engine
that has a single tooth
on the cam
it's important
the relationship
of the cam sensor
compared to
the position of the crank teeth
in so far as
the amotec at least
is using the cam sensor
to derive
which is the tooth
on the crank
since it goes around twice
and there's nothing
unique about four teeth
on a crank
could be any four
it has to
see the cam signal first
and the next tooth
that sees on the crank
is the reference tooth
to top dead center
compression
right how many degrees
it is to top dead center compression
when that tooth
arrives in front of the crank tooth
so it's the tooth
after the cam tooth
happens
and it has to be
out in the middle
of the two teeth
positionally
because
there's stretch in the belt
that drives the cam
or the gears
slop in the gears
and because all the shit
shaken back and forth
if you put it right here
or right on top
of the crank tooth
and then as the crank
is jittering around
like my fucking fingers
seem to be
because I had way too
much coffee
before I came here
it's too close
and you get a little slop
it jumps to this side
of the tooth
but the ECU
doesn't know
that it moved
right
it just says the tooth
that's next
is the one that's
the reference tooth
except if I have
four teeth on the
crankshaft
and I move the
camshaft
trigger tooth
that says the next
one on the crank
is the one
distance to top dead center
if I have
four teeth on the crank
and I move to this
side of that tooth
I'm now 90 degrees
off
right
ahead of where I'm supposed
to be
right
if I at least
just move backwards
across that tooth
I'm off by 90 degrees
in the direction
that doesn't blow the motor
up
right
right
so this was an 8 tooth
I put the lab scope
on it
just to check
because I don't know
what else
oh I find the TPS
I find slop in the TPS
sensor
so I
I'm watching the
throttle sweep
because I'm just looking
for any problem
I don't know what's
wrong
I'm just checking
because when I go open
it reads open
and then I close it
and it still reads open
and I close it
and then all of a sudden
it reads closed
so I'm like
well that ain't fucking right
so I take it apart
and I look
and it's got
like a screw driver
and it looks like
a slot screw driver
and a slot screw
so the TPS
is the slot screw
and the
throttle shaft
has the blade
that fits inside of it
except it's all
horred out
inside of there
from vibration
so you've got
this much slop
before it starts
and then you take strips
make a U
until it's tight in there
right and put it back on
okay now the throttle works
fine
so now that's fixed
so now I'm feeling good
I found at least two problems
I don't know if they're
the problem or not
but hey I found two things
that weren't right
and I fixed them
so let's check
the cam in the crank
sensor
so we check them
and I'm like
holy fuck
it's got the cam
sensor
literally
on top of the crank
tooth
they're at exactly
the fucking same time
so then I'm like
now I'm super excited
100%
I call my buddy
Simon Wagner
that also worked
I'm like hey
I just found this thing
it's got the teeth lined up
it's definitely not
supposed to be that way
right like the sink
needs to be out in the middle
he's like yeah
needs to be out in the middle
he goes is it offset
to one side of it
or the other
I said well it's
a little bit
to one side
but it's mostly
lined straight up
he's like okay
so the side
that it's a little bit
off in front of
move it further
that way
around that tooth
because that will
jump across the tooth
that it normally uses
but get it ahead of it
and out in the middle
of the two teeth
if you can
so that
as it moves back
and forth it doesn't
jump across the tooth
so like cool
so I do
we go run
it makes its best run
ever
it went 691
at 201.75
it had been
201 before
it had never been
691
and they are
literally he
is literally
kissing me
when he comes back
and like
that's we just
made our best
201.75
it had been
it had been 692
or something
at like 201.25
what car is this
it was a 69 Camaro
pro street car
so it's basically
a pro mod heavy pro mod
oh I thought
like wait
I thought you were talking
about the 350Z with the
RV that's why I'm like
no no no no no
that's so
there's no way
that
listen to short
cut the RV story
I tune the thing on the
dyno forum
we make like 38 pounds
of boost
I think it made
830 horsepower
and I'm like yeah
like we need more power
we need more boost
and I'm like
no trust me
you don't
you don't want to try
and run more boost than that
it'll be a problem
like okay
so then we go to the racetrack
and he was
I think he was too young
or didn't even have a license
I can't remember
but his dad was going to
drive the car
so his dad drove the car
at E-town
and we tested it a little
bit
and it was kind of
it's got a clutch in it
and they're trying to learn
that
and the car wasn't set up
quite right yet
but short story
and I think
there is a video
it's on Long Island
I think it was Long Island Dragway
on like a random test weekend
and he goes and fucking
lets the clutch out on this thing
and he had commanded
like just make all of it
and it made 50 odd pounds of boost
and I think he went like
fuck I don't know
799 or something like that
on his first ever run
down the racetrack
and then just came out
stuck the thing on the dyno
and it made like
1500 horsepower
on a 350Z
2
but it was a RB 26
yeah
in the 350Z
in the 350Z
in the 790
yeah but keep it in mind
once again
it was a pro street car
I mean it's like a pro mod
it's like a pro import
it was heavier
it was a 3 quarter chassis
but still
I'm thinking about it
it wasn't a street legal
I'm thinking about a street car
I'm thinking
almost nothing I do is a street car
where is this guy at
when you're talking to me
if you say car
that means race car
not fucking a street car
okay
I'm like you know a street car
that's crazy
where's he at
yeah I know
okay so
okay I got you
that's impressive though
for that year
2003 you said
yeah no it was super
it was super impressive
it was killer
it made how much boost
that's what I'm saying
like 55 pounds of boost
I said oh my god that's
I can't believe it lived
I can't believe it lived
but that also planted
a seed in my head
mm-hmm
and I hadn't really
I had been tuning
based on how I was taught
but I hadn't
it hadn't like
gelled into my mind
to understand
that it's really all about
physics
and you don't really
need to be tuning
you need to be calculating
ahead of time
and generating a map first
that should work
and then just tweak the
map to match what it
actually is
and the reason that gave me
a clue was because
I had only tuned it
to 38 pounds of boost
on the dyno
so how the fuck
did he just close the
wastegate and run
55 without tuning it
and it didn't blow up
because
if the ECU
is doing the
calculations correctly
and you've done
a good enough job
with the fuel map
when you're tuning
as long as you get it
right somewhere
and you run out
of a capacity problem
with your
fuel delivery system
either from the pump
and the regulator
standpoint
or the injector
and that slope
if you've got it right
it'll be right everywhere
else
within reason
to the point where
at least won't blow up
and that job gets a lot
easier with methanol
but so then that's how
that's how not then
but that's planted
the seed that like
hey wait
there should be
a way to calculate
this
because it's doing it
right and
what's going on
in the background
with a mo-tech
at that time
you could adjust
something called
a manifold pressure
compensation
so the concept is
when I run it
and I run it at sea level
it needs X amount of fuel
to run at the correct
air-fuel ratio
if I then go to
twice the
air density
in other words
if I go to 2 bar
keep the temperature
the same
then I should just
simply need twice as
much fuel mass
to run at the same air-fuel ratio
so therefore
your density compensation
is literally
one to one
with air pressure
so that takes
the density part
of the equation
out of the picture
and now all you
have to worry about
is the volume
so if the engine
achieves more
volume flow
at twice the pressure
it's going to require
a bigger
number in the fuel table
you've already got
the density accounted for
particularly if you do
both a manifold pressure
and a manifold temperature
now you have
the air component
of the air-density
equation figured out
the only you're missing
is the water vapor
which isn't hardly
any percentage at all
even from
completely dry to
the wettest you could
ever be
it's only about
5% swing
you can fix that
with a lambda sensor
level of what you're
measuring with
but the point is
if you do the pressure
compensation in the background
which is just simply
the ideal gas law
very simply
more double pressure
double fuel
and then you do
the air-temperature
compensation based on
what the change in air
temperature is
for any given pressure
what that change
in density is
you've got
the density part
of the equation
solved
the speed part
of it comes from
the crank
and you look at
the reference of
those two intersection
that you need to put in
right
so if we
if we achieve
more volume flow
of the engine
we have a bigger number
in the table
if we achieve the same
volume flow
at twice the density
we need the same number
in the table
right
if I haven't changed
the volume
I'm at the same RPM
and the volume
hasn't changed
on the engine
and only the density
has changed
and I'm measuring
the density
and I'm
adjusting for the density
then I need
the same number
for the volume
to work
it'll work out
100%
and by the way
what you're trying to derive
is mass flow
right against engine speed
that's why there's something
called a mass air flow
sensor
yeah
if you run a mass air flow
sensor
you don't need a shanty
literally
you set the air
fuel ratio you want
at any given
mass flow
and RPM
and
unless there's
an error in what it's
measuring
it derives the correct
amount of fuel
and runs at the correct
air fuel ratio
under all operating
systems
a lot of information there
cool
alright
so what I want to know
is what do you think
from your experience
what do you think
the best engine of all time is
that's a hard one
best of all time
well
I gotta tell you
let's see
what's really
what's really intriguing
is a couple of things
about internal combustion
engines
first of all they've existed
for
at this point
100 and probably 50 years
and we are
still
finding ways
to improve them
and part of it's because
they're so completely
fucking inefficient
in the first place
I mean you basically
for the amount of energy
you're putting in
you're only getting
about a third of it
to actually
put to useful work
the rest of it
makes heat
and goes out
the exhaust
and heats the atmosphere up
so I think that's part of it
but it's
it's really cool
that
well I mean
people like me
and everybody in the
industry can have jobs
still trying to refine
and make things better
and we're
but it's also
a little bit
humbling
to think of
all of the
all of the effort
that's been put into
making these engines
as efficient
as they can possibly be
and then look back
to someone like
Harry Ricardo
you know at the beginning
of the last century
who already had
all of this shit
figured out
using
no data logging
equipment electronics
you know it was
all some
you know
hook an arm
cylinder with another cylinder
and put a pencil
and let it
draw a graph
on a piece of paper
to get a pressure volume curve
and you know
that kind of technology
that they didn't have
and like the
Offenhauser engine
the Offenhauser engine
was a fantastic engine
to run boost with
because it had no head gasket
why?
because if you don't
have a head gasket
it can never blow a head gasket
right?
Brilliant
simple or keep it simple
stupid right?
if it's not on the car
it can't be what's wrong
so the
the offy engine
the cylinder
bolted to the crank case
at the bottom
and the cylinder
and the head were one piece
so to machine the valve seats
you have to go up through the bore
right
and machine the valve seats
from the bore side
so that makes it a pain
in the ass to build
right
but once you've done that
now the piston's in there
there ain't no head gasket
it's a base gasket
and there's nothing to leak
above the piston
that's why they ran them at Indy
and that's why they could run
fucking 75 pounds of boost
on them at Indy
and not break them
interesting
okay
so I would say
of all time
I mean look
there's probably better engines
but the offies are pretty fantastic
for when it was built
four valve
bad ass
that's probably the right way
other than serviceability
that's probably the right way
I love that you said that
because it's
it's so different
from what everyone else would
probably say
they probably say some four cylinder
Honda K Series
B Series
RB 2J
you know
3S GTE
all these crazy
you know four cylinders
keep in mind the oftenhouser
was built for a specific purpose
which was racing
right
the rest of these engines
are they're all built
for a specific purpose
purpose also
which was a fucking
road going passenger car
that made fucking 200 horsepower
yeah
the fact that you can take
any of those engines
and make the kind of power
that we can make now
is fucking unbelievable
you couldn't possibly ever
in your life
go get a stock
big block Chevy
small block Chevy
Ford and I'm a Chevy guy
yeah
Chrysler
you're not going to
get in any stock
fucking engine like that
and making ten times
the horsepower that it was
supposed to make when
they designed it
would ever live
okay
now what do you think
the worst engine of all time
is
hmm
that might be a little bit
harder
yeah I mean look
the thing is
like they were all
all of them are
like a flat heads
a pretty terrible engine
okay
from the standpoint of
moving air in it
but they were trying to
make 80 horsepower
so
you know what I mean
they had a different goal
so yeah
I don't
there's not really
I don't
I can't really think of
one that I don't
that I have
and then you know
when you're
when you're adapting
an engine that was
engineered to do
something in a road
going car
and trying to use
an erasing application
that's a little bit
your fault for
trying to use something
that it wasn't intended
to be used for
if you pick one
that's inherently
got a problem
that's not really
the engine's fault
that's your fault
for being dumb
right
most people will say
this motor is junk
because you know
you can't make
certain amount of
power on it
because I'm trying to
make SR 28
make 2,000 horsepower
yeah but so
but so then here's
my argument to that
who the fuck is forcing you
to use the inferior one
you are you dumb ass
like you want to use
that one that's a piece
of shit then fucking
use it
why would I use that
I want to use the best
one I can find
yeah
why work hard
this used to
always happen
in sport compact
or even if you
make a big dyno
oh yeah but you're
spraying it
well fucking who cares
is there a rule
it's legal to use
nitrous and I'm
using it and you're
me or you
it's legal
yeah it was legal
yeah that's
that's the argument
it's always it's always
going to be
but I did it without nitrous
oh really there's extra
points for that because
I don't see where that
shows up on the scoreboard
I don't understand
or the same thing with
boost oh yeah but you
had to run 60
we did it 38 pounds
well who cares
why put a fucking
turbo on that can
make 60 pounds boost
and then I run 35
oh man I'm sure you've
been in the middle
of a lot of these
arguments back and forth
yeah yeah
you just like
I'm just the guy
you were involved
in the vq build
right also
actually two
two one of them
was Vinny 10
right performance motorsport
I think New York
and then the other
one was Carl
because Carl took the
RB out after
I don't know a year
or maybe not even a year
and started working
on the vq
so yeah I worked
on those two projects
and then Vinny's
one ended up getting
sold to these guys
in England
okay John Bradshaw
and he brought the car
over when
performance motorsport
sort of disbanded
and he bought
I think he bought
actually
and I think
there was maybe three
and I think one went
to Australia
it seems to me
but I can't
I can't quite remember
and maybe I have it
a little bit crossed up
but for sure John Bradshaw
had one
and then I helped
John Bradshaw
a little bit
when they were
like revising the setup
and like new turbos
it came back
to New York
and I ran it on the dyno
with like
I remember we switched
it to injector
ID 2000s
because that was
the big injector
at that time
before that had
or challenges
that you face with that
I mean I mean
if you face any challenges
tuning that car
no I mean the tuning part
is not that hard
but both of those
in both of those cases
both engine builders
had to solve problems
like because the blocks
once again
you're trying to make
fucking ten times
the horsepower
it's engineered for
and the problem with
like Nissan
and some of those
other manufacturers
they do a really
effective job
of analyzing
exactly how much
material they need
for the right
for to do this job
and they don't
it's just cost more
and it weighs more
so the block is meant
for 300 horsepower
we'll make sure
it can withstand
maybe 350
and then we're done
so I know the blocks
specifically
specifically were a problem
and they used to
have to weld
the blocks up
all over on the outside
and the inside
and then remachine them
and fucking
then machining them
was a problem
because they had warped
all over the place
and getting the bores
back straight
and the cranks straight
that's a
interview Carl Stevens
interview Vinny 10
because they had
a problem
I didn't
like I was just in charge
of making sure they ran right
and that was it
based on what you said
before in terms of how
engine works
and it doesn't matter
what platform it is
it's kind of like
well then you have
the same mindset
going into any other
engine platform
tuning it
yeah because
once again
there's no where
I enter
what I don't
I don't type in
the engine
this is a SR20
what the
ECU needs to know
is what's
the displacement
and then what's
the displacement
right
it needs to know
what the efficiency is
at any given RPM
and it's original
displacement
so it can calculate
what the mass flow
should be
and then put the correct
amount of fuel into
match
and that is precisely
how a mo-tech
M1 ECU works
you literally
enter
the number of
cylinders
and their displacement
it then
looks at the
map sensor
and the air temp
sensor and derives
air mass
and sorry
air density
and derives
the air mass
and then looks at the
correction table
which is the VE table
that tells it
what the efficiency is
compared to 100
and then it says
what's the air
fuel ratio goal
and the air
fuel ratio goal table
and based on the
mass of the
fuel that you've entered
because you enter
the fuel specific
gravity and the type
then it can say
we have X
air mass
and we want
this air
fuel ratio
with a fuel
that is a stoic
X
right so we want 80%
of 6.4
which happens to be
the stoic number
for methanol
and the specific gravity
is 792
right so
now we know
the precise
mass of
fuel we
require based on
the air
fuel ratio
so then we
take that answer
and work backwards
into a
linearization table
for the injector
that is
the characterised
flow of the
injector
at any given
pulse width
it says
I need this flow
volume
based on the fuel
density
to arrive at
this pulse width
so command
two milliseconds
to that injector
to get that
correct amount
of fuel in the engine
so I was talking to
another
colleague of mine
a guy that
I used to
compete against
and when I was
younger
you know would probably
wouldn't really
want to talk to him
because like
he's part of the other
team or whatever
jokes better right
been around forever
and now
that's
concerned about
building our reputation
because we've already
built them
we find we have
a lot more common ground
than we ever
thought we did
but anyway
I was talking to him
I said look
because I was trying
to
I was trying to use
the analysis
software to under
like the engine
since I'm a kid
I've been thinking
about it
I was telling him this
I have like
a little movie
in my head
when I think
about an engine
so I can think
about the
engine
so I have a little
movie I can watch
that just
instantly shows me
what's going on
with the valve
on the intake side
of the exhaust
or the inlet manifold
pressure exhaust manifold
pressure
I just
I can just roll this
movie around
and
I mean
I can't
come up with
complex answers
but for the most
part I can
just roll the engine
to any particular
point in the cycle
that we're talking
about
and visualize it
in my head
because I'm trying to
get the engine to work
and the car won't work
and if you're tuning
a drag race car
and you haven't run it
on the dyno
then you're going to
tune it by what it does
down the racetrack
and if the car won't
go down the racetrack
you can't tune it
and if the tune isn't
there the car won't
go down the racetrack
I mean it's like
this give and take
this circular loop
that you're stuck in
so I've only
had to learn
the car side of it
because
I'm trying to do
my job
doing the engine side
and the car won't work
and I happen to
do it
but that's how
so the point that I'm
trying to make is that
I have this movie
I can watch in my head
and I'm pretty good
on the engine side
but I'm not that way
on the chassis side
I can't visualize it
I don't have that
movie to work with
and everything is
a question
and I do the
typical fucking
well this should
mean that
and this
I don't know what to do
which is why
I was normally
working with another
expert that knows
that part
because it's way
easier to achieve
your goal
but he tunes on his
podcast
a year and a half ago
he's a tuner as well
and he had mentioned
that a tuner
is not tuning your car
basically
his philosophy
is you're diagnosing it
basically going through
everything making sure
all the sensors are good
everything's done
correctly
all the lines are
connected properly
and then tuning the car
obviously
but that's
basically a tuner's job
to make sure everything's
running there
you're not just
going there
open up a laptop
and just say
all right
I'm going over the basics
every single time
I say this all the time
usually I'm setting up a car
right
or for the dyno
it's something I haven't been
through and everyone's like
I mean the first thing is
I tell somebody
look if you want me to set
your car up and get it
running
book me for two days
day one we'll do it
your shop
I'll do all the setup
and get everything
we'll get it running
100% perfect
and then we'll go to the
dyno
if you want to do it
the other way around
you're going to pay me
and the dyno
and then when we find
something wrong
you've paid us both
but always tell them
just so you know
we're not going to do anything
for like
you're going to be like
what the fuck are we doing
because I'm going to go
through every single piece
that is connected to
the stuff that we're doing
and verify all of it
I'm not taking a map
from some other car
that I put in
and like I'll just
make an adjustment
and fucking go
I'm going through to make
sure that every parameter
in the ECU
and the problem with that
is that with an M1
like I could probably run
through a completely blank
and setup
maybe not super complex
M800
which is the predecessor
to the M1 series Motec
okay
I could probably do
a base map
for an M800
in
25 minutes
and it would be ready
to start and run
with the exception of
check the timing to make sure
that the crank angle matches
right
and just verify
the sensors all work
before you try and start it
and then it'll start
and run an idle
and you can drive it
to the dyno
but they don't give you
base maps
based on the setup
or the engine basically
I would do it all
like on the fly
I'm telling you
I'll take a blank one with nothing
and set it up for what it is
on the fly
and because
I'm going to be grabbing pieces
and bits
that need to be in there
in every single one of them
right
and then turn the M800
into a true VE
or close to true VE
style control
right
and do a bunch of math
in the background
I need to know your engine
size
I need to know the fuel type
right
I need to know what you're
doing with it
I have the experience to know
where to run the ignition
advance
and I have the knowledge
with the injector flow rate
how to calculate
what the pulse width
needs to be
the base number
so you just assume the engine
is perfect
which it's not
so guess what
if you assume the engine
is perfect
and you fuel it
based on the fact
that it's perfect
then when it's not perfect
which way are you going
to be on the air
fuel ratio
go back to this
we have X amount of air
mass
right
we know we want to mix
this at 12 to 1
compared to fuel mass
okay
okay
we have an air mass
no
what it is
or we're assuming
what it is
because we're assuming
it's perfect engine
so we want this air mass
in proportion to this
fuel mass
at 12 to 1
so if I put that amount
of fuel in
and I assume the engine
is perfect
and it's not perfect
it's less than perfect
which means my air mass
is less than
a perfect air mass
right
am I going to end up
rich or lean
you have less air
so you're going to
end up rich
correct
right
it's perfect
fuel it
as though it's perfect
you can start it up
and run it at full power
and the only way you're wrong
is if the engine
is more perfect
than perfect
like in other words
it's 110 or 120%
volumetric efficiency
right
so but you could cover that
up by just saying
well then fuck it
I'll just assume everything's
120% perfect
and I'll always
end up rich under
every condition
because nothing's
ever better than 120
or 130%
volumetric efficiency
when you consider
the density
of the air in the
background
it's a two-bar boost
right
it's got more than
its swept volume
now the volume's the same
but the density's twice
but if you're accounting
for that in the background
and all we're talking about
is the volumetric flow rate
of the cylinder
then
it's not going to be
better than about 130
I've been doing this
25 years and I haven't
seen one that's
better than that
that's actually better
than that
that's not an error
created by some
other thing
that gives you
a false value
right
right
wow
so so much
I want to say
thank you so much
welcome to my world
yeah man
I mean
there's so much to think
about but since you've
been doing it for so long
it's just second nature
some of it is
but it's still
I'm always thinking about
why I'm so interested
in it
look if I win the lottery
I'm going to be doing
this anyway
I'm still going to charge
everybody
I might be a little
bit more picky
right
but yeah
like I love what
I'm doing
it's fan
it's way better
than a real job
on its worst day
I'd remember it
the next morning
now it doesn't work
I have to fucking
write it down
or send myself a text
or send my wife a text
or you know
otherwise it's gone
and I can't
I don't get it back
so I have been
doing that
since I was 14
that's why
I'm where I'm at
because I haven't
stopped thinking
about it
in some capacity
since I'm 14
there's levels
of this stuff guys
and there's a reason
why he's here
because he's the man
Shane T
so if anybody
wants to work
I'm not sure if
obviously you're not going to
work let's be real
you're not going to work
on every single project
you may have to choose
oh yeah
I cherry-picked
that's of course yes
but if they do want to
get in contact with you
what's the best way
best way to reach you
all the traditional ways
email
ShaneTek
at yahoo.com
that's like my first
and last name
S-H-A-N-E-T-E-C-K
at yahoo.com
you can find me
tuned by Shane T
on all of the various
social media channels
as well as
Shane Tek Limburg
on Facebook
send me a text
at area code 7143185845
or give me a call
and go to my voicemail
and then I'll probably text you
and say I'm in the middle of tuning
I'll call you later
or whatever
and go that route
okay
you can try my website
tunedbyshaneT.com
aka motorsportcontroller.com
awesome
well thanks again
for your time
I know we went a little over
I didn't even realize
it was 3.30
but you got to get
to your
off-shore race
so hope everything
goes well for you
and safe travels man
keep listening and watching
continue to keep listening
and watching
also make sure you guys
head over to streetoffer.co
to copy your merch
and we'll catch you
on the next one
more tuned by Shane T
and you can get your
tuned by Shane T merch
oh yeah you can do that too
yeah whatever the website is
hey thanks a lot
for the opportunity man
I really appreciate it
and I love working
in the racing industry
and it takes
someone like you
promoting the racing industry
to keep people
spending money
so that I can have a job
so thank you
for what you do
I appreciate it
I appreciate the kind
we're seeing
see you guys on the next one
peace
bye everybody
this May
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