Project MX-3 - DYNO 1

Above is the graph from our three dyno runs. Below is the state of the car at each dyno test.

• If you have followed Project MX-3 to date you know the car has a DINAN ECU and an HKS Super Megaflow intake as the only mods that would improve power. Run #1 was a test of the cars current power.
• We ran the car with the same settings again to verify the consistency of the results. As you can see the blue and light purple lines are very close together.
• We intended to run this step with the Mazdaspeed exhaust system. Unfortunately the car did not agree. The two bolts from the catalytic converter to the resonator pipe broke off. In order to make the best of this situation we tested the car without a cat-back exhaust!

The entire graph is measured about 300 rpm's off the rpm displayed on the tachometer inside the car. This correction brings the power graphs more in line with what we expected: Peak horsepower at about 6500 rpm. The upper graph on both torque and horsepower is from the third run. Removing the cat-back exhaust on an MX-3 results in about 5 hp and 3 ft/lbs of torque at the wheels.

We expected about 120 hp at the wheels with the factory exhaust installed considering the mods to the car. Of course we were disapointed to discover that we are only running about 111hp at the wheels. At this point it is tough to prove the HKS or the Dinan ECU had any effect on the HP generated by the 1.8L V6. We will duplicate this test again with new spark plugs and wires.

We have noticed the factory plug wires often begin to fail around 50,000 miles. Project MX-3 is still running with the factory wires at over 53,000 miles. Hopefully this will reveal the restriction which is keeping the car from performing as expected.


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