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Motor Trend On Demand calm but here's an
example of one of the shows that you
missed last week
the sunny day here at West tech
performance in mira loma california now
this is where we do a whole lot of work
and in particular today we're shooting
the episode with mighty car mods where
we're putting together this 69 Chevy
Impala with that blown big block chevy
that used to be in the crusher camaro
and fortunately our friends out here
were kind enough to let us use their
parking lot for this gig because we've
got thrown out of our own shop and I
thought I would maybe walk through this
place and show you a little bit about it
because we use it all the time both for
magazine dyno testing and also for
Engine Masters every episode that you've
ever seen of engine masters is shot
right here for a little industrial unit
here again
Mira Loma California Westech performance
group they've got two halves of the shop
you never know what kind of crazy stuff
going to show up out here on any given
day like this little chevy pickup i
forget what your that is 39 ish he's
maybe coming in for a little bit of a
tune-up help which they do on this side
this is their superflow chassis dyno
right here there are lots and lots of
stuff I've seen import cars running the
front tires on this just the past couple
days they've had a ton of trophy trucks
prepping for the Baja 1000 running here
all kinds of drag cars have seen couple
thousand horsepower put down to the
tires here tho run things like this sand
buggy right here check out the LS motor
in the sand car another sand buggy over
there there's always projects just
stacked up everywhere of all sorts of
different kinds some of this belongs to
Rick stoner who is the owner of the
place some of it is customer stuff some
of it is magazine stuff i don't really
know the specifics have like why this
historic vehicle corolla is here
they also have a lift they don't really
want to do mechanical work here tonight
not with the shop does for a living but
they end up doing quite a bit
that's what that's there for rocket
brand racing fuel is a sponsor of
westech that's what we use for all of
our chassis dyno testing and engine dyno
testing so it comes in here
those are actually a
empty I believe you'll see there's a lot
of engine stacked up over here again
some of this stuff belongs to magazine
guys really westech was founded with the
idea of helping magazines do their dyno
testing because there was a long time
sort of a gap in the seventies and
eighties where the magazine's didn't do
a whole lot of engine testing because
there just wasn't a facility to do it so
when they opened this place up all of a
sudden there was a big lot of testing
and I think the magazines have gotten a
whole lot better for it back here is
like their machine shop area you can
take a glance in here and you can see
there's a regular customer who's getting
his engine hung there on the dyno looks
like he's got a big black Chrysler there
that they're going to run that Steve
Brule my good friend and engine masters
co-host he runs the place here and does
that all the like trickery on the dyno
all the magic stuff that nobody really
understand all the flipping of the
secret switch to make horsepower so you
have 290 tues now right yes
so both of these are super flow 90 tues
used to have just a 901 on this side and
what year did you guys go to to dinos
was about 2,000 we've got this space and
put the chassis dyno and right and this
was up and operational in two thousand
aight i believe that you were part of
the first test with Steve Matusik
alright for the float Bowl test that was
the first that was the maiden voyage of
the house gyno okay and then we changed
out the 91 in that cell 2902 also in
2010 and so now they run both Dino sells
many days right Steve runs back and
forth between the two making it happen
so are these old magazines tough
customer stuff all of the above yes
yeah okay moving on check this out this
is like the wall of intake manifolds
there was a time when we did so much
magazine testing that we just had to
have a whole bunch of intakes and
they've sort of collected them over the
years as donations from like YN data
Brock and such so often one will come in
we need Steve to save our bacon on
making some engine run will pull stuff
out of stock here or look at the header
collection over here
yeah we'll have to go upstairs to
because upstairs is where the really
good header situation goes on come on up
here check this out
this is the extremely well-organized
actually it used to be but it's sort of
gotten out of shape header collection
but you'll notice that they are all
bolted together so you can if you can
spot a flange know what engine it is
that the 426 Hemi right there etc then
you can pretty much find what you need
as far as headers go and there's turbos
sitting around a whole lot of stuff
they're sponsored by companies like
Lucas Oil rocket brand comp cams and so
they supply a lot of the materials that
we use for our dyno testing and really
close relationship with Holly as well
and they send us a lot of hooker headers
for our testing that coming down here
amazingly you can find anything you need
here if you look long enough
sometimes it gets a little bit hectic
this is the big water tank right here
this is just this dino right there's
another water tank over there
this is what the dyno uses in the the
water break to actually measure
horsepower and up here is tell us what's
going on there Steve actually need to
stand next to you so that my mic will
pick you out of kids shut the heat
exchanger we actually for durability
test can pump this water through that
giant giant radiator so it helps keep
the water for the dyno cool four-engine
purposes absorber and in those hot
summer day to know Southern California
when we could eat it up pretty well and
sometimes the dyno water gets stinky
yeah change it once well no matter how
many bottles of bleach and sometimes you
know just get stinky but kinda weird
will walk in some mornings and you look
at the diner on Blackwater and
I don't know some strange from chemical
thing happens don't talk about the EPA
will be over here
yeah and so this is the second Dino sell
this is where we shoot all the engine
master shows in this one right here and
it looks nothing like this when we're
doing engine masters because the guys
come in and completely like the whole
place like radically differently and
makes it looks sort of more high-end
than it actually is
this is the reality of it right here the
way the dyno works is mounted engine to
this you'll see it's very much like
transmission bell housing it is a
transmission bell housing and it's blind
here we don't have to hang starters on
the engine anymore because there are
dual starters right here on the things
we actually it's both of them are just
one of both of the starters turn and
then here's your water breaker absorber
which is the thing that actually has the
strain gauge on it which is measuring
what the torque is which we then
extrapolate horsepower from and airflow
through the dyno is a really big deal
and I think it's probably one of the
things that makes the West XL's way
different than a lot of places there's a
massive fan up in here which you can't
really see because it's super dark and
it is pulling air up this way and
drawing it through these vents in the
wall over here so when you're standing
in here when that fan is running there
is a wind and the reason for that is
that you're getting all sorts of fresh
air across the engine and you're taking
the exhaust out of the room
it's interesting if you run an engine
without the fan on it will fill enough
exhaust into the room fairly quickly
that the engine will strangle itself
you'll start to see it just literally
the you know sort of student its own
juices and die so this is how all that
works you can see all the sensors and
everything that we hook up to collect
our data they always run Holley EFI
stuff in here when they're running efi
engines and they also have MS D
electronics were all the carbureted
stuff obviously if I can control both
fuel and ignition when that's required
and you've got gauges out here but
that's sort of just an FYI the only one
we really use here is oil pressure when
where
pre losing an engine so that we can see
if it's getting pressure and over here
this is the control room which also
looks crazy different when you'll see it
on engine masters and this is where
Steve will sit and run everything you
see what's going on
work the accelerator the emergency stop
we steal all of our data right here and
of course this collects all the
information and saves it so that we can
analyze it later and then the last thing
to show you I guess is our work area
this is if you watch engine masters and
I'm doing the stand-ups in the beginning
you'll see me standing right here
talking about all sorts of crazy stuff
see the amsoil logo over my shoulder
it's lit crazy different we have walls
of lights along here stuff hanging up
above me it looks all blue and crazy but
this is where we do most of our work
where he was working on one of our
engine masters engines that we blew up
here the other day but i don't see right
now over here is the wall of felpro
gaskets that are in stock a whole bunch
of engines that are being worked on i
think this is mostly Richard holder
stuff holders a freelancer you'll see
his name and a whole lot of magazines he
runs the dyno here himself often at
night he just cranks out a bunch of
content with all of these engines and
this whole area used to be just packed
with motors they've managed to clean it
out pretty good
this is an engine masters a small-block
chrysler that's our blueprint engines
400 Chevy check this out this is the
supercharged 426 Hemi this belongs to
Rick who owns the place and so does that
dragster up there
everyone always likes the dragster up at
the top shelf which is pretty neat
and more and more and more engines and
stuff stacked and this is the area right
here where we're shooting that episode
that i told you about when we first
opened up this episode of roadkill extra
that is the mighty car mods episode of
roadkill where we're building that
big-block 69 impala so that takes it
right back to where this all began
there you have it a tour of west tech /
performance you can check them out just
google westech performance group in
merrill oma California because you can
bring your engine here and they will
dyno tested for you as well obviously
there's a dayrate a fee but you can get
your engine tested on the engine dyno or
on the chassis dyno it will also help
you to your car up on the chassis dyno
or the engine dyno there you go
here's what you missed last week on
Roadkill Extra exclusively on Motor
Trend On Demand
ok oil and what happens when you slam on
the brakes and all your post
well I don't really know the specific
stuff like why this historic vehicle
corolla is here
people ask me what is my still photo
background and what do I shoot with
that's it right there if you need more
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