Do Inexpensive Performance Meters Work? Car & Driver conducted this (Linky) test in 2005. They pitted various off-the-shelf performance meters against the proven Vbox to check their accuracy. The Products tested:- Escort: Passport G-Timer GT2
- Gold Coast Systems: Tazzo VPC
- Hamilton Performance Electronics: PocketDYNO
- Nology Engineering: PDA-Dyno
- Race Technology: AX22
- Tesla Electronics: G-tech/Pro RR
- Vericom Computers: VC3000
The Results:
The yellow bar is the actual drag strip timing. The closer it is to that, the more accurate the reading. 1/4 Mile times 1/4 Mile Speed Skidpad (lateral G's) Braking Their conclusion:
Not as accurate as the Vbox in most cases, but, with proper calibration, these can produce extremely accurate results. Remember, the Vbox costs around 10,000$, and these start from 100$! Also, the important bit is that it will show you the performance increase (or decrease as the case may be) each modification brings about.
For India, where there are no public dyno's available, something like this is really the only way to tell whether that last change you made actually shows up as a performance increase in the real world, and not just sounds or feels like its improved your cars performance.
Considering the amount of money some spend on souping up cars, why not spend a couple of 100 dollars more and get one of these.
You can read the detailed test of the individual products on The Car&Driver site |