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Swedish vs American tuning

Canadan

Canadan

New member
Joined
Feb 22, 2013
Location
Oregon
I recall reading on here a while back something stating why the stuff built by swedes is they tune engines differently than Americans but I can't recall what it is that person said they did and no I don't think it was John v. maybe it was Americans run too much boost and fuel and not enough timing?
 
It was John and are we talking the na high hp or turbo . Cause they pushing over 200hp out a a b230 n/a on pump gas over 15 years ago
 
The problem we run into here is that we have a strong market for most parts and machining and some good tuners and builders. But in Sweden the b230 is like the 350 or Ls in America . They built it from the ground up and regardless tuning it for so many years they have made it look easy to put 500 hp in a DDturbo car and 200 hp in a na engine all using 530 or 531 heads . What is it that you are after . Best way to do it is go across the pond and learn from the best for a few years come back and make what you have learned easy and share what tb may or n ay not know.
Swedish run to much boost .
FYI fire ring the block
 
Recman4 said:
The problem we run into here is that we have a strong market for most parts and machining and some good tuners and builders. But in Sweden the b230 is like the 350 or Ls in America . They built it from the ground up and regardless tuning it for so many years they have made it look easy to put 500 hp in a DDturbo car and 200 hp in a na engine all using 530 or 531 heads . What is it that you are after . Best way to do it is go across the pond and learn from the best for a few years come back and make what you have learned easy and share what tb may or n ay not know.
Swedish run to much boost .
FYI fire ring the block
Click to expand...

You don't have to go and live there and suffer from drinking 1% beer for outrageous money or being shocked senseless at what ordinary food costs, and fuel costs, and ordinary shoes and everything else costs, or suffer from an impenetrable and inconsistent bureaucracy in every aspect of life----others have suffered already for you...

All you need to do is learn to read the language....and read..

And others have done that already...

And really, a lot of the juicy information is numbers...and they're the same..

And what I was referring too was this article from 1992 or 93 comparing Stock 240 to VOC to National Class, later called Grupp H where the Grupp H car was a typical for the class 2300 8v on 48 Weber DCOEs:
Picies kinda big but I wanted the text clear..The caption to the top piccie says in there "according to the test data the 230 hp Volvo is a smidge quicker than Per Svan's Group A Astra (a full spec lighter 2,0 16v Opel with a beautiful Cosworth head and BIG runners and a 6 speed GM/Grtrac box)
vassvolvo3.JPG


Look at these figures for the intervals---THIS is one reason they build better stuff: DATA.Comparisons. Baselines and results..THIS is something that gives you ideas to aim for--and to compare--something we don't do here in Turboprickerland or even in the silly rally world I am mired in. Everything is measured by "I LIKE it"

Compare:
vassvolvo2.JPG


The article does point out the acceleration difference--pretty amazing, and says, of course the Grupp H car has better suspension and brakes--which also will have a big influcence on SS (special stage) times...

Its really frustrating when this stuff, this info is all known stuff, no magic, easy enough to do, doesn't have to cost like it does there--because we aren't there where every job pays so much more (because it has to when EVERYTHING is so much more expensive), and in fact in many ways now, we can do better...(pistons cost much less here than there then, bitchin rods NOW are cheap, steel light flywheels cost half what they cost there...bearings are cheaper, gaskets cheaper...cam belts and springs (Mitsubishi 4G63 being perfect) are cheaper..
Just Carbs or ITBs cost more..
And good cams.
 
Recman4 said:
Sorry if I let the cat outta the bag
Click to expand...


Oh no, everything is fine..We really ought to learn from our betters what we can---and they can learn some of the stuff we do good, too.
I export my long rods and pistons to Sweden and now not just Volvo but Ford and Saab and Opel too..
(That's the one thing--the Swedes are conservative by nature. Very conservative, and car guys more than average....the guys I export to have known me for nearly 30 years, they know I'm good at engines cause I'm not a "single brand perv" and I learn from very good guys here, there and in UK...and that I did my "apprenticeship in the school of hard knocks" there, their way, very hard headed, and not cutting corners (except maybe on my own cars, never on serious stuff) So while I try to be very careful I still say "Nothing is written"
Which credit is due, I got from this great film when I was maybe 10:
<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/_EZCG2Ex8Q0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
 
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Recman4 said:
That's True depends on your pockets
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If you dont have a lot of money (like me), you take your time, pile your cash and while you are doing that, you use the dialectical materialism (can dialectics build bricks?) to try to understand the reality of the engine you are building and the reality in wich the engine is going to be used (whitout forgetting the environnement in which it is created). Also, you can use social constructivism to deconstruct some of the TB's artifacts in order to not repeat sterile thought patterns that usually lead to something we can discribe (figuratively and literally) as : "going fast nowhere."

In other words, there are still two ways to build and engine
1: The proper way
2: The turbobricks way

The only variant is time.
 
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i like parts that i can get from the junkyard . tuning goes along way and using a gas that's more tolerable to performance mods is the way to go . i've seen people scratching their head when they blow up there 300hp turbo car on regular gas (like what i do wrong) . good tuning will get you a long way. problem is tuning is like opinions and everybody has one .
 
some guys on here put rods and pistons in there car when they aren't even close to pushing the limits of what stock can handle . the swedes prove that all day long with there mostly stock motors and bolt ons.
 
dragbrick780 said:
some guys on here put rods and pistons in there car when they aren't even close to pushing the limits of what stock can handle . the swedes prove that all day long with there mostly stock motors and bolt ons.
Click to expand...


This is just the sort of wrong conclusion that I think is drawn and then instantly becomes a Turdboatpricker Meme, mainly because it fits with the American lazy, simplistic, belief in magic mentality---one which since the rise of forums and soical media has become even more fantasy based.

A COUPLE of very very careful expert tuners with ready access to way more resources than virtually anybody here, and whose dail job is serious SERIOUS actual working on heads---(that means grinding on them, checking results, grinding more, checking more---I think what you guys call "In the Real World") have done some pretty amazing things dynoing cars with minimally done bottom ends.


That does not mean "most people" do anything like that "all day long"..with "mostly bolt ons...
Disabuse yourself of that notion. It is wrong and it is flat silly (and silly is a EXTREMELY polite choice of words)

This Swedish word is better: skit snack.

Studying the dynamics of this oft expressed and obviously desired mythos would be as instructive about the differences as yapping about builds, because it is here that the source of the differences is found.
 
Recman4 said:
The problem we run into here is that we have a strong market for most parts and machining and some good tuners and builders. But in Sweden the b230 is like the 350 or Ls in America . They built it from the ground up and regardless tuning it for so many years they have made it look easy to put 500 hp in a DDturbo car and 200 hp in a na engine all using 530 or 531 heads . What is it that you are after . Best way to do it is go across the pond and learn from the best for a few years come back and make what you have learned easy and share what tb may or n ay not know.
Swedish run to much boost .
FYI fire ring the block
Click to expand...

waxing poetic doesn't get anyone any further down the road. one of the things to look at when considering a "DD 500hp turbo car" is total mileage traveled (since many of the cars spend 6+ months in the garage getting worked on or at the very least not driven), but also and more importantly, how did they go about getting to 500hp?

A lot of times (and you can search this out), the answer is-an aggressive cam, bigger valves, better springs and retainers, oh and a giant turbo and 7500rpm rev limit. So you're not really putting any kind of strain "dd-ing" the car when most sane people don't commute to work banging off the limiter every day.

as far as the rest of it, it's all fairly openly discussed and the information is readily available, along with the reasoning. Everyone seems to fall into this trap that there's something special and unique about the volvo engine relative to other engines, and as such it requires mystical knowledge to make power. It doesn't. It's not any more special than any other engine. This isn't some sort of internet conspiracy, you won't see ads that read like "learn swedish and unlock this little known b230ft secret" or "Tuners worldwide can't believe they missed this one detail"
 
vincentzgagnon said:
I'm watching this tomorrow. You had a chance to see The Pervert's Guide to Ideology? Slavoj ?i?ek is da sh1t!
Click to expand...


No, not yet but I have stumble across him and read a pile of things before...

I did have a couple of friends from nearby and those guy would discuss in a crazy round and round way culture and differences--this was in the bad ol' days of Warsava pact facing NATO-a million mean armed to the teeth--and Tito growing old....What would Tito's death mean for everybody? Would Slovenia split? Would Serbia attack? Would Russia and USA move to "help" their surrogates? What is life like there? And here? and in Sweden, another small country "on the outside edge of Europe"?
And lots of tea, and tabaco was spent often to 0100 in night was consumed and references to books, film, music, newspaper and TV in all these places was constantly invoked...
The connection to Slovoj was he was discussed in academic circles in Slovenija and the one guy's wife was instructor at Ljubljana University..

Naturally he would be very useful to read and watch to understand differences in Swedish vs American tuning...
 
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