2002 Ultimate StreetCar Challenge: The Dyno

The dyno was the first true performance test of the event and, as expected, it took no prisoners. To keep the test as short and unforgiving as possible, each car was allowed only two pulls separated by a maximum of five minutes. A dyno queen that must be tweaked and prodded to make a good run has no business with the Ultimate Street Car title.

Dyno runs were scored two ways. Peak power is the obvious first score, but we also wanted to judge each engine's power delivery. An engine with a broad powerband should get more points than a peaky one making the same power. This characteristic is something dyno geeks call "having more area under the curve."

We scored power delivery by adding the torque output every 100 rpm from redline down to 45 percent of redline, giving an obvious advantage to the cars that rev higher. The slow-revving Mustang, for example, gets measured from 2700 rpm to its 6000 rpm redline, while the Ferrari's powerband is 1400 rpm longer.

Despite our attempts to reward flexible engines, brute power still ruled the day. And by far the most brutish of them all was the funny little Hyundai from Texas. With two completely separate drivetrains, we had to dyno each engine independently and add the results. The front engine was first. With a crowd of competitors looking on, McIntyre opened the throttle and the understated Hyundai let out a brief and relatively unimpressive "braaaaaaaap."

Only the short duration of the pull gave any indication of how much power had just been recorded--308 hp at 7200 rpm on its first pull. This was strong enough that the soft-spoken McIntyre declined to make a second run.

Turning the car around and strapping it down again, the rear wheels delivered an even more impressive 319 hp. Remember, these engines are completely stock internally. The grand total of 627 hp eclipsed the next highest score,

Geoff Bennett's supercharged Mustang, by a crushing 93 hp.The dyno was not nearly as friendly to the rest of the field. Justin Sykes' all-wheel-drive Skyline had to spend an hour on the lift before the test. R32 and R34 Skylines can be converted to rear drive simply by pulling a fuse, but the R33 always sends some torque to the front wheels, regardless of what the electronics say. The only way to get all the torque to the back is to remove the front driveshaft.

The Skyline recorded 505 hp at the wheels a few days earlier, and the addition of a water/methanol injection system designed fora Buick Grand National was expected to boost that even higher. Unfortunately, a severe misfire dropped power to 440 hp at the wheels. Lesson learned: Don't make last-minute changes.

Mike Carwin's turbocharged and supercharged MR2 had only been assembled the week before the test, and had very little development time. Considering the hasty construction and 1.6-liter displacement, 318 hp was mighty impressive. The power delivery score, however, showed its weakness. The switch from supercharger to turbocharger at 3500 rpm was poorly managed, and power output nose-dived until almost 5000 rpm. The MR2's power delivery score was calculated from 3300 to 7400 rpm, so the troubled area did a lot of damage. In peak power, the MR2 was seventh overall; in power delivery, it dropped to ninth.

Kaneko's rotary 510 was also suffering from a mysterious misfire, an ignition fault somewhere dropped output to 318 hp, far less than one would expect from a turbo 13B.