Psycho, thanks for your response. I would like to give you the example of my MX-5. A friend of mine wanted more power from his but did not want to pay anyone for it. He rigged up a turbocharger set up himself and when finished and tuned properly this 116hp car, that delivered about 90hp at the rear wheels, was putting out 220hp at the wheels or about 285 at the crankshaft.
But the turbo system was unreliable and kept blowing seals, plumbing would come loose, and the ECU tuning was amateurish so the car would not run properly most of the time.
So if amateurishly done, its a bad situation.
But then you also have an MX-5 tuner called Flying Miata that is in the business of modifying this car. THeir max version puts the 1.6L MX-5 at 300hp (crankshaft) and it is dead solid reliable, street drivability is unaffected, it runs on premium gas, and the fuel economy is decent unless you use the power all the time. And this is without touching the internals of the engine. IF you choose to touch the internals, they will build an engine with forged low compression pistons, forged piston rods, reinforced head bolts, strengthened crankshaft elements. THen the boost can be turned up from 12 psi of the standard engine version to 15, 18, or over 20psi, and the car's put out an easy 400hp. from a simplistic 1980s engine design.
How did they do this. By doing a good thorough engineering job, and lots and lots and lots testing including on the racing circuit. They had or developed expertise in engines, forced induction, heat transfer, and ECU programming.
Today's cars in India, many of them, have engines far more advanced than the old MX-5 lump. They have much more advanced metallurgy, superior head designs, advanced electronics controls, and there is no reason that a skilled tuner could not get these engines to be reliable while producing 50% to 150% more power than stock, without touching the internals.
Of course all this R&D work and testing and use of quality components costs money. For the MX5, you can get low pressure Turbos that boost power by about 30% for very cheap, intermediate turbo and supercharger set ups, and the uber powerful systems I mentioned above. costs range from Rs70,000 to Rs 2.2lacs, not counting labor. at the low end of that that you get a basic small 6psi turbo, no intercooler and a piggback ECU. at the high end you get a bigger 12psi turbo , intercooler, advanced replacement custom ECU, high flow injectors, hi flow fuel pump, intake exhaust, etc. All of this is for engines without any internal modifications. Of course for a car with this 12psi turbo, you also need to invest in clutch upgrades, brake upgrades, and suspension upgrades, so that drives up the price by another lac or so.
It seems that tuning in india is limited to race cars that don't have to last long or be trouble free for long, and the attitude in India is that modification is not suitable for road use.
But this is not true. the 120% rule is not true if the people doing the tuning has the expertise and they put in the time to do testing and ensure reliability. |