Hi all. We're off on our travels next week up the west cost for 2 weeks with 2 adults, 2 kids and all the associated camping stuff. Even if we pack light the Continental is a heavy old beast. We were camping earlier this week and as we drove home, I starting thinking.... I serviced the van at the weekend and discovered the alternator bearing is worn. Bearing (!) in mind our trip I ordered a new one from Peter at Volksgoods (who I highly recommend). This meant the engine was coming out today to fit the new one. Also lurking in my garage are some 'baby dells' (Dellorto FRD 34) and a S/S quiet pack which came from Bluebird years ago and a steel header to match. I'd kind of decided that as the engine was coming out I might as well fit the carbs and exhaust. I've fitted them to my other van and to my beetle in previous years. The engine in the van is a great, stock 1600. Is has carried this and my other van many, many miles. The only deviation from stock is a petrinox ignition. I had just given it a full service and it ran lovely. It was just those hills and when laden that was niggling me. I was heading home this lunchtime to start work on the conversion when on a whim I found myself here; I wondered what my current stock setup was making in BHP and more importantly torque. I popped in and the very nice guys said they'd do a rolling road session there and then. I explained my plan to fit the carbs and exhaust and that I wanted to see how much of a difference it made. They said it'd cost £40 and that would include 2 sessions (before and after). If anyone has experienced a rolling road before you'll know it's a bit nerve racking! Anyhow. They had a good (good natured) laugh at my expense (bearing in mind the other cars were 911 and Subaru!). So how did we do? As you can see it made a whopping 45 bhp at the engine giving 29.1 bhp at the wheels. I headed home and set to work... This is ready to be fitted tomorrow. It got too late to start up the grinder and drill to remove the stock air filter bracket. I'm going to drill out the spot welds so the van can return to stock at some point if the mood takes me. I'll finish the job in the morning and head back for my second session on the rolling road. Any guesses as to the next BHP result??
Brilliant post. Could someone enlighten me as to how the rolling road deduces the engine hp from what's being measured at the wheels? Meanwhile I'll say 5% increase, so that's 30.5 bhp at the wheels.
PIE - I'm hoping '29' isn't your prediction for today's bhp at the wheels. That would be kind of disappointing! Macswiggs- I'm assuming it's a percentage thing. They didn't use any 'camper' specific data to work it out. I'm going more on the 'at the engine' power as the 'at the wheels' one is slightly worrying!
@KarlB I had mine done at the wheels, it was 36.9, could you ask the lads white your there roughly what that would be at the engine? Cheers Dave
They do a run down as part of the test. Finish the run, knock it into neutral and allow the dyno to run down against the transmission, so estimating losses. This is the biggest part of the error in any dyno calculation, as the way the dyno is set up and calculates the losses (obviously) has a big impact on the estimated flywheel horsepower.
Thanks Owen. The stock bhp seems fairly sensible for the engine and I'm really after an idea of the difference the alterations make out of curiousity. PIE- what engine you running?
also every dyno is calibrated differently so really direct comparisons should only be done on vehicles tested back to back on the same dyno.
My old 1600 was 58bhp at the engine after I fitted twin carbs. Your carbs and exhaust are probably better so I'd hope for more. Different RR though.
Hats off to you for making such a change just before your holiday. Not sure I would have. OK I probably would, but I would caution you that I'm now divorced. I'm also looking forward to the results of this proper before and after carb and exhaust change, it's something that will interest a lot of people. You would see better results if you uprated the cam as well, but I'm sure you already know this.
Thanks Owen, that cleared that one up for me. (Sorry, don't know how to do those quote things.) To think that 30% of your power turns to heat in your box, diff and bearings seems horrendous if not a bit erroneous, that only leaves 70% to push our unaerodynamic bricks through the air!
VERY interested in this. I'm off to the RR on Tuesday to get my carbs properly set up. I'm happy with the speed I get out of my bus - would just like to get a little bit better MPG and reassurance that I'm not running hot.
