Re: Dyno test inspection

[William Elliott <William.Elliott@mail.mei.com>]

On Mon, 27 Apr 1998, Mr. Daniel P. Grady wrote:

> The exact scene I would have expected if I had let those fools in my car. If
> anyone is asked to relinquish control of their ship TELL THEM IT IS QUATTRO!
> Imagine what could happen! I must go have nightmares now. Goodnight all.
> BTW: How many of those fools do you think know what IROC means?

Chris replies:  <<Not to throw kerosene on the fire, but the guys in MD seemed 
to know what
was up.  They had never seen a car like mine (a CQ, figures), but knew all
about quattro.  They asked lots of intelligent questions, and the guy who
drove did a good job, considering. 

He had to drive on four rollers upto 50mph, with the car wandering across
these things, watching a computer screen through the left window, while
shifting and trying to keep the speed between the two red lines of the
computer graph, presumably while keeping the RPMs up. Keep in mind that I
was sitting in the passenger seat, there are concrete pillars about 6 feet
away in each direction and the rollers are only about eight feet wide... 

Anyway, the guys in MD may make minimum wage, but they like cars, esp.
nice, original and slightly exotic ones.  And they were very carefull.  I
was bummed that they could not do an RPM/power out graph, and so were
they...>>

Chris: the reasons the guys in MD are "careful" is that
 in the early days of the MD tests, the state had to fork
over big bucks (well over $100k) for the cars ruined in 
a very short period.

Actually, most of the damage was to full-time 4wd trucks.

MD suspended the use of the dynos while they tried to 
figure out the problem.  They did a lot of additional 
training, hired more experienced people, and made the
dynamic test optional (and cheaper than stationary) for
a period. If the car failed the roller test, they would
immediately test stationary.  If it okay there, you got a "pass".

BTW, the last car I had tested in MD was a heated-up 
Mustang GT... (no flames please, bought it to sell for 
a tidy profit. Lots of fun in a straight line!)  Was marginal
on a stationary test (at a friend's garage)... passed with
flying colors on the rollers! Used profit to help fund UrQ.

Bill Elliott
Lake Mills, WI (with NO safety or emission inspections!)