FASTER THAN R50 V10 TWIN TURBO VW TOE RAG! (AWD KX-S Kluger) 7.10 seconds 0-100kph (+ FJ Cruiser) 6.84 seconds 0-100kph V6=Don Mega!!!!

[RICE RACING]

Following on from my note in setting up the MAP sensor tucked away in a thread I thought I would post up this little doco on AIR BOX modifications and how to test them out.

The idea was to improve the performance of my daily driver (FJ Crusier) without spending any real money for POD filters, intake kits etc etc.
My idea was to open up the air box's hidden power by reducing the pressure drop across the filter element, and the box and intake pipe itself. I have enclosed some pics of the hard mods done, as well as some of the actual testing showing the end results in measured pressure drops in the intake system (AIP air intake pipe pre throttle) and MAP (manifold pressure center of plenum).

*please for background have a read of my MAP sensor post* in the RX7 ecu thread steps to follow* this will describe some of the basics of MAP pressure and ambient effects and how to set up sensors and test them*

FIRST FJ Crusier air box mods

IT2 data, however AF is wrong off stock O2 sensors!, but shows what happens anyway on other aspects in the ECU

Stock performance test, NOTE this had 100millibar pressure drop

Interim power improvement stage 'green trace', unleashed a bit more from here :)

Testing of the reduction in air box restriction and showing just how good this mod is, in giving the engine as close to ambient air as is possible while still being well filtered

So I wanted to do a proper test to measure the pressure loss across an air filter at a high resolution, but also test the effect of an air box, K&N panel filter and induction pipe.

I have enclosed photos of the set up and results.
1GR-FE V6 (RR tuned engine) ~320bhp @ 5700rpm
K&N fitted air filter with modified Air Box (restrictions removed) and modified Air inlet pipe (resonators removed)

Parameters measured:
(units millibar for high resolution) 1 mb = 0.0145psi

*Ambient pressure

*MAP (center of inlet plenum)

*AIP (air inlet pipe just before throttle body) this is the measure the pressure drop caused by the K&N, Air Box, Air Inlet Pipe.

Other parameters shown,
*rpm (taken off COP coil-)
*acceleration IMU data, and GPS derived (zeroed)
*power
*ambient temperature
*TPS AP1 from the electronic throttle
*GPS height

SET UP:
pressure sensors (one to plenum) one to air inlet pipe pre throttle

another view

rpm pick up and inlet pipe pressure point

front view air box housing K&N with internal air flow mods :)

the don mega testing gear on board!

NOW for the results, these are an eye opener!
I improved the power output of this engine by spending F*CK ALL MONEY, all I did was trim the AFR by changing the air path to the AFM (not the subject of this thread but so to give context) the air box has some bigger openings in the bottom of it, and all restriction internally have been removed, also the restrictive paper filter was f*cked off, and replaced with a TRD/K&N oiled type cotton filter.

What is critical here is the have absolute pressures all calibrated and zeroed during the ANALysis, to see accurately what is happening out on the road

Image of all sensor pressure channels zeroed to ambient reference.

Pull in 2nd gear to ~100kmh, check pressure ref line just before start of test, note AIP and Ambient same pressure.

Detail screen shot with report of pressure difference to follow (first graphical representation, ref line at max power.

Report of pressures, and pressure drops to ambient reference between line points (averages taken)

Now you can see that not as much pressure is dropped across these parts are you might think. maximum of around -30mb = around -0.43psi
If you take a close look at the graph you can see actually that there are quite a few zones at the peak power point where the pressure in the plenum is actually greater than ambient (obviously a tuned point, dynamic effect). There is very little pressure loss across the air filter, air box, inlet pipe as shown by the AIP figures.

Also of note there is positive pressure in the air box when lifting off at 100kmh.

Hope this is of some interest to people.

Testing these things is not as easy as it may seem in real world as the pressure units are quite small, and as per my other threads you know that ambient pressure changes with as little as 0.5m difference in height let alone weather effects, so there needs to be a reference sensor to do this job correctly and all need to be corrected to that before conducting this type of analysis.

OH FWIW comparing stock std induction system without any RR mods there is over 1.4psi pressure drop!!!! around 100mb, and this on its own translates to 10% less power just due to that factor alone. less pressure in the plenum = less air molecules = less power :)

Oh and RUN 4 on the same test show above ambient average in MAP! with matching power increase, def NO RESTRICTION here worth worrying about, all done on OEM parts :) no need for a BS pod filter and alloy pipe POS from K&N or some other people

NOTE: The simple way to read the pressure drop column is to divide the millibar figure by 10 then this represents the percentage of power loss (read pressure loss) over the Ambient reference pressure, so you can see there is only 1% to 3% left on the table F*CK ALL!

To save you effort I put it in units most here can understand and simply highlight curve of MAP (in gauge PSI) to rpm other figures are grey'd out
NOTE: on stock set up this registered over 1.2 to 1.4psi drop

Custom graph (graphical form) to engine rpm, showing Ambient pressure dropping to altitude and air inlet pipe pressure and manifold absolute pressure. 2nd gear pull up a hill.

[RICE RACING]

postscript:

I improved the power of the 1GR-FE and the performance by around 20%, went from around 150rwkw average 'stock standard' to 180+rwkw (my power measures are factual and much lower than a dyno dynamics for comparisons) but of most importance the power increases and averages translate EXACTLY for percentage improvement to ACTUAL improvement (reduction in time taken and distance taken to do a testing incremental on the Race Logic VBOX3i.

A large part of the performance gain was derived solely from analysis of the air box restriction and reducing that, but also trimming the AFR from low 10's to more chemically correct mixture for power production, this was done simply by detailed mods to the AFM flow path alone, the changes stayed within short and long term fuel trims so no errors are caused but end result was 'tuned' AFR to correct values, the IGN timing through my IT2 data capture was o.k. for power so no mods needed to be done to timing.

In this case just detailed mods to the air box and fuel trimming less than $200 spend inc procurement of TRD air filter, did the job. Forget the $30,000 worth of VBOX testing gear to prove it all LOL. Unlike a dyno claim its validated with performance proof too!

:)

[RICE RACING]

Quote

So why would the original setup have had so much scope for improvement? People that design cars are [generally] not dumb, so it must have been a concious design choice. Is there any great increase in induction noise?

Further to my point putting some numbers to it:

You can see the command from the ECU. With a TARGET LAMBDA value which in reality when I tested it was nothing like this, again my idea on this is to counter the effect of needing to cover off up to 20% ethanol in the fuel is not able to be done in a closed loop strategy so the engineers need to factor in the 'leaning out' caused by this with a target AFR to cover all cases of not only the fuel Hydro Carbon ratio but also the production spread of the AFM main load input.

Here is the data straight off the ECU.

So again with proper analysis of all this and strategies you can work around this an optimize the set up, I did this as mentioned and by running 10% ethanol content fuel, ironically the cheapest **** fuel has the right octane for this 1GR-FE as well as the small trimming of the actual delivered AFR at full load, with more than safe enough fueling to counter high temps high load running etc.

The good aspect of running the VBOX system is industry leading true speed trace, and positional accuracy, you can glean all kinds of pertinent 'information' one such action is the 'changing of gear' actually release of clutch and engagement of other clutches in the automatic gear box. This is shown as in instant command by the PCM to control solenoids in the trans body, but the VBOX shows it takes around 0.125 seconds for this action to take place physically as showing in acceleration. The ECU does this NOT by throttling the engine to reduce load BUT by drowning the engine in fuel and retarding the spark timing (again see ECU commands) this is reflected in the actual measure 9.6:1 AFR as measured!........ you can see the normal timing and fuel is reinstated when the engine speed matches the next gear road speed, during that transition phase though power (inertia) in the rotating assembly is transferred through the torque convertor and drive shaft to the wheels (see power and acceleration spike) this phase on a 1st to 2nd shift lasts around 0.450 seconds, upon which time normal 'power' is resumed to the drive train.

Pics below of what I typed:

clutch (gear) swap in box start

process end

FYI
http://performancedrive.com.au/2014-toyota-fj-cruiser-review-video-0704/
Timed 0-100kmh in 8.2seconds (VBOX)

Mine does 7.077 to 7.093 seconds on a std temp and pressure day, (4 tests in a row actually), and has a best time of 6.85 seconds
Stock standard after run in I recorded ~8.81 seconds with wheel spin on take wet take off (without that would have been ~8.2 second range), but did not care to test that further than the initial power reference run, since many others had done so and it was not powerful enough for me.

Edited November 16, 2016 by RICE RACING