From the Editor

There is something which utterly frustrates me about the aftermarket auto industry. I've written about it before but it needs repeating - cos each repetition is new to people who have never before heard my views. And to what am I referring? The abysmal level of so many of the aftermarket performance goods, especially those items produced by the "little man" - y'know, small companies taking on the big guys.

It is the literal truth that of all the products that AutoSpeed has tested, more than half do not meet the claims of the makers. And I don't think that our sample has been particularly bad; instead I think what has been bad is the R&D and testing of the products by their manufacturers....

Take the latest product. Now, at the time of writing this, I haven't decided whether or not to continue with the AutoSpeed test. So, perhaps in addition to a column, you may well find an article in another issue of AutoSpeed that summarises our overall impressions of the product.

(In fact I have now decided to make those comments just an addendum to this column.)

And what's the product? Called the CMS Race Performance Road Dyno, it is a re-badged version of a US device. Basically, it's a small data-logging box that records ignition (or ECU tacho) pulses. You do some acceleration runs, logging the changing pulse rate, and then download that info into a PC. With some provided software, you are (apparently!) then able to draw power and torque curves for your engine. As you would expect, you need to enter into the software the details about the car's mass, gearing, aerodynamics, etc before any meaningful calculations can be made.

The cost of the little box plus a few leads and an inductive pick-up is AUS$330.

Now there's no reason why such a system couldn't work very effectively. Even if the actual quantification of the power being produced is in error a little (and it probably will be), the variations in power that are achieved by different modifications should be very clear. After all, if you have the same vehicle mass, gearing, stretch of road and weather conditions - and you accelerate faster - then you must have more power.

So, certainly a product worth a test.

But from our perspective, product reviews always require plenty of hours. In addition to testing the product, when we do a review we also need to photograph it, arrange for a variety of cars to use it, and then spend the time writing the review. So, no product review is a quick and easy story - none of 'em. Even if the finished story is only a 1000 words, the time that has gone into it is similar to that which it takes to do a full feature car story.

So when I received the box of goodies, my first step was to check on its condition (ie that nothing had been broken in the post) and then photograph the device. A few hours later, I scanned through the photocopied(!) instructions, soon realising that to get best results we needed a manual transmission car with exposed plug leads. (You can use an ECU pick-up on direct fire cars, but I didn't want to spend the time finding the right ECU pin in my car - not at the very beginning of the testing, anyway. That meant that using the supplied inductive pick-up on a plug lead was much easier. And the need for a manual trans car? An auto's torque converter introduces some other problems which I wanted to avoid if possible.) And of course, any car on which we did the testing it'd be nice to have comparative chassis dyno figures for as well.

So, to find a car. I called a staff member, but he didn't want to put his car on a dyno. Then I got onto an AutoSpeed reader who has a very quick Mazda RX7 and a host of friends with fast cars - would he like to do some testing? Angus MacMaster was keen, but was just about to head off interstate on business for a few weeks. That was no problem - I'd told the company concerned that we'd need the product for 8 weeks - and so I waited until he returned. We'd arranged to do the testing together one Thursday evening, and on the morning of that day I decided that I'd better make sure that the Road Dyno system at least worked - and so do a trial run on the auto trans Saab turbo. I arranged for my lady to take my Audi to work and leave her Saab behind, re-read the Road Dyno instructions, then plonked the stuff in the Saab. The inductive pick-up went on a plug lead, and the Road Dyno sat on the passenger seat, its flashing green LED telling me that it could see the ignition pulses. The car was already warmed, so I drove around the block, on one stretch doing a full throttle run through first gear.

Back home I unplugged the Road Dyno (leaving the engine pick-up lead in place) and went inside to view the data. The software - supplied on two floppies - was quickly loaded, then I plugged the Road Dyno into a coms port with the supplied lead. After selecting the right port, the software recognised the presence of the Dyno and starting to download that one run. But it didn't get very far, sucking up about one-fifth of the information before stopping. Shortly afterwards, a time-out indication came up and that was that.

I simply couldn't get the data from the box into the PC.

Hmmm, I then tried an older computer - same problem, and then an even older (486!) laptop. Identical behaviour in each case.

But it wasn't something as silly as a flat battery, was it? I went to the shop and bought another 9V battery for the Road Dyno, and repeated the whole sequence of events, including the on-car data gathering. Same result.

By now several hours had elapsed - time totally wasted.

I rang the distributor and told him of the problem. He promised to email some more software immediately - but when his email arrived, there was no attachment. That was concern enough (though the culprit later proved to be my ISP's virus hunting software) but the email's cover note was even worse: "Try this program. As I mentioned, it was written to stop the Time Out function on older computers, but as yet I have not tried it!!! Let me know how it goes."

WTF??

I am trying to review the product, not develop it for you!

Unfortunately it's typical of some manufacturers and distributors that they genuinely expect media like us to help them perfect their goods.... when in fact in a product review we're playing the role of the paying and critical consumer - and so the very last thing we feel inclined to do is help them out!

Mulling over this email, I wandered down to the car again. Seeing the sensing cable still in place I popped the bonnet, and reached in to remove the inductive pick-up from around the sparkplug cable. Remember, on this cool day the car had been driven only twice around the block, undergoing just two full-throttle runs. If the device was being used in anger you'd expect to do maybe 10 full throttle runs - and after driving the distance to a flat, empty road. But when I tried to release the clip on the pick-up, I found that it wouldn't come loose without a struggle. A closer inspection revealed that the plastic pickup had grossly distorted with the engine bay heat...

For Godsakes! How the hell else can you use an inductive pickup with this system without it getting hot?! It's meant to be under the bonnet while you're doing full-throttle runs!

Wasn't any testing of the pick-up done at all?

So right now I'm waiting for this new, apparently untried, revised software to arrive. But already the system hasn't got past first base - it doesn't work out of the box. Whatever the outcome of the finished test, on the basis of what was initially supplied, right now to me the product is a flop.

Yet another one.....

More of our most popular articles.

Useful parts for nothing DIY Tech Features - 6 October, 2009 Getting the Good Parts from Scanners! Changing the weight of electronically-controlled power steering DIY Tech Features - 26 February, 2002 Modifying Speed-Sensitive Power Steering A brilliant do-it-yourself handheld spotlight or bike headlight DIY Tech Features - 11 February, 2008 Building a High Performance LED Lighting System, Part 1 Beautiful and sophisticated, but was it a technological dead-end? Special Features - 30 June, 2009 The NS Savannah