Ok, I'm on the computer now. The first thing I should tell you is that the dyno operator let me drive the truck during the pulls! It was a pretty surreal experience. It's weird not moving and yet the speedo says you're doing 80! That's also why Run #2 is shorter than the others. In the first run, it was kind of sensory overload and I finally realize, "hey dummy, it isn't gaining any rpm, let off!!". So in the second run I was a little more "with it" and when it sounded like it wasn't gaining more I let off.....well I let off too soon. Finally for runs 3 and 4 I was deliberately watching the tach and I wasn't letting off until I hit about 3650. It was weird, it would quickly get up to about 3100 and then just creep up the rest of the way.
There's something else I should share about the tach signal too: we weren't able to get it to run off of the crank sensor. And I didn't think to bring my Ferret timing adapter, so we used the roller speed to calculate RPM. This worked reasonably well since I had my converter in full lockup, but I'm sure there was some descrepancy in actual RPM and what was being recorded. In fact, after the 3rd run we could smell burning rubber from tire slippage, so we aired down the tires to get a little better grip. He was out of VHT compound to make the rollers more sticky. Next time I run, I'll bring the timing adapter.
Regardless of that, it definitely was only pulling hard until about 3000-3100 and I expected it to pull hard until about 3500-3600 based on the fuel curve of the pump. Well, my fuel supply isn't a rock-solid 25psi all the time, which is what the IP is calibrated for....and based on conversations with Joel, it was on the top end that the inlet pressure made the biggest difference, so I'm sure that's where my top end power went. Unfortunately I didn't watch the fuel pressure gauge during my runs, so I have no idea how low it went during the runs. On the way home though, during just a gentle roll-on, the pressure dipped to 19psi, so it was at least that low, and likely lower, during the dyno pulls. Moral of the story there: I have more power left in this configuration if I can get a better fuel supply system going!
Oh yeah, another thing about the dyno. So the way a Mustang dyno decides how much to load the engine is by vehicle weight. It must try to recreate a real world situation by allowing the rolls to accelerate as fast as the car would accelerate based on the weight...........or something, dunno. So the first run had the true weight of the truck which is 5700 pounds. Since I only saw about 22 pounds of boost he added another 5000 pounds of vehicle weight to the calcs. That seemed to help as torque went up a little, but still not a ton of boost. He ended up adding 5000 more pounds for run 3 and the torque went up even more. You can watch the vids and see that I only hit about 23-24 pounds of boost during the runs, so it wasn't loading the turbo as much as I can in the real world. Having said that, you can also see in one of the videos that the exhaust is really clean, so I don't think I needed more boost anyway. Now if I had all of my fuel supply, then maybe the rest of that boost (air) would have helped? That will be determined in future runs.
Ha, so yeah....seeing the exhaust. You know I made a vent tube for the run. Well while getting it hooked up and run out the door my dad was pulling on it to try to get the most length out of it and he pulled the stuff right apart at the first bend! I don't know if you've ever worked with this stuff, but it's just a strip of aluminum wound in a spiral and crimped together, so if you pull too hard you can pull the crimp right apart. No biggie, I brought some duct tape with me, just in case. Well if you look closely in the first video you'll see it blow apart at the duct tape, ha! So the other runs after that were run without a tube. The guy was really cool about it. He was expecting Cummins-like smoke, so the fact that the 6.5 doesn't do that helped in this situation. Oh and that's also why you'll see something that looks like an exhaust tip on my tailpipe - that's the 4-6 adapter for the ductwork still on my tailpipe. I'll make something more robust for future runs.
Ok, I think that's all I can think to type, so now it's time for videos! I took EGT & Boost videos for each run since I was driving and then my brother took videos from the outside for each run. The process we used for the runs is to slowly get up to the speed where my converter would lock in 3rd gear, then I'd drop rpm a little, then ease up to 2000 rpm before hitting it. Again, this was a really cool experience driving it myself!! Although seeing it from the outside could have been really cool as well. Oh yeah, speaking of EGT....it was a lot lower than I expected! So was that because I wasn't hitting the boost level I normally do, or is it the new air filter? I've hit 1250 getting on the highway unloaded, no problem, in the past. Honestly I haven't thought to look at EGT when driving around since air filter installation so I'll need to do that. Maybe the Donaldson filter was really that much of a restriction? If so, I am SO glad I put the aFe one in!!
VIDEOS:
Run 1 EGT & Boost
Run 1 Outside (this is when the tube blows off)
Run 2 EGT & Boost (you can see how I let off earlier)
Run 2 Outside (you can see how I let off earlier)
Run 3 EGT & Boost
Run 3 Outside (this one was from behind so you can see the exhaust)
https://youtu.be/_umWKVHwM5Q
Run 4 EGT & Boost
https://youtu.be/-C2xUFbG610
Run 4 Outside (my brother recorded the dyno screen during the run)
https://youtu.be/NW6vrrPlIzY
I think I've covered everything. If I think of anything else I'll be sure to share. Thanks for following along with me!