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isn't as hair brained as you might imagine. I built my programs that way, the same programs that people have been buying for their cars and putting down really good numbers and A/F ratios with. It certainly isn't something I suggest that people go out and do on their own, but that's because I dont think that everyone has the capacity to do it safely. The dyno results have been after the fact. The thing about tuning is once you've been doing it for long enough, it comes second nature to you. Listening to the engine, watching A/F and EGT, and feeling the pull on your back. It can be argued that tuning a car on a dyno can get down to splitting hairs and putting you closer to the breaking point than you should go. With the butt dyno, you adjust more agressively until you dont feel any noticeable change and then put it back to the previous setting and leave it. I think this approach keeps you from trying to get that last 0.01HP more at the expense of an additional 100 degrees of EGT. You can tell when the engine is having issues with something you changed. Either it feels sluggish, you hear audible ping, EGT's climb too high, or you dont feel any change at all. The key to this is knowing what the limits are in different circumstances. That just comes with experience and I can't begin to count the time I've spent behind the wheel with a keyboard in my lap and my voltmeter in MAXHOLD mode monitoring the EGT's and the carputer datalogging everything going on under the hood. Reviewing the data and knowing what causes what and where you can get more power from is the same steps used on a dyno to tune a car. Except, the tuner has the advantage of two additional quantitative data points of which a street tuner only has a qualitative analysis of. You can feel power, you can also read a number on a paper. But dont think I am saying that dyno tuning is bad. Its the bottom line when it comes down to it. All I'm trying to say is that tuning it "on the streets" isn't as bad as one may imagine. It actually scares the piss out of you enough that you DONT get stupid with it. This has just been my experience also - I still wouldn't recommend ANYONE to tune their car in this manner simply for the fact that there are some morons out there who are stupid enough not to realize they really dont know anything about this. I know there are a lot of people who CAN do it this way safely and with good results, but its the morons I am looking out for with that statement. :)
[ ashleypowers.com ]
[ agpowers@bellsouth.net ] [ Zemulator Information Sheet ] When pigs dance, you better get it on video... "You never really learn to swear until you learn to drive."
-George Carlin
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