mods for the 355

You already have black boxes..lol.

My thinking is that the stock boxes can be modified(along with some little "top secret" goodies) to give the same reported gains as the GrM.

I know this is way off-topic but did you look into crack testing your wheels??

 

Haven't spoke to the powdercoater yet. Is a certain someone I am thinking of working on a top secret goodie... The guy we mentioned last night on the phone???

 

YES YES YES...He is one smart man

 

I too am working on a set of improved intake flow 'black boxes' for the 5.2 355 .............

 

How about a recommendation for engine management chips? Anyone have any luck? Powerchips,Tap1,Imola? I have heard these chips advance timing, remove or delay knock sensors and increase fuel to air mixtures.

 

dear all

again thanks for all the info. also the reason i ask why the 360 wheel will fit the 355 is because i want to see if they share the same offset. i know a lot of people are selling off their rims.

 

Little hard data that I have to support what I say but I have knowledge of a 355 2.7 that had the chips and all the goodies. Extensive testing led to everything being taken back off after numerous dyno sessions. Big claims on the Net but little if anything on the car.
I had to sort out a 2.5 Mondial T that was chipped by a big name source. Finally had Master Thursby the Great burn up some OE clone chips and fixed all of the FI connections and fusebox issues and set all of the parameters back to stock with a set of Hyperflow Cats and an aftermarket muffler being the only deviation. Just had lunch last weekend with the owner and he said he averaged a little better than 25MPG while doing long runs well into triple digit speeds at triple and four digit elevations. Emissions legal, dead smooth idle.... The HP chips would put a cloud of soot out the tail pipe under full throttle that looked much like a Public Transit Bus pulling away from a stop.

Ferrari did not make a name for themselves by leaving a whole bunch of performance on the table. If it could be utilized, they damn well sold it. HP figures equate directly to the final sales figure. To find hidden power in these cars and retain reliability one has to turn over quite a few stones and be satisfied with numerous small gains which in the end all add up. I approach it by trying to think like the engineering staff at Ferrari SpA, "we want this and that and this..." and then look at it from a bean counters view and the marketing view. "That" costs too much to produce in volume and "this" makes the car too noisy for the Swiss, and "that" will never pass the cold start EPA Smog requirements. When viewed in this manner you will find small improvement areas as no one is concerned if the Swiss govmnt. doesn't like the sound and the EPA isn't checking cold start emissions. Think of it as the engine design engineer being Robin Williams in Good Morning Vietnam and the marketing and bean counters being the twins with the red pens. The design guys run in to the meeting all giddy and by the time they leave their design is hacked to dickens by all the red tape. If it could rev to 10K and retain a respectable reliability there is no reason what so ever Ferrari wouldn't have sold it. Remember, Ferrari really cares if it makes it out of the warranty period intact, it is obvious they like to sell parts and base the P&L figures on this fact.

I think the time has come where we all have to look at this from an emissions view, if not legal, at least something respectable as no matter which side of the Warming debate one stands, we do have to clean things up a bit. The days of dumping fuel in engines is gone. The simple fact is an engine makes the most power about 2 degrees short of piston melt down while the knock sensors are going ballistic from detonation. What we want and what the environment wants are not that far apart. Troy built Cats that flow damn near what a straight pipe will flow and you have to be doing something real stupid to be pulled over for noise issues. Look for what the Red Pen Twins would have taken away from the engineers that designed this lump and there is HP to be taken back and then define the play ground rules as to what one is willing to give up in reliability and all around driveabilty and there is a whole new world to be explored under that rock. Then, as Bruce B. so well stated, "kick out the fat chick", that is the cheapest performance to be had. We would take a car being prepped for the GT Class, weld in a roll cage and hang the suspension off it (happens to be illeal BUT if proven it was done ONLY in the interest of safety...) and mount the seat to it. With the driver connected to the cage and the cage connected to the wheels and the body just coming along for a ride we would pull out the hole saw and sawzall. Not an easy sell to ones spouse when we are talking about the family Ferrari.

Dave

 

"I would like to challenge ANYONE who owns a car with GruppeM air box ,or anyone who distributes or intalls them, to PROVE all of the alleged hp/torque gains.
Considering that this modification retails for approx. $3400, what FACTUAL proof do/did you have that motivated you to purchase??????????????????
I have heard alot of claims and theories, but NO DYNO graphs....... WHY????????????
If it is all that it is claimed to be surely GruppeM or others would be taunting this to induce someone to purchase.
I have already fallen into way too many bad purchases based on the hype produced by false claims, word of mouth, and marketing gimmicks......NO MORE for me, if it really works then prove it, or I am NOT BUYING period.......
I DO NOT want my initial purchase of $3400 to turn into $10K+ because now I have to purchase a bunch of additional parts/service to get it to work properly!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Any takers???????????"


Here we go:

http://competizioneracing.com/index.php?option=com_expose&Itemid=29&topcoll=15
Go to "performance enhancements" 355 5.2 dyno graph is there. Before and after GruppeM with 30 minutes between runs.

Regards,
Fernando

 

I have the GruppeM on my 95 for 4 years and love it. Don't just think about maximum hp or torque numbers. Look at the whole graph and see that the mid range hp and torque increases. Throttle response is better. I posted some dyno graphs on one of the threads. Competizione said they got 12rwhp form the GruppeM and their was a guy with an NSX in California that got 12-14rwhp with the GruppeM on a 95 F355.

 

bcwa,

The guy a couple posts above mine installed the GruppeM intake on my '99 355 a few days ago. I opted not to get it dyno'd since I'm going back for dyno tuning in the next month or so. However, my derriere dyno indicates a definite improvement in HP and throttle response. If the shop still has my stock airbox around I'll see if they can dyno the car with and without the GruppeM just to back up the dyno already posted. Admittedly, it's a bit of a drag that it costs $3400 to get a measly 11hp, when the same amount of money on most cars would net you another 80hp, but then again as Ferrari owners we spent more money than necessary for something as useless as a toy car...

-R

 

Robin--Did you have the ECU reflashed also?

 

There is a very nice affordable intake improvement for the 5.2 355 on the horizon ........ along with honest dyno numbers to prove its muster ........

 

OK, look back at those pics. The Gruppe M on the 5.2 355 looks sooooo good that this alone is pretty much worth the coin on appearance alone. C'mon, I would drop $3400 on challenge wheels so fast your head would spin, and 99% of the world wouldn't know them from the stockers; and I despite being light, I bet there ain't a soul on here who could tell the difference from in the car. So what's the difference?

For what it is worth, the Gruppe M is just a little bit louder. It's subtle, but me likey. Besides, I took the money out of the market to buy them, so in reality I got them for 1/2 price!

 

Can it be modified to fit the 2.7 355?

 

You had your chance on Wednesday...

 

The 2.7 intake design is better than the 5.2 ...... but it can still be optmized a bit more ............ fabrication for the 5.2 is about 50% done ......... I will be posting dyno numbers soon after fab completion ........ probably before the end of this month ........

 

(Please bear with me)

Is it due to the long straight run in the air path that make the 2.7 design better or is it due to the extra airflow meter? Someother reason?

My car has 2 unusual chambers attached to the air boxes (one on each) I was told these are to allow more airflow under high demand, i.e instant full throttle. This is not something I have seen on ANY other 355, it is on the unfiltered side of the air box. I will see if I can find some photo's....

I look forward to seeing the completion of your project Oz, sounds AWESOME!

 

Really?

 

I think I know what your 355 has .......... I believe they are a form of pulse resonators ......... in short, the idea was every time there was a reverse pulse on the intake side it would be stored in those chambers as pressure, available for when the flow goes in the intake direction. That way they don't interfere with the column of air coming in through the ducts drawing air from the outside. I hope that makes sense .......... I really don't know how well they worked in practice with the air cleaner and such.

The 2.7 is improved as you said, with the two separate flow paths and MAFs among a few other things ......

 

Thanks Oz, here are some old photo's I have of my air boxes, interesting what you say about pulse resonators, not sure if they are of much benefit, I could remove then and see if it makes any difference is guess.
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Yup those are it ! .............. it would be interesting to see if there is any noticeable benefit for them. If you try the 'removal experiment' make sure you cover the holes they would leave behind. You don't want to draw hot air direct from the engine compartment into the intake .

 

Hi James, I think those have something to do with lowering the intake sound to pass noise-level standards. (??) Just a barely-there memory of a thread on here a long time ago. Sorry if I dreamed it, that happens sometimes.

cheers Hudson

 

Hey Hudson, I dream of my car all the time haha..... You are correct, I started a thread a while ago and the consensus at that stage was that these are to reduce noise, but they are on the wrong side of the filter for that to be the case, induction noise reducer chambers are normally on the filtered side of the system. Not 100% certain but Oz's theory is more what I think these are for.

Good to see you back on here brother, been a while?

 

I will see if I can find some rubber bungs the correct size to cover the holes and give it a shot, it will be fairly unscientific but interesting no less.

 

Nope that's next month Debating whether or not to dig up a new exhaust first. I like the Tubi I have but am in the mood for something different.. MS Racing or Kreisseig maybe.

-R