TBs, CAIs, UDPs and other stupid shit people want to discuss

[Canada]

I'm not a complete idiot here (I'm in the top of my ASEP class [GM's tech training program]).....the guys that designed the UDP aren't monkeies either. I know what goes in an engine.....and any weird vibrations that thin piece of rubber is going to absorb doesn't amount to dick as far as I am concerned.

All I can say is that I've had no problems (i.e. alternator or crankshaft snapping) with it......nor can I think of ANYONE (between Beretta.net, BStuff.com, MyMonte.com, 60degreeV6.com, Corsicas.com, the Grand Prix boards, or any of the Grand Am forums) that has had trouble with it.

I've measured alternator output before and after the UDP.......you know what the difference was? About 1%. Darn.

The fact remains that you don't need a UDP. You drive your car to work or whatever....fine. The fact also remains I drive my car to work/school everyday....and am looking for cheap/simple mods. Hell, I'll bet most of you hardly drag race (street or strip)....other than Colin.

Oil/cotton gauze filters actually tend to filter BETTER than the paper ones.

I'd agree with you on the headers.......TOG's made 18 whp on a 99+ GA GT. Thats insane........big V8 boys would KILL for that sort of gain from headers.

Torque loss of an intake??? Where did you get THAT idea? Sure, the PEAK torque is lower.......look at the chart again there bud. Nice job, glad to see you're able to comprehend a dyno chart. The downward fall of tq/hp is the car coming off the 1-2 shift. Hell, if you think the first hundred rpm of that chart is actually the curve, I'll show you a chart where I'm making 180 ft-lbs at the wheels with the 3100.

I knew Tim's 3.33 trans took a shit shortly after he sold it (Did he ever get a trans cooler on it????).....but I wasn't aware of the ECM being retarded as well. Screw cobbling/hacking an ECM for that car together.....the thing (as do I) NEEDS a proper (fuel/spark curves, shift points, governor) reflash.

[SappySE107]

Actually, big block V8 guys get 40-50 hp out of an equal length tuned set of headers. Problem is most header companies make what fits, not what performs the best.

Lorenzo has dynoed the cone filter vs stock intake box and did lose a considerable amount of low end for a scarce top end hp gain. Acting like a smartass isnt a very good idea on this board. You may be the top dog at your school and other boards, but quite a few of us here talk from experience, not out our asses. Look at the placement of the cone filter you are comparing to stock. Lorenzo is talking about stock location for the cone in place of the box. You can run a hose from the stock box with a K&N filter in it for cold air and also get an improvement. apples to apples please.

The computer is a very important aspect of engine performance. With MAF, it seems that mods are better adapted for a greater scale than MAP based cars. The other major restriction are the exhaust manifolds, which completes the circle of this post....headers.

[v6h.o.]

Canada: im not saying the guys at FFP(EDIT, NOT FDP, Too many lettered companies.. i always get that bass ackwards.) are monkeys... but the one simple question is Are they Certified Mechanical Engineers? have they tested this product to ensure it cancels out and removes all crankshaft harmonics ??

have you ever seen write ups on the failure of cranks due in part from no harmonic dampner? have you seen pictures of crank failures from no harmonic dampner??

I have.
the stock crank pully and its rubber ring do actually do a big part in maintaining harmonics, they may not be comparable to any aftermarket "Fluid dampner" or "street dampner" or many of the other aftermarket Dampners out there on the market for the likes of v8's.

which is another point i'd like to make. why then if you feel there is no need for dampners on engines do you think there is such an aftermarket for these products? why is it every race engine you see on at the track wether it be a streetcar/weekend track racer, or a full blown drag only car do all engines on there still use some form of aftermarket dampner?

ha, typical smart-assed know it all ASEP trainee... :P
(i went through that training course myself years back)

[v6h.o.]

i dont know what happened to his page but this is a cached version of it. a very good read:

http://www.google.ca/search?q=cache:BzNhxG9XgPwJ:www.dinanbmw.com/html/danger_of_power_pulleys.htm+harmonic+crankshaft+failures&hl=en&ie=UTF-8

http://www.grapeaperacing.com/GrapeApeRacing/ttramblings/dampers.pdf

http://www.pacarsearch.com/stealth/udp.htm

[SappySE107]

what does FDP have to do with under drive pulleys?

[RacerX11]

I think he meant FFP (Fast Forward Performance), not FDP. Franz is getting a bad rep, and he isn't even involved

Marty

[v6h.o.]

why is it when i go to say the one i say the other...

yes i meant FFP.

[Rhedalert]

Look Larry , or Richard Kline or whoever you are:

How long has that underdrive pulley been out? 18 months at best? It's not like as soon as you put this simulated pulley on that the crankshaft will snap, but put some mileage on it and eventually shit will fail. Do you think GM would spend so much money and research on developing the correct balancer, when they coulda just slapped a solid metal one on there and call it a day? Your theory of saying it's just a crappy piece of rubber and does no good is like me saying that tire valve stems are little pieces of crap and do no good. *just because it's a little piece of rubber, that doesnt make it worthless, bud* Point is there's only a handful of people with these underdrive pulleys, and how long has FFP tested them? Hell, FFP's not even in the stock market and you trust their word on it...
Yes there's proof of loss of torque by just using a cone filter, and if I wanted to be cool, I could scan it and post OUR OWN DYNO SHEETS a million times, but I'm sure you still would neglect to see that, just like you ignored the detailed explanation of WHY spinning the alternator slower is a bad thing. So is it worth that 5hp?

[3100 MPFI]

When I built my 3100, I wanted to be able to rev it, so everything that I planned and designed when building this motor was so that the engine could be spun at high RPM's. I wanted to be able to SAFELY rev my car to 7000 RPM, and not have to worry about..... say..... The harmonic balancer blowing up and disentegrating (okay, a little excggeration there, but you get the idea).

When I dynoed my car, I did 3 runs. The FIRST, and THIRD were with the stock airbox. The SECOND was with a cone filter. Before you just jump the gun and say it was just a cone, and not a true CAI, then here is a little fact..... When I put the cone in, and the car was being run on the dyno, I had the hood OPENED, and a shop AC unit blowing DIRECTLY into the cone so there is NO WAY that there was any heat getting into this thing. It was seeing better conditions than it will EVER see on the road. The dyno results (going by an RPM dyno, not a SPEED dyno) show that there is a 6 HP INCREASE, but a 22 TQ LOSS. I am sorry, but I would rather have the 22 TQ than the 6 HP. It did not just shift the powerband DOWN like you said. It just plain was not there. If you want to say that I am reading the dyno wrong, then let me throw this at you. If I was reading the chart wrong, and decided to go by the SPEED DYNO for my max power, then it would read that I am making 258 HP AT THE WHEELS. My car has one hell of an HP surge when it SHIFTS GEARS.

I know that I am reading my charts right, and for the gain that you get with a cone, it just is not worth it for the bigger loss that comes with it. Now, I am just waiting for the next trip to Ben so that I can get it dynoed again, and this time, with the headers.

Oh..... And my engine is NOT STOCK. With the help of GPSE3400, Ben, GPXSS, and Rhedalert, it has been TOTALLY worked. The only thing that I did not do was the underdrive pulley (not that I ever planned on it).

[bszopi]

Its about time to split this thread since you guys have the urge to discuss this crap in a thread that has NOTHING to do with any of this... Anyway, here is a post I tried making earlier in the evening, but once again, the frickin firewall at work didn't like it....

Michael from FFP just actually finished up his BS in Mechanical Engineering, and usually you have to take the PE exam prior to graduation, therefore he could then be called a certified engineer.... We had a discussion similar to this at the 60V6 meet last year and Michael went in-depth about how they actually determined the best way to design the pulley. One thing that was discussed was the fact the, although aluminum, the UD pulley is close to the same weight as the stock unit. Granted, it doesn't have the embedded rubber piece people are talking about (I never knew anything about that piece), but it does maintain the weight, and therefore balance, at the end of the crank.

As far as aftermarket dampers.... I think there might be other reason involved as well. I know on my old 400SBC, we had a Fluidamper unit on there meant for a SBC, but the 400SBC was balanced differently. The car shook like a mofo because it didn't have the right damper on it. If the range of UD pulley out there weren't designed correctly, I'm sure that we would be hearing about vibration issues on our engines as well.

[gpse3400]

I swear it's figuratevly in one ear and out the other....

Well for the sake of this ego driven "stupid" thread I'll throw my friggen credentials around too, so be it. I'd like to say I have a B.S. in Industrial Technology/Automotive Management plus a AAS in Automotive Engineering plus a bunch of other fun fun fun certifications and what not. But what the hell do I know, I've had enough of this. I swear I have better things to do with my time than to get electronically insulted, cursed, and bitched at.

Initially trying to say something positive...I never thought a huge flaming thread would result......

thats what I get.......

[bszopi]

May to be mature Lorenzo.... you three are the ones that initially started the arguing/bashing, and now its you who is sick of being insulted? Yeah, that makes alot of sense. I could care less who has what degree in anything. Until I see an engine destroy itself due to just the non-rubber damped pulley, I'm going to believe that it was designed with enough thought to be safe for the engine.

[v6h.o.]

brad again... it has nothing to do with balancing or maintaining the correct weight to balance out the engine!!!
arghghghg.... what we are discussing is the torsional and harmonical issues possed on a crank from when the process of combustion basically acts like a sledge hammer on the crank and as we all know. smacking a piece of metal you get vibrations. to cancel these natural vibrations (wont feel them in the engine) this is the job of the dampner.

what FFP has is just a crank pully. there is no dampening effect or part to that pully whatsoever. it may be properly balanced and weighted right. but thats not the worrysome point.

[GPXSS]

I understand what you guys are saying about the tortional effects that the crank see's, and that they need to be balanced out (not necessarily cancelled out.. just absorbed)

What about the accessories that are rotated by the crank pulley? They are all attached via a rubber belt, which will inherently give a little... do you think those rotational forces would be enough? On the flipside of that, with those kinds of loads on the outer ring, will the rubber split point really have such an effect since the outer ring is so loaded up?

Personally I think 62mm is about right for what a 3100/3400 needs... 3400's and worked 3100's can also benefit from a 65mm TB

I also never dyno my vehicles with any filter or cold air pipe.. I disconnect the air pipe and in the case of my 3100, I use an air horn directly on the TB.

[gpse3400]

Ok here we go again.. I'm gonna hate myself for this.

I haven't started anything. All I said is that If you tried a TB and Downpipe You might actually like it. I never brought up pulleys and cone filter systems. As fars as being mature, go have a talk with the canadian from iowa. He brought up pulleys and intakes, overall he/she didn't like what I had to say and challenged me. I responded. And anything I've said has not been for the most part degrading or anything but just mostly in an attempt to explain my position. For 5 HP I have no clue why why this arguement has been pushed so far. As for as everyone else in agreement well I'm speaking for myself, but it's nice to have a backing nonethelss. Yet I'm still the only one getting attacked...... And if "WE" didn't care about degrees and certifications then YOU wouldn't've mentioned it as commodity to make the part more appealing. Dammit Brad why am I arguing with you!? I never argue with you! I don't wanna argue with you! I usually argue with ben! I'd love to withdraw and not give a complete damn but I'd rather we come to an understanding because we've known eachother. Make a note, in NOT so many words I keep saying do what you want in the end I ain't your papa, I only know what I know. I was challenged so I civily replied. Now its really gotten out of hand and not by my doing.

DAMN IT! Some of you people need to sit down read the whole thread before throwing car parts at each other!