Advancing the platform - Glides, are they cheating ?

[Twisted Tuning]

That thing is STILL faster than a 4 cylinder Fox body Mustang.

I think the term 'cheating' needs to be defined here. I could be wrong, but I would think Tony means, and I would agree, that slapping a powerglide behind a high power 335 would be cheating if the only goal is to claim the quickest E.T. as a vendor. If vendor X has a fully prepped drag car and says, "look, our turbos can do 9s, while vendor Y is stuck in the 10s", then I would be less partial to vendor X.

In the same vein, while I know Tony has said he won't do stock motor testing any more, I hope he doesn't begin to make HP @ boost level claims using his motor. I think vendors should follow GAPP - generally accepted performance practices - i.e. HP @ boost claims should be on a stock head/cam motor. Figured that's a good enough term since everyone loves that freakin term when racing now. :barf

I don't necessarily agree with part of this. A vendor can test their products on whatever car or engine build they want. I don't think it's the vendors job to spoon feed a community common sense knowledge that gains would be less in a stock unmodified engine compared to a built ported and etc engine.

The community/consumer has a job to do too. And research and learn a bit for themselves.

Now, what I do agree with is no vendor should hide mods of a build for advertising purposes.

This here is just a general statement. And not directed towards anyone. But, this also goes inline with people tending to feel they are entitled to having certain information about certain things when it's truly none of their business

 

[langsbr]

I don't necessarily agree with part of this. A vendor can test their products on whatever car or engine build they want. I don't think it's the vendors job to spoon feed a community common sense knowledge that gains would be less in a stock unmodified engine compared to a built ported and etc engine.

The community/consumer has a job to do too. And research and learn a bit for themselves.

Now, what I do agree with is no vendor should hide mods of a build for advertising purposes.

This here is just a general statement. And not directed towards anyone. But, this also goes inline with people tending to feel they are entitled to having certain information about certain things when it's truly none of their business

I agree they can test on whatever they want - however, if a vendor makes a claim and says "our turbos make XXX HP @ XXX Boost" then I would hope they would be referring to a stock head/cam motor. If not, it's misleading at best, and false advertising at worst. At a minimum, they should state that they can make "up to" that power on that boost, otherwise, it's blatantly misleading. Just as I would hope that for performance claims they are using a full or close to full weight car, and not a 2000lb gutted track car with lexan windows.

Can you elaborate on which information you would say are considered proprietary? I understand the whole log argument, and I can't decide which side I am on. In one view, if you paid a tuner, it's proprietary info and shouldn't be released, but on the other hand, a log can only give so much info as to an overall tune, and for WOT pulls, there's only so many degrees of timing that you can choose from.

 

[DennisKing]

This is advancing the platform.
https://bmw.spoolstreet.com/threads/new-wr-938whp-and-861-wtq-35-psi.2656/

 

[Aaron]

So wait, using less turbochargers is fair, but using less gears is cheating?

 

[ninjacoupe]

So wait, using less turbochargers is fair, but using less gears is cheating?

The consensus looks to be a resounding no lol.

 

[DennisKing]

So wait, using less turbochargers is fair, but using less gears is cheating?

Using transmissions from 60 years ago wouldn't be considered an advancement, no.

 

[Tony@VargasTurboTech]

It's not cheating, but it belongs in its own category if you ask me. You have removed the factory piece and replaced it with something that was never sold in the car. Doing little stuff doesn't change much (suspension, turbos, fueling, etc), but when you remove the engine or trans and replace them you have altered the car in a way that it should be viewed differently. I said it before, if you put an LSX in an E90 with a standalone, Powerglide, and ran 8's not many people would call that the E9X record, in essence, that is what you are doing. People have differing opinions. This is mine, if we wanted to a run a 9-second pass that bad, I could have taken one of the numerous Powerglide, TH400's 700R4's, etc all stacked in the back room on shelves from when my dad used to build muscle cars for everyone, and fit it to one of our shop cars. It never ever crossed my mind, and honestly would be boring. If I were to swap the trans in any of my cars it would be for something new, high tech, and fun. Not a 2-speed slushbox that makes the car single purpose, trailer it to the strip, run it, and trailer it home. Snoozefest...

 

[Torgus]

It's not cheating, but it belongs in its own category if you ask me. You have removed the factory piece and replaced it with something that was never sold in the car. Doing little stuff doesn't change much (suspension, turbos, fueling, etc), but when you remove the engine or trans and replace them you have altered the car in a way that it should be viewed differently. I said it before, if you put an LSX in an E90 with a standalone, Powerglide, and ran 8's not many people would call that the E9X record, in essence, that is what you are doing. People have differing opinions. This is mine, if we wanted to a run a 9-second pass that bad, I could have taken one of the numerous Powerglide, TH400's 700R4's, etc all stacked in the back room on shelves from when my dad used to build muscle cars for everyone, and fit it to one of our shop cars. It never ever crossed my mind, and honestly would be boring. If I were to swap the trans in any of my cars it would be for something new, high tech, and fun. Not a 2-speed slushbox that makes the car single purpose, trailer it to the strip, run it, and trailer it home. Snoozefest...

You should spend more time on your products and less time on the forums. Didn't you hire a handler just for this?

Doing little stuff like turbos doesn' change much? Fueling does not change much? Suspension does not change much?

Lawls.

By your flawed logic the turbos you sell should be in their own category as they are not factory.

 

[doublespaces]

Found this thread in a search. I think the topic has new legs now that we've seen this develop.

 

[101duck]

Never saw this before. But I look at it like this, it's quarter mile times, Theres so many things you can do to make times tumble, and end of the day if you put everything into it's own category, there's 30 top 10 lists. If it's N54, it belongs in the N54 list, regardless of transmission, rear end, tire, engine management, power adders. Quarter mile times aren't for pushing the platform forward. End of the day, the people who run these times (myself included) aren't doing it because if x amount of N54's run a 9 we advanced to level 4 lol. We do it coz we like it.

Ghassan did it with a rear clip and stripped out shell, stand alone management, bias ply slick etc. Does he need his own list now? N54 powered cars that have a live axle conversion?

It's not cheating, and it doesn't have anything to do with moving the platform forward. The platform moves forward thanks to people like Terry, Tony, Jake, Martial etc. What 1 person or 1 shop does down the quarter doesn't affect anyone at all.

 

[SJ_1989]

Theres so many things you can do to make times tumble, and end of the day if you put everything into it's own category, there's 30 top 10 lists. If it's N54, it belongs in the N54 list, regardless of transmission, rear end, tire, engine management, power adders.

I agree and disagree. Having a ton of classes like stock turbo, hybrid, single, street tires, bias ply's, standalone, glide, whatever is dumb. Anyone can put a single turbo and bias ply's on and gut the interior and run a decent 1/4 time. I do think there needs to be a few classes though to distinguish between the clear competitive advantages like AT or MT, OEM chassis or back halved car (i.e. solid axle), etc. Who cares what power adders is used as long as it's N54 powered car from the factory.

Ghassan is in his own class IMO and has the quickest in the world to date. He has a back halved car. That is no longer an OEM chassis.

So, an aftermarket transmission isn't cheating just like an aftermarket single turbo isn't cheating. There's more than one way to skin a cat. In my mind, advancing the platform is getting more people involved in drag racing by showing everyone what the platform is capable of and get them to an actual track (not street racing) to try and achieve a "recognized" time by the community. That's why I'm building mine.....and it's fun.

Hell, with all these single turbos running 700+ hp we'd have a lot more 9 sec 6MT's if people would just upgrade their rear suspension properly. We'd also have a lot more blown stock motors .

 

[aus335iguy]

It’s also very much about what happens in Mexico. If anyone could do it, they should’ve but didn’t. Now they(mostly Tony) are crying it’s cheating because it showed that buying his products doesn’t make a fast car.

 

[aus335iguy]

Also, let’s say for example I change my stock DCT to run drivelogic software from an M3... is that also cheating ? The hardware is the same ...

 

[Cheezy]

To revisit this, I feel like the title is a loaded question. I feel like it should be "drag racing- power glides, are they cheating" in which case, no. But "advancing the platform- power glides, are they helping?" They're helping us advance to quicker 1/4mile times, yes. But they're not advancing the platform as a viable aftermarket solution to any real problem. Cams, closed decks, headwork is all advancing the platform. But the majority of n54/55 owners are going to ever be able to get on the internet and order a glide kit to just toss into their car. Personally, I'd rather have a sequential anyway.

 

[aus335iguy]

To that end they are showing what’s possible when the car isn’t being german; ergo advancing the platform

 

[Rcboosted2007]

Never saw this before. But I look at it like this, it's quarter mile times, Theres so many things you can do to make times tumble, and end of the day if you put everything into it's own category, there's 30 top 10 lists. If it's N54, it belongs in the N54 list, regardless of transmission, rear end, tire, engine management, power adders. Quarter mile times aren't for pushing the platform forward. End of the day, the people who run these times (myself included) aren't doing it because if x amount of N54's run a 9 we advanced to level 4 lol. We do it coz we like it.

Ghassan did it with a rear clip and stripped out shell, stand alone management, bias ply slick etc. Does he need his own list now? N54 powered cars that have a live axle conversion?

It's not cheating, and it doesn't have anything to do with moving the platform forward. The platform moves forward thanks to people like Terry, Tony, Jake, Martial etc. What 1 person or 1 shop does down the quarter doesn't affect anyone at all.

Well stated, I couldn’t agree more.