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Cheap intake upgrade o my Limited really made a difference.

In regards to my BMW, i had stock airbox in, and then a Dinan CAI.

Nothing else. And the BMW read back to me what my butt was feeling.

More air... and colder air.... made a huge diff in the OBDs numbers.

The BMWs MPGs increased.

And the registered real time torque numbers jumped up when WOT.

And all it was, was air. Nothing else changed.

Now, Dinan wants you to also reprogram eCU to maximize it, so the car can map the best way to utilize it based on ignition rates etc... but all alone and just air, big improvement.

Absolutely my throttle response was peppier. Theres no question, and my numbers reflected it immediately.

Now, that was a Dinan CAI, not some red drop in from amazon.

As not a scientist, nor an engineer, but based on life experinces, i dont think its weird for OP to have felt what he felt. My guess is, if he had an OBd reader ajd did before afters, hed have at least a LITTLE something that would back himself up.
 
riccnick said:
I think the only useful info we'd get from it maybe would be the MAF/MAP readings. Even then, their accuracy would be questionable.

I'm curious, how does it calculate the torque a motor is putting out? The only way I could imagine is if you input your gear ratios, tire size, and weight and then did a 0-60 run maybe it would be able to do the math?

And once again, even realtime data is pretty questionable without verification of other controls in the experiment. The best we could do is a comparison between the two filters and their recorded OBDII data, but that would not be necessarily translated into "better" performance in any metric.
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Yeah, i dont know really. But from what i can see, its all SEEMS very accurate other wise.

I will say this: in BMW i run with it reading certain air data and other data, like full time. So i knew what the numbers were, on a steady.

And then I throw in a mechanical devi e like a CAI which is merely mechanics. No electronic to even let the OBD know something new was in place of the box.

And the numbers jumped around. Intake air was cooler. Etc. MAF rate diff. all of it..

So its reading info real time... it wouldnt have known to give me doff numbers. I hopw that made some sense.
 
Longhorn5G said:
In regards to my BMW, i had stock airbox in, and then a Dinan CAI.

Nothing else. And the BMW read back to me what my butt was feeling.

More air... and colder air.... made a huge diff in the OBDs numbers.

The BMWs MPGs increased.

And the registered real time torque numbers jumped up when WOT.

And all it was, was air. Nothing else changed.

Now, Dinan wants you to also reprogram eCU to maximize it, so the car can map the best way to utilize it based on ignition rates etc... but all alone and just air, big improvement.

Absolutely my throttle response was peppier. Theres no question, and my numbers reflected it immediately.

Now, that was a Dinan CAI, not some red drop in from amazon.

As not a scientist, nor an engineer, but based on life experinces, i dont think its weird for OP to have felt what he felt. My guess is, if he had an OBd reader ajd did before afters, hed have at least a LITTLE something that would back himself up.
Click to expand...

If it's the BMW in your sig, I'd say that vintage is at the very cusp of automobiles that had low hanging fruit so to speak regarding things that are "easy" to improve on performance wise. The level of engine management (and development resources that the OEM's have) that comes standard on vehicles nowadays is pretty significantly different than what OEM's could do even ten years ago, never mind twenty.

Most likely what you did, without tuning for full potential, is lean out the air fuel mix, which was probably overly rich to begin with to comply with Federal Emissions standards. Tuning would have let the ECU add in more fuel to go with that air and actually net you a more powerful level of combustion at the same as factory air/fuel mix.

Regardless, I don't see it as an apples to apples comparison of investment v.s. performance payoff that the OP is trying to portray here. And certainly not with the same level of powertrain development technology considering the age of the BMW.
 
U can see, just from a reader, the oercentage ur throttle body plate is open, or closed. Its ridiculous. Like if you need to clean it with lube to loosen it up to react faster. And then u do. And then u see throttle opens much greater percent.

I love the thing. Reads exhaust pressure. exhaust temps from info fro. O2 sensors. All sorts of stuff.

Tell u when ur evap ourge valve is purging, and at what rate.

Its a nice tool.
 
riccnick said:
If it's the BMW in your sig, I'd say that vintage is at the very cusp of automobiles that had low hanging fruit so to speak regarding things that are "easy" to improve on performance wise. The level of engine management (and development resources that the OEM's have) that comes standard on vehicles nowadays is pretty significantly different than what OEM's could do even ten years ago, never mind twenty.

Most likely what you did, without tuning for full potential, is lean out the air fuel mix, which was probably overly rich to begin with to comply with Federal Emissions standards. Tuning would have let the ECU add in more fuel to go with that air and actually net you a more powerful level of combustion at the same as factory air/fuel mix.

Regardless, I don't see it as an apples to apples comparison of investment v.s. performance payoff that the OP is trying to portray here. And certainly not with the same level of powertrain development technology considering the age of the BMW.
Click to expand...
Im with u, believe me.

I was only making two points.

1. Even in 2019, i still do believe that an engine that breathes better, runs better.

And 2. Given that its 2019, we have readers at our disposal that can help quickly ascertain certain things. Versus 20 years ago, when heading to a shop to have a dyno was the main way to check simple mods.
 
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