who has the most powerful 3.6?
Discussion
There's lots of people going for larger capacities, but there's a lot of smaller engined cars going well and very reliably. So with this in mind I started looking at the 3.6 and it's performance prospects within practical constraints (money, cost, financial outlay and finally cost lol) oh and what would actually fit in the engine bay!
So far I've only been testing exhausts (with surprising results for all the wrong reasons!) .. the short inlets i trialled years ago but never did anything with, and swinging the cam timing about a bit.
Sadly there's nothing that really sets the world alight, and there's some booby traps you've got to be careful of. eg if you've fitted a large bore (tuscan S sized) exhaust you may be better of taking it off again .. no gains at the top end on my test mule and up to 10bhp lost at the lower end of the rev range.
I'd never been convinced by the Tuscan S cam timing either .. less lift on overlap .. when I first saw the TVR figures for the S cam timing I was convinced the person telling me had got it wrong. Well guess what .. the Tuscan S cam timing works really well! doh! In fact I've been swinging cam timing around all day and the best I can come up with loses me a bit of hp at the top end (about 5bhp) but has fattened the midrange up quite a bit (between 5 and 15bhp through the midrange) but losses at the very bottom and at the top, but only small.
And lastly I've had trouble replicating the original short airbox gains on my test mule but I think I've sorted what I need to do with it, space permitting.
Anyway this is he best compromise of exhaust, cam timing and inlet length that Ive come up with so far.
has anyone got a normally aspirated 3.6 with better power? The test mule engine isn't even in the best health either and I hope to break 380bhp with this engine before I call it a day.
Here's the graph for interest. Not bad for a little engine though
So far I've only been testing exhausts (with surprising results for all the wrong reasons!) .. the short inlets i trialled years ago but never did anything with, and swinging the cam timing about a bit.
Sadly there's nothing that really sets the world alight, and there's some booby traps you've got to be careful of. eg if you've fitted a large bore (tuscan S sized) exhaust you may be better of taking it off again .. no gains at the top end on my test mule and up to 10bhp lost at the lower end of the rev range.
I'd never been convinced by the Tuscan S cam timing either .. less lift on overlap .. when I first saw the TVR figures for the S cam timing I was convinced the person telling me had got it wrong. Well guess what .. the Tuscan S cam timing works really well! doh! In fact I've been swinging cam timing around all day and the best I can come up with loses me a bit of hp at the top end (about 5bhp) but has fattened the midrange up quite a bit (between 5 and 15bhp through the midrange) but losses at the very bottom and at the top, but only small.
And lastly I've had trouble replicating the original short airbox gains on my test mule but I think I've sorted what I need to do with it, space permitting.
Anyway this is he best compromise of exhaust, cam timing and inlet length that Ive come up with so far.
has anyone got a normally aspirated 3.6 with better power? The test mule engine isn't even in the best health either and I hope to break 380bhp with this engine before I call it a day.
Here's the graph for interest. Not bad for a little engine though
The car was already mapped (emerald ecu) with tuscan S cam timing and made about 350bhp before the latest mods. It made 366bhp when fresh last year so we're really 10+bhp down on where we should be I reckon, but i'm only reporting the numbers I'm actually getting rather than speculating what it *might* give.
spitfire4v8 said:
The car was already mapped (emerald ecu) with tuscan S cam timing and made about 350bhp before the latest mods. It made 366bhp when fresh last year so we're really 10+bhp down on where we should be I reckon, but i'm only reporting the numbers I'm actually getting rather than speculating what it *might* give.
It comes 350 standard out the box, whether you have cam timing or emerald ecu remap. I don't think they would increase the bhp anyway would they?Fancy updating this thread with your results? It'll keep everything in one place....
it is a big loss but then again the wheels were doing 150mph. typically my dyno would say 55/60hp losses but i only tend to run mine to 100-110mph. 383 is an amazing number from an exhaust and a remap and eclipses anything i have ever seen personally. I'm nearly 10hp down on that and I've spent 4 days testing everything i can think of so far that's easily changeable. great stuff.
spitfire4v8 said:
it is a big loss but then again the wheels were doing 150mph. typically my dyno would say 55/60hp losses but i only tend to run mine to 100-110mph. 383 is an amazing number from an exhaust and a remap and eclipses anything i have ever seen personally. I'm nearly 10hp down on that and I've spent 4 days testing everything i can think of so far that's easily changeable. great stuff.
Genuine question because I'm interested in how these things are calculated (and I'm not interested in casting doubt on any results), but the plot has a manual entry of 2.8% slip. How is something like that calculated, and seemingly with a large amount of precision?spitfire4v8 said:
it is a big loss but then again the wheels were doing 150mph. typically my dyno would say 55/60hp losses but i only tend to run mine to 100-110mph. 383 is an amazing number from an exhaust and a remap and eclipses anything i have ever seen personally. I'm nearly 10hp down on that and I've spent 4 days testing everything i can think of so far that's easily changeable. great stuff.
Just trying to work this out in my head hope you don't mind. I just had a look at my old graphs 2 different dyno's and both my runs were done at around 140mph and loss of 50-60bhp Why is there so much difference in loss from one dyno to the next?Cheers Scott
If my memory serves me well, while the car was at Austec for it's re-map it was also getting its M.O.T and 4 new wheels/tyres fitted
(but this was done after the re-map)
The rear tyres were way past there best and almost like slicks when it arrived there.
I guess this would account for the large loss through the drive train.
When I picked the car up I was commented that they had big problems with slippage and wheel spin while it was on the dyno, and in hindsight they should have waited for the new wheels and tyres to arrive before they re-mapped the car.
(but this was done after the re-map)
The rear tyres were way past there best and almost like slicks when it arrived there.
I guess this would account for the large loss through the drive train.
When I picked the car up I was commented that they had big problems with slippage and wheel spin while it was on the dyno, and in hindsight they should have waited for the new wheels and tyres to arrive before they re-mapped the car.
Edited by zooooom on Friday 1st June 10:34
spitfire4v8 said:
3.6 engine is much revvier than the 4.0S in my experience, seems more urgent through the gears, hene why Sags typically have CR box and shorter diff, but they both need revving to get the most out of them i think.
Is it not better to concentrate on power delivery between 3000-6000 rpm rather than top end bhp as acceleration is more often than not the requirement rather than top speed ??
Not meant to be criticism in any way - appreciate the work you're doing here - especially if you get more bhp out of CliveF's Sag when the fuelling issue is resolved - so I can benefit of course
spitfire4v8 said:
There's lots of people going for larger capacities, but there's a lot of smaller engined cars going well and very reliably. So with this in mind I started looking at the 3.6 and it's performance prospects within practical constraints (money, cost, financial outlay and finally cost lol) oh and what would actually fit in the engine bay!
So far I've only been testing exhausts (with surprising results for all the wrong reasons!) .. the short inlets i trialled years ago but never did anything with, and swinging the cam timing about a bit.
Sadly there's nothing that really sets the world alight, and there's some booby traps you've got to be careful of. eg if you've fitted a large bore (tuscan S sized) exhaust you may be better of taking it off again .. no gains at the top end on my test mule and up to 10bhp lost at the lower end of the rev range.
I'd never been convinced by the Tuscan S cam timing either .. less lift on overlap .. when I first saw the TVR figures for the S cam timing I was convinced the person telling me had got it wrong. Well guess what .. the Tuscan S cam timing works really well! doh! In fact I've been swinging cam timing around all day and the best I can come up with loses me a bit of hp at the top end (about 5bhp) but has fattened the midrange up quite a bit (between 5 and 15bhp through the midrange) but losses at the very bottom and at the top, but only small.
And lastly I've had trouble replicating the original short airbox gains on my test mule but I think I've sorted what I need to do with it, space permitting.
Anyway this is he best compromise of exhaust, cam timing and inlet length that Ive come up with so far.
has anyone got a normally aspirated 3.6 with better power? The test mule engine isn't even in the best health either and I hope to break 380bhp with this engine before I call it a day.
Here's the graph for interest. Not bad for a little engine though
Great result. I really like the characteristics of my 3.6 Tuscan, roughly what £££ takes it to the output you've achieved and does it still retain the cammy behaviour? So far I've only been testing exhausts (with surprising results for all the wrong reasons!) .. the short inlets i trialled years ago but never did anything with, and swinging the cam timing about a bit.
Sadly there's nothing that really sets the world alight, and there's some booby traps you've got to be careful of. eg if you've fitted a large bore (tuscan S sized) exhaust you may be better of taking it off again .. no gains at the top end on my test mule and up to 10bhp lost at the lower end of the rev range.
I'd never been convinced by the Tuscan S cam timing either .. less lift on overlap .. when I first saw the TVR figures for the S cam timing I was convinced the person telling me had got it wrong. Well guess what .. the Tuscan S cam timing works really well! doh! In fact I've been swinging cam timing around all day and the best I can come up with loses me a bit of hp at the top end (about 5bhp) but has fattened the midrange up quite a bit (between 5 and 15bhp through the midrange) but losses at the very bottom and at the top, but only small.
And lastly I've had trouble replicating the original short airbox gains on my test mule but I think I've sorted what I need to do with it, space permitting.
Anyway this is he best compromise of exhaust, cam timing and inlet length that Ive come up with so far.
has anyone got a normally aspirated 3.6 with better power? The test mule engine isn't even in the best health either and I hope to break 380bhp with this engine before I call it a day.
Here's the graph for interest. Not bad for a little engine though
Cheers Andrew
redspike, the cam timing i settled on is worse for top end but gives better midrange so yeh I'm in agreement with you. The best cam timing for power though only made about another 5hp on top but lost out anything up to 15hp lower down. What i'm using at the moment is best in my view for the 3.6, but it might change when i get to do the work on a 4 litre as i wouldn't really want to rev a 4 litre up to 7800rpm which is where i've got the soft cut limiter set on the test mule.
zooooom said:
If my memory serves me well, while the car was at Austec for it's re-map it was also getting its M.O.T and 4 new wheels/tyres fitted
(but this was done after the re-map)
The rear tyres were way past there best and almost like slicks when it arrived there.
I guess this would account for the large loss through the drive train.
When I picked the car up I was commented that they had big problems with slippage and wheel spin while it was on the dyno, and in hindsight they should have waited for the new wheels and tyres to arrive before they re-mapped the car.
Tyre condition would have negligable effect, I suspect brand new tyres would be a potentially worse on a nice dry dyno infact. (but this was done after the re-map)
The rear tyres were way past there best and almost like slicks when it arrived there.
I guess this would account for the large loss through the drive train.
When I picked the car up I was commented that they had big problems with slippage and wheel spin while it was on the dyno, and in hindsight they should have waited for the new wheels and tyres to arrive before they re-mapped the car.
This has been done to death in the past, but if you google the differences in the two dyno's you'll understand the differences in the two figures. I believe your car would read differently on the DynoDynamics used by SRR/Spitfire4v8s. It is pointless comparing the two unless the same dyno is used. I don't mean any offence to anyone or to question anyone else's business.
edit; Joo, I believe you mentioned potential airbox replacement in the past, do you still believe there are gains to be had there? Also, please tell me you haven't given up on turbocharging it...
Edited by BCA on Friday 1st June 13:07
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