I think the elephant in the room is that Magnuson or whoever is behind the B8 S4 3.0T stage 3 kit rushed this release.
Anyone know why? I think I do.
I think it has a lot to do with jones2012S4 and his dual pulley setup. Jones ran his stage 2 GIAC B8 S4 on race gas this summer in not so great density altitude, and set a new B8 S4 at 11.53 @ 121 MPH. Only it wasn’t stage 2 GIAC. It was stage 2 GIAC + an overdrive crank pulley, whose larger size means the stock TVS1320 supercharger is bring driven even faster than stage 2 proper. I call it stage 2+. Jones didn’t call it anything because he wanted it kept secret. Unfortunately for him people talked, so his secret is out. The good news is that it seems to provide a significant boost delta and power delta over the standard stage 2 cars. Resulting in what looks to be 30-40 hp gained based on his top end. The fastest GIAC cars trapped 118-119 in great DA…but jones trapped 121 in +1500 feet. That’s pretty significant.
If he runs his car on his lightweight wheels and tire setup (rather than the heavy setup he had on) and in 0 feet of density altitude, I wouldn’t be surprised to see him run 11.3X @ 123 MPH.
I think Magnuson and their band of authorized dealers recognized that the TVS1320 with a crank overdrive pulley and a smaller supercharger pulley would cut the delta gained by going stage 3 to almost negligible levels, and they recognized the financial danger and rushed it out.
It’s not a coincidence that jones had everyone who knew about his mod on ziploc mouths for a month after he set the record, and all was quiet in stage 3 land…but once everyone figured out what it was (including Arin @ APR) the stage 3 kit suddenly exploded onto the scene.
Stage 2+ is a major threat to the viability of the Stage 3 kit. I think the sooner the B8 S4 owners recognize this, the sooner people will be saved from wasting 20% of the price of a brand new S4 on the stage 3 kit.
THIS is why they released summer quartermile times, and didn’t wait to run great times in the fall
THIS is why they released it even though multiple stage 3 cars are getting crushed by stage 2 cars
THIS is why they are in full on panic mode
Any thoughts?