Customer Q&A (with Peter Treydte, Banks’ Director of Technical Communication)
QUESTION #1:
I have installed a Banks Monster Exhaust and am considering a “Six-Gun and Speed-Loader.” My primary application is towing a 15,000 lb. trailer (GCWR 23,000) with an ’06 F-350 SRW 6.0L Auto 3.73 CC SB 4X4. I tow at 60 to 65 mph (3.73/18 in tires) which translates to 1,700 and 1,750 RPM. All of your charts start at 2,000 rpm which is 74 mph in my truck, which never sees towing. Consequently, my interest is in torque and power output from 1700 to 1750 RPM.
1. What is the torque and HP increase that I will see from the Monster exhaust and at what RPM, especially 1,750 RPM?
2. What is the torque and HP with the Six-Gun and Speed Loader at 1,750 RPM.
3. A product that I would like to see you offer for my truck is a way to manually select 4th gear. My choices are 1, 2, 3, or 5th.
The higher rpm max output numbers don’t do much good for the vast majority of trailer tower’s like me who don’t tow at 75 or 80 MPH.
Read on for the answers…
ANSWER #1:
First, I must address your overriding concern about test data at engine RPM’s lower than 2,000. It is important for you to know a little bit about how our testing is done. All the power data that you see in our brochure is the result of full load testing. That means that the vehicle is brought to full throttle application in a fixed gear (in this case 4th gear which is direct) and a load (resistance) is applied to the rear wheels in order to maintain a specific engine RPM. These conditions give us the most accurate measurement of the engine’s power output. Our tests normally start at the top of the RPM range, in this case, 3,600 RPM. The vehicle is held under this set of conditions while data is taken; this will commonly last about 30 seconds. Then more load is applied to draw the engine RPM down to the next test point, usually done in increments of 200 RPM. This is repeated until the RPM reaches a point at which the vehicle electronics determines that load is too great and a downshift to the next lower gear is commanded, in this case, 3rd gear. This scenario can only be compared to climbing a hill at full throttle while the hill gradually gets steeper and steeper.
The scenario that you describe of cruising at 60 or 65 MPH at 1700 to 1750 leads me to believe that you are indicating a situation that does not require a dramatic amount of power output. If you continued to maintain that speed while climbing a hill, eventually your throttle application would increase and your transmission management would downshift the transmission such that you were no longer operating at 1700 to 1750 RPM. This brings up an essential point of vehicle dynamics and power applications. Any given set of road conditions will require a certain amount of horsepower to accomplish a task. For instance, your GCWR is 23,000, and your vehicle with a trailer has a certain aerodynamic profile. If we assume that you are traveling on a perfectly level road on a day with no wind at 60 MPH, there will be a certain amount of power required to accomplish that task. For the sake of argument, let’s say that is 100 HP. Your engine needs to produce 100 HP at 1700 RPM to keep that vehicle moving at 60 MPH. We can assume that it is capable of doing so in its stock condition. The addition of a Monster Exhaust will not change that power requirement. The engine will still produce 100 HP to keep the vehicle moving at 60 MPH. HOWEVER, by removing restrictions to airflow, it will be able to do so more efficiently, which translates into better fuel economy. Every one of our airflow products will have this effect. Once one of these conditions changes (faster speed, acceleration, steeper road, heavier load, headwind) then the power requirement also changes.
The added power potential of the Monster Exhaust, Techni-Cooler, and the Six-Gun Tuner will be used when your power demand is increased. This occurs when you want to accelerate faster (ideal for taking a heavy load up to merging speed), pass slower traffic more safely or climb a hill faster or in a higher gear than previously possible.
You may occasionally see power curves from other manufacturers that show data at lower RPM levels, but those tests are performed on an acceleration dynamometer that never applies a full load to the vehicle. Tests are performed by running the engine rapidly through its RPM range. This data is not a proper representation of the conditions that your vehicle is subjected to on the road, especially one that weighs 23,000 lbs.
I hope that this gives you a better understanding of why it is difficult to answer your questions about what the power increase is at a lower engine RPM. This data could be gathered from a vehicle with a manual transmission, but then it would not be applicable to your vehicle with an automatic, and since it is impossible to operate the vehicle at that RPM under full load anyway, it is meaningless information. With that in mind, allow me to attempt to address each of your questions:
1) The Monster Exhaust will typically offer increases of 15-20 HP and 40-50 lb-ft, with these improvements occurring within the RPM range that has already been illustrated. Based on the discussion above I could not venture to guess what this increase would be at 1750 RPM.
2) Based on the discussion above, I do not have horsepower and torque data for the Six-Gun at 1,750 RPM.
3) I agree with you that a product that would allow you to manually select 4th gear would be valuable, and there is the possibility that we will develop such a product. There are a number of things that can be done to improve the overall performance of the Ford 5-speed automatic and we are doing testing now to determine what path we might take for a product.
I hope this is helpful to you. Please let me know if you have additional questions.