Rolling Road Dyno - Car Tuning
How our rolling road dyno works
When it comes to improving the performance of a vehicle, we’ve got all bases covered. Our rolling road dyno, or chassis dyno, is effective in calculating your car’s power output. In fact, a complete measurement can be done within 30 minutes.
What is it?
You’re probably familiar with the term ‘rolling road dyno’. For those that aren’t, it is a machine with a set of rollers that a vehicle can be driven onto. It allows us to check how the car is performing and, subsequently show the improvements from any vehicle modifications.
In simple terms, the rolling road dyno provides us information on the power characteristics of the particular model by measuring the torque and rotational speed. Using this info, we can then modify and improve the performance with the likes of a diesel or petrol tuning box, to ensure your car is making the best power possible. The results are very accurate, and help us to offer a reliable and specific tuning box for your vehicle.
How to prepare?
There are several things you can do to check your car over before it goes on the rolling road dyno. For instance, check the tyres and pressure, suspension and general vehicle. Ideally, you want everything ready to go before getting your vehicle tested as it could lead to lower power readings, due to any faults. Likewise, try to take the car for a short drive and get it to operating temperature to ensure more accurate results.
When you’re all set to go, your car will be strapped onto the rolling road dyno. The strapping ensures there will be no side-to-side movement or the vehicle coming off the rollers. We then get the dyno calibrated to your car so that RPM is linked to roller speed.
Types of dynos
There are two basic types of dyno - the chassis dyno and the engine dyno. An engine dyno tests the engine on its own, the engine of the vehicle has to be out of the vehicle for the test. This type of dyno measures directly at the flywheel and gives an accurate flywheel figure. This type of dyno tends to be used by car manufacturers and engine builders. Unfortunately, as the engine has to be removed, it is impractical to use this type of dyno for customer’s vehicles when tuning. A chassis dyno (like ours) tests the engine whilst in the car. It measures output at the wheels.
Using a chassis dyno requires:
- Strapping the car effectively to the dyno, maintaining tyre contact with the rollers and preventing it from “climbing up” the rollers.
- Selecting a suitable gear for the test.
- Running the car up to operating speed in the desired gear to calibrate the roller/rpm ratio.
Once these steps are completed a power run can be undertaken:
- The dyno operator will lower the engine speed to the desired level (usually around idle rpm) before opening the throttle. The car supplies maximum power to the wheels and attempts to accelerate the large mass of the rollers (while measuring the rotational speed of the rollers)
- The power test will end when the engine RPM reaches the pre-desired level and the dyno operator removes his foot from the throttle.
- On some dynos (including ours), at this point losses are measured. After the operator removes their foot from the pedal, the car is put into neutral. The dyno then measures the deceleration on the rollers by the transmission and drivetrain.
Once the test has ended, the logging software will look at how long it took the car to accelerate the known mass of the rollers, measuring the torque figure for the vehicle. Similarly, the rotational speed numbers will be logged to create an accurate power number. By adding the losses measured from the car's drivetrain to the wheel power output we get a very accurate flywheel figure. Our dyno software does this automatically, producing very repeatable accurate runs.
Benefits
The benefits of measuring performance are huge. Because we can see the results from your car as standard, we can often immediately identify any potential problems before tuning. Once a good baseline has been established, we can measure power output when tuned and ensure that the results are what we would expect. We can assess the benefits of both our products and anything from aftermarket exhausts to performance air filters. You can rest assured a diesel or petrol tuning box does will not affect your vehicle warranty, as there is no trace of the box once removed. So long as it is not physically present if the car is taken into a dealership, there should be no trace of the box installation. The ECU software is left alone, meaning the vehicle can return back to standard in a matter of minutes.
Servicing
Our Engineers service our Dyno annually. This helps to preserve the life of the equipment and also ensures that runs are accurate and do not give false results.
Here is one of our Engineers servicing our Dyno.
Are tuning boxes available for my car?
We stock 100s of tried and tested tuning boxes, guaranteed to increase power, torque and fuel efficiency.
If you are interested in what we can offer for your vehicle, please use our Vehicle Selector page.