A couple months back I ran across a website where the company sold hardware/software that would allow you to measure combustion pressure relative to crank angle, especially useful for blown and nitrous tuning. They also had hardware/software to measure intake/exhaust port pressure waves. Since then I have found out that their base system costs $2495 complete and I downloaded their demo at www.tfxengine.com\DemoCD2.html Very informative. After watching the detailed demo, and contrary to what I was told by certain members of this forum in the past, it seems to me that anyone with a good understanding of how engines work would not have a problem using this equipment to their advantage. Of course maybe some people just don't have a good understanding of engines ! Or else they don't want others to get an advantage.

 

I agree with you. While the price of the equipment was prohibitive for the "casual" or hobbiest tuner, it looked like it was practical for a professional. I'd like to see the results of tuning and timing adjustment using pressure transducers versus the "old school" method of trial and error on a dyno. I bet a good tuner could really improve the torque curve across the RPM range with such a tool. Then again, I'm just a keyboard tuner...

 

That is cool stuff. The trick is knowing what "ideal" is for the evo engine. In other words lots of R&D is still needed to build a knowledge base for each engine. It is a quantifiable way of charting differences and would be great for exhaust manifold design among other things. I love dat' chit

 

I recently heard about this, and actually was trying to figure out who e-mailed me regarding this because I had come across it (coincidentally) not too long before..

This actually isn't new.. I'm fairly certain that R&D and Engineering of engines have used this type of technology to find good designs for intake and exhaust manifolds.. I have to look into this product more closely.

I do agree that anyone with a good understanding of how an engine works, the relationships of the components, and of course, if you understand that there is a difference between cam timing and ignition timing, or Crank angle and Cam Angle, you can learn to use these tools.

And because I'm insane, and will be building a brand new engine.. I'll likely contact this company and see what it has to offer (and if its a worthwhile investment) for my tuning.

 

Combustion analysis has been around since 1930's!

They actually rigged up a camera to take pictures ofth flame propigation @ every 2.4 crankshaft degree! They took photo's through a crystal glass cylinder head! They had to clean the glass for taking photo's @ specific crank angles........Talking about having time on your hands!!!!

The research was done by Gerald M Rassweiler & Lloyd Withrow. I am cetain you can find an sae paper detailing their methods & findings...

 

Yep, actually the SAE Paper was what I had come across.. Its nice to see the technology is finally becoming something somewhat practical and affordable to use.

 

I think the ultimate would be a "low cost" (ie <$500-$1000) integrated pressure tranducer/spark plug that outputs a scaled 5V signal. This would make it very easy to integrate with various engine management systems.