I took Irene to the dyno shop today to do some tuning and see what this new turbo was going to give me for my money. The classic 4 cylinder Volvo engine didn’t let me down, and Irene laid down some pretty solid numbers. After 8 runs and alot of fine tuning of the fuel and spark maps, the results were in. The best run peaked at 519 horsepower, and 525 ft-lbs of torque.

Strapping my car to a dyno always makes me nervous. There is something strange about standing next to an engine running wide open, but not moving anywhwere. The engine seems so much louder in a closed garage than when you are running down the road. I’m always convinced something is going to blow and parts are going to fly. I sat in the passenger seat during the tuning this time, and one of my paranoia’s is that the clutch or transmission is going to fly apart. So I sit with my feet under me and out of the path of the spinning engine and clutch parts. I don’t know why, I always have my feet on the floor on the street. Its basically the same thing as racing down the road, but like I said, its paranoia, not reality.

Its rare that I can put the engine under the same kind of stress on the street. And this is even more true now that the car is so ridiculously fast. To tune the engine properly, I have to datalog with my laptop, and run the engine all the way up to redline. But I really can’t open the throttle on the street anymore without the tires spinning in the lower gears. I have to use a higher gear, 3rd or 4th, and this means that I am possibly running double the speed limit in a hurry. So I rarely tune on the street anymore. The dyno is a much better place to do this kind of work.

Irene started the day off with a bang, and put down about 480 horsepower on the first run. That was enough to get the attention of the guys running the shop, and A few people came out from behind the scenes to see what was making all the noise. These guys primarily work on Mitsubishi Evo’s, and were used to seeing 500+ horsepower cars on the dyno. But they were really shocked to see a Volvo laying down this level of power. Over the next hour I tuned and tweaked the AF ratios and ignition advance. And the last run I squeezed 519hp out of the little 4 cylinder motor.

Here are some thumbnails of the dyno charts. Click them for larger views.