I was looking thru the latest Eckler's catalog and came across this item. Is this worthwhile or is it a farce? Is there an improvment in HP and if so, does anyone know how much on average? My '90 L98 is stock. They advertise it as a "seat of the pants improvement". I'm typically very wary of $99 items where claims of this kind are made. Any light on this subject would be much appreciated! :chevy

 

Save you $ for something else. :) All this unit does is make the computer think that you have your foot to the floor all the time. If you want that effect, PUT YOUR FOOT TO THE FLOOR. :D

 

Its a waste of money, dont buy it.

 

Sounds like another Eckler's farce. :smash: Thanks for the advice Scorp! :seeya

 

Agreed with scorp there...Also,be sure your floor mat isnt in the way of the pedal when pushing the gas WOT to the floor.

Its Amazing to me they have these 99 dollar plug ins for the sensors to do exactly what your foot can do when its pushing the pedal to the floor...LOL...and it sounds convincing in a way eh?! Should be a class action lawsuit against or something against this.

Also,If the TPS isnt signalling the ecm its going to WOT something else is wrong if this switch is needed to fix that.

:)

 

Makes alot of sense to me Bill! :lol: :yesnod: Thanks again

 

We hashed this through some time ago on the forum...

I say its worth it .....it works for me...

But everyone else said....no go!!!!!!


To each his own.....if you have the bucks...try it......


Like I said....works for me.....but I'm not as enlightened as most of our fellow forum members.

Will go on my own path...with this...so should you.

enough said!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

tony
:D :D :D :D


[Modified by oldace84, 12:49 AM 10/3/2002]

 

You might have a point here.... You ACTUALLY Own one and have given your advice.. Maybe the people who responded should specify if they have 1st hand experience with it or are just passing the same info around..

No offense intended but I get caught up in the same scenario... I want to help people so badly I pass on any info I have.. Even if I really have no experience in it. I have since backed off because I realize it's just not useful.

My gut tells me its a BS product..But when someone who actually has one says he notices a difference...It makes me think again..

 

I've got one. The only redeeming feature is it came on the car and it wasn't me that got screwed by the purchase. Since actions speak louder than words I'll tell you what I'm doing. It is in a box in the garage, not on the car!

I kind of get a kick out of all the catalogs and how each item will give you 10 or 20 horse. By now we should be up to at least 1000 hp.

 

I have a cute little write-up about the TPS in my web page. :reddevil

It's 3/4 the way down the page in red lettering.

http://www.corvetteforum.net/c4/john_robatto/

 

I'll get one when I see a dyno graph that tells me it makes more power. It's complete crap and here's why.

Your car knows how much fuel to add and how much timing advance to run based in large part on the TPS sensor. So, if your TPS sensor is working correctly you won't see ANY increase in HP because when you dyno a car at full throttle, with the throttle blades fully open. The computer will see the exact same thing weather this thing is installed or not.

Now, they say it helps for part throttle driving? Really, well basically they are taking your throttle away from you. They say that any time you are over 60 % throttle it makes the computer read full throttle. OK, so this means that it's going to be adding fuel and timing advance for only 60% of the air! In other words it's gonna run WAY rich, you might get some smoke out of your tailpipes. If it gives you any power increase at part throttle whatsoever it is going to do it at the expense of fuel economy at part throttle. Under part throttle the car is designed to maintain the perfect A/F ratio for fuel economy, which is not the same as peak power. So essentially they richen it up as if it was at full throttle. The problem with this is that the car is tuned for peak power at WOT. So, if it goes rich at true WOT, it's gonna go WAY rich at part throttle which will cost you power as well.

So as others have said, if you want full throttle, put your foot to the floor. Say you're at 65% throttle and this thing kicks in. You might make a LITTLE more power being too rich than you were making when the car was trying to maintain it's proper mixture but it's gonna be a wash. You can have the possibility for a little more power (very little) and give up the top 40% of your throttle for a slight seat of the pants improvement that won't show up on any dyno or at any race track, or you can just keep your $100.

There was a Corvette gathering in BG right after I got my headers and flowmasters. I was talking to this guy with an otherwise stock LT1. He seemed like a super nice guy, fairly knowledgeable but then he started in with the B.S. factor. I told him how much power my car made with the hot cam and such, which was 313.3. I hadn't dyno'd with the headers yet. This dip told me that he dyno'd 325 with just his throttle performance switch and his vortex rammer intake. Both of which IF they have ANY effect will not show up on a dyno.

I told him really, that's cool, and then walked away. I guess I'm the butt for spending $1200 for swapping a cam and doing some real work when I could have had better results by spending about $350 for an air filter and a throttle performance switch.


[Modified by Nathan Plemons, 9:39 AM 10/3/2002]

 

Actually I would NEVER believe that thing could ever increase HP. I just think it may have the ability to make the car more responsive without feeling like you have to beat on the gas pedal... It goes under the driveability heading...

HP gains are not always important.. Here is a gross analogy
What if we had two cars exactly the same..except for HP and response..
The first car had 400 hp but the throttle reponse took 3 seconds to get it up there
the second car had 350 hp and it's throttle respose took .1 sec to get up there..

What would be more fun to drive and what car would look better on the dyno?

 

Well Nathan maybe they were smaller horses, or maybe some of them had died, or maybe he accidenlty counted some of them twice, or maybe they dyno them at 275 a year ago and he assumed some of them had bred. I know the type the only way to outdo them is make them tell the story first so you can top it. Thats how they operate.

 

If you're looking for something that feels like a kick in the pants to drive I'll just make you an ON / OFF switch for your throttle.

The throttle is a calibrated system, changing the airflow or fuel flow without changing the calibration has detremental effects. Look at a 58 mm throttle body on a stock car, by 75% throttle you are already flowing all the air your engine will use, but it's not reading WOT so it's not adding the proper fuel. You'll have a dead spot from where it loses it's calibration up until you hit WOT and it adds the proper fuel.

Now, if you combine these two things, a throttle body and a throttle performance switch you'll certainly feel a SOT pants improvement, because a little bit of pressure on the gas pedal seems to have more of an effect. However, you might as well stick a block of wood under the pedal because the last 25% at least is going to do you NO good, you were already flowing all the air you could with all the fuel you could by 75% throttle. Essentially you have the exact same throttle potential via a shorter control. So for any given amount of pressure on the pedal you'll go faster, but you just run out of pedal. Taken to extremes you have a simple on / off switch.

If you just leave it alone your throttle will be very accurate and you can much more easily control your vehicle.

Besides, we're not talking about a 350 horsepower car and a 400 horsepower car. We are talking about 2 300 horsepower cars, both of which will have identical track times, both will dyno exactly the same. One will simply be able to have more control over his throttle than the other.

If you're willing to give up throttle resolution because you don't like moving your foot an extra half inch, I guess that's fine. Different strokes for different folks.

:cheers:

 

I'm passing the same info. But think about it. It plugs into your TPS. What does your TPS do? Measures throttle position from 0.54v to 5.00 volts. This little thing is just going to modify your TPS voltage and tell your car to go into WOT mode at a different time.

 

Great Explanation!!
That is exactly why I put the stock MAF ends back on my C5.. When I had the Ported MAF ends I had to recalibrate it and that brought me right back where I started. :crazy:

I decided it was not worth the effort.

the only thing it did for me was make the motor think there was less of a load on it...So I guess the timing may have been a bit better...

 

Gentlemen, thank you all for very informative replies. This should be archived as a White Paper! Seriously, I do appreciate the explanations which helps much to improve my general knowledge :chevy :seeya