I was reading the August 2005 issue of Super Chevy, and they have a short article on page 97 about the Granatelli MAF (actually, they call it a MAS). They have some really "interesting" results: 35.07 horsepower and 23.88 lb-ft gain. This appears to be on a stock '97 Z28. I did not notice any mention of whether the car was automatic or manual. Something else interesting was that the car only made 193.56 horsepower at 5200 rpm. This was on a Mustang dyno, so the numbers may be lower, but that's a 30% drop from 275 hp. Hmm...

Of course, they did before/after dyno comparisons, but they immediately put the car on the dyno after the MAF swap. I'm thinking that the new MAF leaned the car out some, but after a few days of the BLMs adjusting, most of that gain may go away. The author of the article mentions that he had never seen a dyno run before this, so that's a little weird. They changed the air filter, since it was so dirty, but they fail to mention whether this was before or after the first dyno runs. It looks like they may have done it between runs. One last nifty fact - Super Chevy apparently did another article with the Granatelli MAF back in 2000 that only yielded a 18 horsepower increase, according to Granatelli's site. Was it a different version of the Granatelli MAF?

All of this seems really fishy to me. Does anyone really believe that a LT1 gained a whopping 35.07 horsepower from swapping MAFs?

 

Granatelli MAF is useless, just get a good tune it will do the same thing. The MAF leans out the motor, thus producing the alleged gains. I doubt you'd actually see 18 horsepower, maybe on a stock LT1 you might see that.

Its completely worthless, overpriced garbage. Do not buy it.

- Z28WannaB

 

Yup. They're worthless unless you're pushing 450 RWHP.

 

Guys the after test was 228hp I believe the before was 19X and if you read the article it had a NASTY air filter. I find it hilarious that the after test was at the lowend of what an LT1 f-body puts to the ground BONE stock. Yeah do some reasearch and you will find that Granatelli MAFS are junk at best and even if you want to argue that do some searching on STOCK RWHP numbers and you will be suprized at how low the output of the tested car was.

 

I have a dyno tuned car with a stock descreened MAF. I also have a
Granetelli MAF on the shelf. I will be participating in a dyno tuning
session in August and my plan is to do a couple of baseline pulls with
the stock MAF and maybe some tweaking. Then I want to put the
Granatelli MAF in and see what happens, do some more tweaking and
see what the bottom line is. The only advantage I can see in the
Granatelli MAF is related to heat soak. I have a So Cal daily driver
type car and think it's a better option. I'll let the dyno tell me.

 

Yeah, I wasn't planning on it. I thought it was just a funny article, especially with all the discrepancies. I really like how they gained more horsepower than some people get with a cam.

 

Well at least now I'll know where they got the 35hp claim from when the newest Granatelli ads come out, that'll be all over the place most likely...

18 was crap, 35 is some kind of weird useless crap, lol...

 

I also read a similar article in Camaro Performers a few issues back and they claimed 19hp and 22 ft-lbs. with the Granatelli unit. I dont know though, I am skeptical about it.

 

To begin with,and to end with, amost of the articles you see about G MAFs, etc. are ADs. Not unlike weight loss programs, muscle building, wrinkle creams, etc.

 

I wrote Granatelli a letter regarding the maf and their claims just asking for more information on their claims. I explained the point of view from what people posted here on the board about how the computer works, my understanding of it all etc. They never bothered with any reply.

 

I'm sure Super Chevy would do the same.

 

So basically the magazines are getting some good dough to make this device look good. My question is then is how are they able to show all of this horsepower improvement with a dyno? Just wondering what tricks they do.

 

Like I posted earlier in this case the baseline was with a nasty filter, other easy tricks include not actually flooring it either way restrict the cars power them magically have it make exactly what it should have stock after the addition of "XYZ part". A great example of that can be seen in the Tornado infomerciant they use a LT1 Impala SS, if you wath the dial on the wall in front of the guy he just low reved it the first test then let it fully rev on the second test after the POS was added and it made about 220hp at the tires which is perfect for a car that made 260hp flywheel.

In this case they made 228hp after the adition of the part well if you do some digging a lot of guys seem to be putting down more than that with bone stock cars, if this was a $20 part I could say so what but this is a $300 part so you are going to want it to actually work and it does not.

 

That definitely clarifies things.

 

Yeah, they could easily pull that by someone who's never seen a dyno run before.