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Dyno's and wheel/flywheel powers, a few questions and pointers

8K views 21 replies 10 participants last post by  mk3_turbo 
#1 · (Edited by Moderator)
Hello all,

My brother has recently bought an ST TDCi Mondeo and is looking at tuning.

I've seen some fantastic power plots here.

However, there is a huge lack of actual power at the wheels figures.

The one well presented car with 202bhp has actually made 141bhp at the wheels before correction.
The massively high intake temperature there is forcing a huge correction.
In this case, going from 20degC to 70degC offers about 141bhp > 201bhp in pure correction terms... and there is no way the car would have made 201bhp at the wheels had it actually been intaking ambient air.

However we look at the situation, the correction figures are hard to believe... It's hard to take anything solid from the data and make a good decision from it.
I don't believe for a minute the car isn't stonkingly quick ;) But I do believe that the original corrections from an earlier dyno look much more in the realms of what the car is doing... the later dyno's with large intake losses seem to be distorting matters!

While looking for appropriate tuning I've had a good read here and all over for the ST TDCi Mondeo's, but really useful before/after wheels and corrected flywheel figures are hard to come by.
Do any other members here who have had remaps have wheels figures for their runs at all, especially from Dyno Dynamics rollers?

I'm trying to get a grip on what is really possible from these cars engines, because from what I have seen the tuners range from small mis information to big white lies! (Celtic Tuning for example, manage to even show you their HUGE corrections to big up their flywheel powers, while their wheel powers are fairly similar to their fellow tuners offerings)

As with all cars and tuning, a little transparrency is so important to get the best product you can...

Just from my experience, ALWAYS ask for a corrected readout of your wheels power (ie, the plot), as this is what your car is actually doing.
To find out what power you really have at the engine, a VERY good rule of thumb guide can be found here...

http://www.pumaracing.co.uk/coastdwn.htm

Try the sums with as many cars as you can and they work pretty damn well. I've had or taken over 10 turbo diesel cars to dyno's and these calculations work out almost perfectly, easily as good as dyno corrections that I have seen in my time!

So watch out out there... a Mondeo ST TDCi is making around 130bhp @ wheels standard, and 155bhp @ flywheel.
To hit 200bhp @ flywheel, you need about 170bhp at the wheels.
As you can see, the acceleration power losses go from 25bhp > 30bhp.

Thanks for reading this far. I hope I haven't come across as preaching to the converted, just I don't like to see tuners mis-informing people, or at least not giving them the information to make a GOOD choice!
There is nothing like being 100% happy you know what your car is doing, rather than always wondering if that dyno figure was a bit optimistic :)

Cheers

Dave
 
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#3 ·
I think my brother is already on here, but I'm not sure what his name is.

I'm just worried at some of the dyno's on that Maha roller set I have seen.

The intake temps are fairly huge, considering the cars are running OE intake systems and fans blowing into the front air dam.
All they appear to be doing is forcing a higher correction figure so the fairly moderate wheels figures are inflated up to near 200bhp!

I hope most people would try to find a reputable Dyno Dynamics roller setup and just be keen as to what the car is running at the wheels AND flywheel after their correction (because the ones seen here (Maha specifically) are corrected twice in essence, so you can't see corrected for atmos wheels/flywheel seperately)

More than anything it just makes you know that what your tuner has given you has been what they have promised... I have seen many unhappy customers with flywheel figures grow 40bhp, but wheels figures go up about 15bhp :(

As my brother tunes his car we hope to do lots of before/after testing and OBD diagnostics plots to show the benefits with as much data to back them up as possible and give as honest an appraisal as possible.
I hope he doesn't mind putting his cat back on so we can test it before, then after again with it back off ;)

Dave
 
#5 · (Edited by Moderator)
Ah that is fantastic then!

Well, I hope to bring some information on here that can stand up to some pressure when others question it's integrity and meaning.

Longer term, I am still deciding whether to invest in a Powergate R and develop the map file with my brother, so if that goes ahead we will be happy to show the results every step of the way!

First things first, a fair appraisal of the car as it stands in it's standard form.

Thanks for the welcome and I hope to be of some help to everyone in the coming months... with my brothers car as the guinea pig :D

Dave
 
#6 ·
Ha ha welcome Dave (my bro) we have been discussing mapping and the figures given on the site, as it stands looks like we could well be developing a map
 
#7 ·
[quote name=Mr Whippy]
Longer term, I am still deciding whether to invest in a Powergate R and develop the map file with my brother, so if that goes ahead we will be happy to show the results every step of the way!

Dave[/quote]

Excuse my ignorance but what's a Powergate R? Is that something specific to the Ford diesel engine? Or will you be able to develop maps for pretty much anything? Maybe the ST220? :naughty:
 
#8 ·
Scoops1972 said:
Mr Whippy said:
Longer term, I am still deciding whether to invest in a Powergate R and develop the map file with my brother, so if that goes ahead we will be happy to show the results every step of the way!

Dave
Excuse my ignorance but what's a Powergate R? Is that something specific to the Ford diesel engine? Or will you be able to develop maps for pretty much anything? Maybe the ST220? :naughty:
that would be good, im finding all this mapping busniss cinfusing lol :confused:
 
#9 ·
The Powergate R is a tool made by Alientech which can read/write the ECU data of the Delphi 2.2 TDCi ECU in the Mondeo.
There are cheaper options, but none so convenient. With a good file ready to write, the tool itself is totally user friendly and reliable.

A list of supported ECU's is here:
http://www.tuningtools.be/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=1_10&products_id=3

It is quite expensive, but ultimately getting GOOD tuning from a tuner is not cheap either. At least my brother and I will KNOW what our map is doing, and the benefits before and after!

If we can do a few other cars for ÂŁ200 a time after we have done a good few months of shake down testing and development then we have broken even and I'm happy!

Unfortunately Scoops, it can't do the ST220. I'm not sure what tool you need to do those. Probably not THAT much to be had from remapping them though. Exhausts and sports cats and possibly intake work are what will open them up. Don't most make a good 230-240bhp with a sportier exhaust on the dyno's anyway (thats genuine proven, not pretend 230-240bhp by the way ;) )
 
#10 ·
Welcome

Pretty daring, telling both sides could be wrong

One side being the customer and more than willing to believe he's got even more than what he paid for.

Other side, telling they are a bunch of liars and that they thrive on the naive thoughts of their customers believe huge BHP gains.

Nevertheless, there will always be believers and followers in both camps.

The ones that say no it is right, I'm even doing more than is conceivable.
And the nay sayers who will always question the good faith.

Ah who cares it's Christmas, it is a time of peace and reunion.

Will wait till Friday for the hostility.
 
#11 ·
[quote name=Mr Whippy]
Unfortunately Scoops, it can't do the ST220. I'm not sure what tool you need to do those. Probably not THAT much to be had from remapping them though. Exhausts and sports cats and possibly intake work are what will open them up. Don't most make a good 230-240bhp with a sportier exhaust on the dyno's anyway (thats genuine proven, not pretend 230-240bhp by the way ;) )[/quote]

I'd love to know just how much improvement the Milltek exhaust, Dreamscience Strategem, and now the Pipercross VIS has made to my car but I dare not take it to a rolling road in fear I'll just be told a load of bullsh1t!!! Certainly feels a lot better to me (certainly sounds a lot better!)but proof of improvement would be good!

Good luck with the development :L
 
#12 ·
Dyno's are almost totally useless unless you have a before plot and after plot from the same place, and you know that there is no bias on their behalf.

I use a G-tech Pro RR, it's a fairly simple tool, fairly meaningless in isolation wrt to power without weighing the car and being very precise (and even then it's wheel bhp, not crank), BUT, as a before/after tool it can detect changes of even 1% in torque comfortably by averaging runs... When developing a remap file, or checking mods same day (ideal) then it is VERY powerful! (Ie, on my current car I'll go out and do about 12 G-tech runs with 4 different maps and get four really good average plots to compare the changes etc)

It's great for doing intervals and 0-60/0-100/1.4mile though, and they can be fairly indicative of performance too.
 
#15 ·
Hehe yeah, any G-data > Excel gives you good power.

The G-tech works well for me though, it stages itself, has temp correction on the accelerometers, lots of tools/sheets to work with the data with, and has a few onboard viewing tools too.

I'd like a VBox Mini too, but it's all starting to cost too much for a hobby, though the sensor inputs for on-car sensors is a great feature!

Some fantastic tools out there today. If you know what the data is showing you, and know how to read it I think you don't really need a dyno to tell you things.
The only important thing is always having a reference point. Even a chassis dyno isn't the best absolute tool, and is often most telling with the before/after, and the same is true to the same degree of accuracy with g-devices and GPS ones.

I'm just not a big fan of these dodgy inertia roller correction figures. They are essentially worthless numbers. I may as well just tell you your power. 205bhp! Is that what you wanted to hear? Great :D ;)

Dave
 
#16 ·
[quote name=Mr Whippy]The Powergate R is a tool made by Alientech which can read/write the ECU data of the Delphi 2.2 TDCi ECU in the Mondeo.
There are cheaper options, but none so convenient. With a good file ready to write, the tool itself is totally user friendly and reliable.

A list of supported ECU's is here:
http://www.tuningtools.be/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=1_10&products_id=3[/quote]

Thats the same unit Celtic tunning use.
 
#17 ·
bip78 said:
Mr Whippy said:
The Powergate R is a tool made by Alientech which can read/write the ECU data of the Delphi 2.2 TDCi ECU in the Mondeo.
There are cheaper options, but none so convenient. With a good file ready to write, the tool itself is totally user friendly and reliable.

A list of supported ECU's is here:
http://www.tuningtools.be/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=1_10&products_id=3
Thats the same unit Celtic tunning use.
They seem like a very well developed tool. Anything that has the setup to allow home users to swap maps willy nilly without major issue (ie, bad writes etc) should be a great main tool too!

Just the initial cost, but when you consider how much a remap alone costs, then a few journeys back and forth to a tuner, etc, it soon becomes worth it if you can do a few cars.

The main consuming thing will be the development, but all good things come to those with patience/time, and I have plenty of both :)

Dave
 
#20 ·
Here ya go Peter:

 
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