A buddy of mine sent this to me this afternoon. I thought it was pretty cool, but still need to do a little research on it. http://www.autoblog.com/2008/07/29/dynolicious-turns-iphone-into-cheap-performance-meter/ I'll be purchasing it as soon as the Touch re-charges. :grin:
Okay, after upgrading to v2.0 (REQUIRED!!!!), I got the thing on the Touch and went for a quick drive. It's late, NO ONE on the road, and very dry conditions. The Touch was mounted in my cell phone holder on the dash, in a vertical position. Under the Setup section, you enter your vehicle weight (with driver, fuel, etc.). I went with 5150#, + 190#. Tank was about 1/3, but I didn't add that in. I put in a 12% drivetrain loss. IIRC, that's about the average for the RC trucks. They say to enter "zero" if you want RWHP. Those are the only 2 specs it needs to run tests. FIRST TEST RESULTS - 0-60: 8.44 sec. - Max Speed: 66.6 MPH - Max Acceleration: 0.90 G - Peak Horsepower: 331 HP On the roundabout, I performed a U-type turn to the left. - Lateral G: 0.73 G Tires didn't even squeak, so I know there's more available there. I didn't do anything too fierce with the brakes, so: - Braking: 1.09 G I'm sure that if there was a bim on a cell in front of me, I would have a prime opportunity to really get on the brakes and try to 'bury the needle' with some real braking. As you can plainly see, there are some errors happening. But I'm not sure where they come from, exactly. My top speed was well over 75 mph. I know from the dyno test last year that I'm well over 450 HP to the wheels (very close to 500 FWHP). The timer is automatic and starts after the unit calibrates itself. So, you have to watch for the "green light" on the Touch and THEN go. Unfortunately, I have this habit of keeping my eyes on the road so my times are way, WAY off. :grin: It only lists 1320' on the main page; not in the Results pages. The graphs are cool, but again, they're only on the main page. It also sucks when you have so much HP that the needle shoots off the graph. LOL I did not do a true calibration prior to my first test. I have since done a "big boy" calibration. It's got a cool feature called "Mods", that lets you enter runs pre- and post-modification. Remember: It's a $13 iPhone/Touch application. Not a $2000 vehicle-mounted computer designed and hard-wired to gather data from a plethora of components. More testing tomorrow!
I ran another test tonight with the Dynolicious. Vehicle: 2005 Dodge Ram Rumble Bee (Keith's truck) Engine: 5.7L Hemi Reported OEM HP: 345-350 Entered Info: - Weight: 5436 with 2 riders, and 7/8 tank of gas (6 lbs. per gallon), an iPod Touch and a full 12 oz. can of Pepsi. Edmunds = FAIL when it comes to Dodge Ram 5.7 specs (I mean, Dodge only sold a kabillion of them....no need to have specs up on something so unpopular and rare), so we went with the 4.7L curb weight. - Drivetrain Loss: 20% (auto transmission) SECOND TEST RESULTS - 0-60: 9.55 sec. - Max Speed: 64.5 MPH - Max Acceleration: 1.06 G - Peak Horsepower: 312 HP On the roundabout, we performed the exact same U-type turn to the left. - Lateral G: 0.78 G Tires barely squeaked on Keith's truck, and I could tell he wasn't really pushing it. Keith said he was over 80 mph, so there's that difference again. With his intake and exhaust, he should be much closer to OEM numbers regarding HP, even at the wheels. I'm not sure how those Mini guys got it so damn close to their dyno numbers, and all the rest of the measuring. Also, has anyone figured out how to save COMPLETE runs? It shows: 60', 330', and 1/8 mi, but that's it. No quarter except for the initial screen. Speaking of the initial run screen, does anyone know how to save/print the graph? It seems that once you're done with your run, it vanishes. It's kinda cool, but I'd like to see just a couple of more features (maybe a 1/2 mile and full mile setting), ability to save/email/print front page graphs, and slightly better instructions. Again, for $13, it's a toy. But even Barbie's car comes with 4 wheels.
That IS pretty damn cool. Don't tell Momo. He's no longer in the EQ...he's an IQ...."I-Phone Queer"! LOL
but how accurate can it be???? what does it use to calculate??? better question is HOW does is calculate????
I just downloaded it! $12.99 It seems badass! The program was calabrated using professional racing meters!!!! And they say it's spot on!!! 1/4 mile times, 60 ft, lateral G's, HP....
.. Vehicle weight, drivetrain loss%... Apparently you plug a bunch of different car specific facts in such as the above and the internal gps and gyroscope in the iPhone does the rest !!!
btw: you save profiles for all your vehicles! It will save your test results!!!! For me, if this works as advertised or a close proximity to actual track results, that's perfect for me! Just so I know a ballpark figure of what my car can do...
My guess is that it's all accelerometer. Can you use an iTouch/iPhone like a Wii controller? That would be accelerometer. Mostly, cell phones use "assisted" GPS (not really GPS at all). The cell phone itself does not have a GPS receiver in it. Cell towers (or wifi towers) have known locations. The assisted part is the capability in the phone to report to a cell tower the list of cell towers it can "see" at the moment. With a list of cell towers you can triangulate to determine the location of the device. Or that could be done on the phone. You can find out for sure by checking it in a tunnel where you still have a cell or wifi signal. If it works it's assisted GPS. Assisted GPS won't be as accurate as real GPS. Since everyone is reporting that this is pretty accurate I'd be guessing it's using an accelerometer built in the phone. (now I'll email my friend that works at Apple and see how close I got :grin
(we'll try this once again, for those in the back row.....) http://www.srtconnection.com/forums/showthread.php?t=8375 ^ TESTING RESULTS POSTED IN THAT THREAD!!!!!
Just as a question...why is this in Show n Shine - Interior? haha *edit again* - thanks big D!! :thumb:
