You two know exactly what Im talking about. Nice.

I was just jokin' about duelin' 'tards there Ron...




Sorry about that.

[QUOTE]The disintegration of a technical forum

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I feel that I have to say that I am seriously disappointed in the events over the past month on this site. After three years on this site I am witness to a disturbing trend, and what I see going on is unacceptable.

I have recently observed more than a few people banned from the forum; many others simply take a bow and don’t come back. What I don't see is people like Ricky banned for a year, people like vette threat, all who do the same kind of hostile posting that is both unpleasant and unproductive. I have witnessed Tony Mamo himself engaged in personal attacks and not be pulled, which, at least to me highlights the benefits of being a forum sponsor. The banning of jsup for a year seems to be completely one sided and inappropriate and forces me to ask; if you have done the same type of arguing back and forth, why are you still here (did your mother ever tell you it wasn’t who started it)?

What exactly did JSUP do that was so wrong? He asked a vendor, who is asking for money, to prove his point (as an engine builder, I find the claims that he and the AFR website make to be quite steep). He was told he was 40-50 HP short and all he said in return was "prove it". To date no one has.

Sure, we were treated to anecdotal stories about ripping out 10 year old cylinder heads and putting in new heads, tuning the car up, tuning the car, and tweaking the valves, which proves nothing (where is the 40hp over a competitive product). Then we had the infamous "David and Goliath" thread that only demonstrated that a poorly ported POS stock head will be out flowed (slightly) by a brand new Cnc’d head, again proving nothing.

All JSUP really did was to challenge those who said he was leaving 40 HP "on the table" to prove it. And guess what, if it happened, I didn’t see it.

Here's the response he got; there are three vendors trying to sell heads (Brodix, Dart, AFR). Brodix says "all the racers use our heads", Dart says "we use wet flow technology" and AFR says "I'll give you 40 hp over the other guys". Now 40 hp is interesting; prove it and you have the sale. What the response was amazes me to this day "buy a set of heads from the competition, buy a set of mine and put them on the car and run dyno test (all on your dime) and then post them on the corvette forum. Oh and I'll take the heads back if they don't make more power. Does this sound insane to anyone else? Are we supposed to buy a Dodge Viper and prove to Dodge and the world on our money that it's an inferior product? I don't see anyone doing that so why should we do that here? How insane is this? Why are you guys going along with it? Where else in the world could you get away with this?!?!

When JSUP made arrangements that would have clearly demonstrated what I believe is the error in the small port, big flow argument; once again Tony went ballistic and insulted and abused JSUP (say whatever you want, saying you are disgusted at someone is out of line). Seems to me that unless someone has their lips planted firmly around Tony's anatomy, they get attacked; by not only Tony, and not by professional engine builders, but by people who have built an engine or two in their garage!

Again, what did JSUP do that was so bad? He spent time and effort researching information and posted it (I read it all, most of it, was spot on). Amazingly, none of which was ever refuted! In fact, Tony, who NEVER mentioned port design in any of his posts in the past (the focus was solely on flow vs. size); all of a sudden was talking about how much the shape mattered; interesting. He also kept bringing in JSUP's lack of dyno numbers over and over again, as if that really had any bearing on what was being discussed. I have engines that make more power than most; that doesn't mean anything in respect to the discussion that was raging. You might as well ask him whether he prefers boxers or briefs as it's just as relevant as his dyno numbers. In reality though this is what happens when someone can't support their claims, they divert from the topic. He said prove it; you blinked, simple as that.

I think what happened here is clear (and this is the reason why I’m typing this post). When Tony was being exposed for the fraud that he was, and not being able to back up his points (because if you make claims like “this is the best 23* cylinder head on the market" and can’t back it up; you are in fact a fraud), he went to the mods and took JSUP out (if what’s right is right and fair is fair, why are many of us still here when he's not). He couldn’t take the heat, so JSUP was out of the kitchen! Plain and simple. When he can't control all aspects of a "challenge" and I use that term loosely, he freaks out and starts the name calling and throws his weight as a supporting vendor (and starts his own thread). Let's just be honest and call it what it is. None of JSUPs posts were ever even disputed with any technical rebuttals; actually some reasonable people started to see the light and it was going against Tony's marketing, and that friend was all she wrote. From where I sit, the stronger JSUP’s points became, the stronger the censorship became; to the point that a fully technical thread, which no one came in to dispute (only to bash, including Tony), was locked. One has to ask, why was that thread locked when it was?

Lastly, the dyno the mule thread was simply asking for a side by side comparison; nothing more, nothing less. Instead of taking the opportunity to prove his point once and for all (he was able to use a better flowing, smaller cylinder head; the whole basis of his marketing), Tony decided to attack and insult JSUP on not producing dyno results; again, as if that has anything to do with the topic at hand.

You may see in the future these "technical challenges" put forth completely controlled by AFR. Anyone care to guess what the results of that would be? How about if Brodix started sponsoring the forum and doing the same? I think we can all agree on that one at least!
All this will prove that if you take a car with old heads, which may or may not have been the right heads in the first place, and tune it up (sparkplugs, cap, rotor, timing) , change the cam, re set the valves, put on new rockers, OMG the car feels better and makes more power.

Here's the question, would that "challenge" car make less power if the heads were Dart, Brodix, Edelbrock, or anything else with all the other upgrades? Now you’ve added enough variables to experiment that it can not be conclusive. It will not back up the claims that AFR is the “best 23* cylinder head you can buy” as stated on the AFR website; that’s what I want to put to the test (lofty claims that since I haven’t had a full blown race car engine come through with a set of AFR heads on it…), but beings how I know that to be false, I also know that it will never be allowed to happen.

And the saddest part of all, is there are seemingly intelligent people here that will lap up this crap as gospel and act as if something was actually proven, which, in fact NOTHING was proven (where’s the engine output data, brake specific fuel consumption, all the things that I look at when judging a combination), then they'll tell the next poor sucker that if he does not buy AFR he's leaving 40 HP on the table so go spend his money there weather it's good for him or not (and it’s obvious from the posts that very, very few people here have any business lending engine advice at that level) . That is pathetic.

So it is with this I lament the fall of a once great technical resource, as it has rendered itself a laughing stock of the internet (when it comes to performance related topics). Have you noticed how all the guys with the real fast engines/cars are gone? Have you noticed that no one asks about engines here anymore? Why do you think that is? I think that everyone got tired of hearing the same answer over and over again, when their application is obviously completely different than anyone else’s. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that if you need something different, you won’t be using the same products as someone else. If you people knew 1/2 what you think you know about building real engines, you'd know twice what you really know, on a good day. Take my advice; start building real engines, you know, the ones that have to conform to rules and get compared to other engines; then you will find out just how on the ball you are. You won’t like it since at that point the whole, money buys speed saying, doesn’t hold true. The excuse for your engine not being competitive will lie solely on you and then, maybe then, you will understand where the professionals are coming from when they talk about coming up with an engine package. Until that day comes, do what you always have done; throw some more money at it.

Deakins
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So glad I could try and help your buddy out, this is as transparent as it gets so Ill call a spade a spade.
Never again.

You know what, if I respond to this it's only going to get worse.

All I can say is that if you look at the responses to this thread over there, it really solidifies Deakins' position.

My flow numbers and my dyno numbers have no bearing that 2+2=4, nor does my choice of boxers or briefs.

All I ever said is that a manufacturer made an outrageous claim, and I asked for proof, never got it.

so rather than piss off a whole bunch of new people, I'm going to the gym for a couple hours.

Not surprisingly, no one will argue the facts that Deakins mentioned, they will just attack.

Look, if Goodyear said they have a tire that would produce 50% better mileage, I'd ask them to prove it too. And put up real proof. That does not make me a bad guy.

Somehow this has become emotional to people, so how about just locking this thread now.

It pains me to see this kinda stuff.

I sure hope everyone here can cool off real soon.

You can still count the number of locked threads here on one hand, I believe.

I sure would like to keep it that way. But I don't think this needs to go any further.

I'm not going to allow our technical section to turn into a joke. It's not going to be the place where all the spillover from CF happens.

If certain members don't exercise some self control and cut it out right now, I'll do it for them. Don't be selfish and ruin the forum for others just because you have problems containing your keyboard courage.