He had 2 runs in each car. The 1/4 mile part was really rushed. The track did not stay open that long, and we could not reschedule due to conflict of schedule. How long does one person take to learn how their car launches? A full day at the drag, maybe a few times at a drag, but certainly not after 2 launches.

 

And to those who aren't in San Diego and don't understand the crappieness that is Carlsbad Raceway don't understand it's influence. It's really old, and just a bad track. There are potholes along the track....it's not level, you go down some and then it raises in elevation towards the end. It's really tough to launch here without slicks as the surface is pretty worn out and not in great shape. Shoot, you have to drive a long dirt road to even get into the track.

That said, there were a lot of Z's there, mine included who were racing as well and the times pretty much sucked for everyone. It was actually a pretty embarising day to be there in a Z. I mean, there were all these NA civic's running 11's and stuff (gutted with slicks and stuff). Shoot, some dumb SRT-4 neon that still had the dealer plates beat every Z out there I think. He may have had slicks though, can't remember.

But given how bad the track was you can't hope for much more. In places where NHRA doesn't exist and you don't have lots of money for actual nice tracks you will never be making good numbers. It's sort of the nature of the beast. No one who races in San Diego likes Carlsbad Raceway but it's all we have.....so it has to do. That honestly played a big part in the disapointing numbers.

If/When they do the TT shootout it might be better to look to Palmdale or LACR (even if the elevation is higher making it a slower track...at least you can get the cars to hookup.)

Or maybe what would be good is if there is some way of Sport Z borrowing some of the equipment to do good quarter-mile tests from another magazine. Something like their 5th wheel thing so you aren't necisarily tied to being at a certain track that is open to the public (making there be some wait between runs) and you could just find an airstrip somewhere that you can use for a couple hours to test with. But I don't know how feasable that is to borrow/rent equipment like that.

Oh, there was talk that the ati guys snuck some octane boost at some point too, didn't personally see it but some said they did so that could possibly show a little influence in numbers. Just saying what I heard.

Edit:
And I do want to say that it was put on as well and thanks to Sport Z for inviting people out. It was good to see the FI cars run and more people there lends credence to the track being sucky (for those that raced...most of the FI owners didn't as they wanted the car to cool between runs if they were going to go again) but to those that did, no one was getting any decent launches that day.

 

Spyre:

Thanks for describing it well. I have to watch how much i describe all of these varibles because i dont want to appear as a person just making excuses. Yes, the track is worst then I remember from being there last time.

I just feel that in describing it, the data becomes more useful to you guys. I am sure every test has some varibles they would like to change. This test is no different. All in all, I think it came out ok and I am proud we did it. I think we learned a lot with this test and I will do everything i can to take what we learned and apply it to our next test. As they say in teaching, you teach it 3 times. The first is planning it out, the 2nd, is actually teaching the lesson, the 3rd, is after teaching it and reviewing in your own mind. That process also applies to this as well.

Jeff - zland

 

Jeff,

The Supercharger Shootout article is great even if it didn't provide the results some people expected. While small, I found the dyno charts to be very interesting. It's unfortunate that two out of the the three cars experienced on-going detonation problems and the high levels of low end torque (especially Stillen's) tended to worked against the performance results.

It's obvious that a great deal of time and work went into generating this article. My hat's off to all involved.


DaveO
2003 G35 Sedan / DP / Willow / AT / Premium / Sport
350Z Engine Cover, T-Stat & Air Duct / Stillen CAI
GG 7-Wire H-G Kit / TS ECU / E-Fans
Street Edge TC / B&M Cooler / Stillen Exhaust

 

Thank you for making my point even more clear C5.

 

Thanks DaveO! Is anyone else having a hard time reading the dyno charts as published?

Jeff - zland

 

I got mine today. Yes it would have been nice to have larger dyno pics, -- maybe you could post them online at the website?

Regardless it was a great article and makes me happy I found the used stillen setup instead of one of the others.

 

Ditto with the dyno charts, also you should have had them all scaled the same way. Maybe scale them the same and overlap the curves?

 

I just got the ok to post the dynos in a larger size here thus you will be able to read them. I am at work and got to go home to get the file to post them. Hopefully I will remember to do it before I go sking this weekend.

Jeff - zland

 

We'll do one better. On Monday, we plan to have available on www.sportzmagazine.com the four dyno sheets as well as audio from each of the dyno runs. We also have video of one of the autocross runs. I'll post more details Monday.

Dave Bexfield
Editor, Sport Z Magazine
www.sportzmagazine.com

 

You know, I remember way back that Sport Z was whining about telling the results of the Z shootout before the article came out. People wanted just dynos and 1/4 runs.

It's funny how you didn't want to give up that info and it completly SUCKED!!! Dyno is all you got? That doesn't mean that much if you got 4 different installers and 4 different tuners.

I won't say anything about the driver of the cars, but I will say that the people that put him behind the wheel and published it are the ones that should be flamed. Poor Karl, he works for you guys. Don't hate on me, I'm just speaking the truth.

I WAS thinking about subscribing, but I'll just stick with the scanned copy I found on the internet. hehe.

 

You know your juvenille comments are really not constructive. It comes as no suprise that you quote The Fast and The Furious in your signature.

 

 

Here is the link to the dyno's posted on our webpage.

http://www.sportzmagazine.com/Z_Down...percharger.htm


Jeff

 

That was the fast and the furious? Darn I thought I made that up.

 

Thanks Jeff, so the ATI 7 PSI made more power than the Vortech 8PSI?

 

On the same dyno, same day, the ATI produced 8.9 more hp with those test cars. Read the article for details of time of test, temps etc but it was all calibrated to temp variations anyways....

Jeff

 

Opps, dbl post

 

And both were all over the page at the high rpms

 

i noticed that the Vortech was not tuned well, because the line was all over the place. If you do a search for vortech installs on this forum you'll find very smooth line on the dyno graph after tuning.