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Dynolicious Featured in Road and Track

Wednesday, January 21st, 2009

Dynolicious receives high marks in the February issue of Road and Track magazine. Road and Track profiles three accelerometer-based performance systems (a stand-alone system, Dynolicious, and an in-car computer). Dynolicious shows how well it stands up against dedicated accelerometer-based performance hardware.

Speed Zone

By Douglas Kott Portions reprinted from Road and Track February 2009 page 95 Sure, we at Road & Track make it our business to performance-test any enthusiast-worthy car that showes up on our doorstep. But suppose you want to generate these figures yourself? With the typical 401(k) looking more like a .401(k) these days, it doesn’t make sense to rush out and spend thousands on a Racelogic VBOX GPS-based system, the anodized blue beauty that we use to generate the acceleration and braking figures that appear in our Road Test Summary. So here’s a sampling of less expensive alternatives, tested simultaneously aboard a Dodge Charger SRT8 and compared against our VBOX system in the nearby chart. Note that the numbers across the board are slower than our typical road-test times, as we made the runs two-up – with International Editor Sam Mitani riding shotgun and running the iPhone – and the traction control engaged for the sake of repeatability. Although we’re not getting rid of our VBOX any time soon, we came away impressed with the accuracy of these devices… well with the exception of Sweet Leilani.

Dynolicious Software for Apple iPhone and iPod Touch

With accurate accelerometers built into the latest iPhone and iPod touch, it was only a matter of time until someone came up with a “killer app” for the amateur road-tester, and Dynolicious has stepped up to the plate. Assuming you already own an iPhone or iPod, it’s cheap and has superb color graphics enabled by Apple’s 480×320-pixel resolution screen (for the 3G). That means color-coded graphs that practically leap off the device. Dynolicious records the usual suspects (0-60, 1/8-mile, 1/4-mile, lateral and braking g’s) and offers graphs and friction-circle displays that can be played back or viewed in real time. You can export timed runs or skidpad runs to your computer. Dynolicious is supported by a website forum, and you can subscribe to a newsletter for help and ispiration. Chalk up another cool and clever use to the iPhone. We’re told you can use it to make phone calls, too.

0-60 mph, sec
	VBOX	Charger SRT8	G-Tech Pro SS	Dynolicious
Run 1	5.44	5.59	5.66	5.52
Run 2	5.51	5.70	5.73	5.63
Run 3	5.56	5.74	5.77	5.87
1/4-mile, sec @ mph
Run 1	13.93@103.8	14.01@103.9	14.15@101.8	14.11@102.9
Run 2	13.85@103.7	14.06@104.6	14.09@101.5	14.15@102.9
Run 3	13.91@103.7	13.99@104.4	14.13@101.7	14.15@105.8