Purchasing a dyno is one of the wisest things an engine builder can do.
An engine rewards us with power increases when we find what it likes. An engine does not have any appreciation for the time and money spent building new stuff to test. An engine likes what it likes and does not care if we spend a million dollars looking for those needles (crumbs of power) in the hay stack or we stumble across by shear accident.
Learning the limitation of a piece of test equipment and how to accurately interpret the test results will take a little time. Most of the guys using the model dyno you have tend to make their run times too short especially on engines over 50 hp. Short run times tend to coax the tuners into making many of the same common errors. These common errors are too much compression, excessive timing advance, too lean on the jetting, and exhaust systems that are too short. The short run times will reward you with power increases but will not produce enough heat in the right areas within the engine and exhaust system to make problems raise their ugly head. Every customer is not building an engine for 300 ft drags. If you need help call me. some guys get off on the wrong foot after attending the new dyno owners school in Las Vegas.
It is best to find design and tuning problems while testing on the dyno and not let your customers discover them with a failed engine.
