[updated:LAST EDITED ON 29-Apr-02 AT 02:08 PM (EST)]>I have to agree with LW555. I, too, put one on. The REAL
>gain was when I put the Tornado sticker on the back
>window! Man, talk about power increases!!!!

Wow, you got a sticker with yours? Wow, Now I'll have to get a Tornado just for the sticker to put on the back window with the K&N and Crane and Comp Cams stickers I just got
....or wait, did I burn those stickers with the boxes.

 

You may be interested in reading the same thing in the Excursion forum.

I asked a fellow X owner to drive his truck with and without the Tornado and report back his findings (although with a much larger margin of error than claimed) for all of us.

Take a look down there!

Concensus from real world testing is that you're better off donating the $70+ to a needy family.

https://www.ford-trucks.com/dcforum/excursion/176.html

 

Here is a website from an independent auto repair facility that tested the Tornado. Their results show it is worthless:

http://www.salemboysauto.com/tornado.htm

INLINE SIX POWER!
300 Cubic Inches of Low RPM Truck Torque! And twin-I-beams too!
"Drive a stick young man! There'll be plenty of time for automatics when you're old and unable."

 

I have to question your skepticism branding the Tornado as pure junk. I looked on the website and they had a very compelling abc local news program clip which tested the device on a dynomometer using their abc news van.

They tested it without the device using a glass jar with a cup of gas in it. It went 2.7 miles at 60 mph on a cup of gas without the device and 3 miles with the device. They repeated the test to verify the results. 0.3 tenths of a mile adds up on a full tank of gas.You can't argue with math. The device seems to work. Unless they are dummying up the commercial. Horsepower was also increased.

I haven't bought one yet, but very likely will. $70 seems steep to save a few bucks in gas. It's really just a squirrel cage fan that doesn't move. It ought to be around $10 tops. But,hey, that's marketing for ya!

They have plenty of testimonials on the web. I am shy about any performance product. I bought my first spark plug booster gismo for my opel cadet station wagon in 1975! It didn't make any difference. But it had a good salesman at the flea market! It worked for him!

I actually am considering making my own by snipping up some sheet metal I havelaying around the shop just to test the theory. I always enjoy a good science project! As long as I am not selling them I can do what I want. A cookie tin looks perfect for my 73 olds!

Dan

 

To the person that claimed ABC got 2.7 miles to cup of gas...Do the math...There are 4 cups (8 oz) to a quart (32 oz).... so you have a mileage figure of 2.7x4=10.8 there are 4 quarts to a gallon so 10.8x4=43.2 mpg. Now, please do tell, what van gets 43.2 mpg? ABC is famous for doctoring up reports to favor their views.

Some of you might remember when ABC got sued not just once, but 5 times in a 3 year period for "editing" reports. The two most famous cases were the exploding gas tank (they used a model rocket engine for "dramatic effect") and the flipping Samurai (seems the tires, which were rated for 35 psi, were aired to over 80 psi). I guess you just can't blindly believe what you see on TV.

Now lets look at some common sense things. AIR is not an LIQUID, it is a GAS, and acts and flows differently then a LIQUID. A Gas is a very poor conductor of mechanical energy. This is why during the tornado demonstrations they use LIQUID instead of colored AIR (or any gas for that matter). The AIR that enters a tornado will NOT carry the mechanical energy (swirl) created by the device pass the threshold of the device. That would VIOLATE the laws of a gas in motion and the laws of AREODYNAMICS.

If you think I am Wrr…wrrrrr…wrrrrr…wrong (it’s hard for me to say that word) you can prove this on your own without spending 70 bucks on a piece of junk. You will need the following things: Two, two 20 oz clear plastic bottles, one roll of duct tape, one two liter clear plastic bottle, one shop vacuum of any size. One Bar-B-Q (steaks, hot dogs or brauts are optional).

1) Take the two-liter bottle and cut the ends off.
2) Cut down one side of the bottle so you now have one large piece of flat plastic.
3) Using one of the 20oz clear plastic bottles as a template cut out a circler pattern from the flat plastic you made in the last step.
4) Cut out any shape you wish from the piece of plastic made in step 3 (though it should look like the tornado product in question).
5) Cut the large end from the two 20oz plastic bottles.
6) Tape your tornado look-a-like to the large opening of one of the bottles then tape the two large ends of the bottles together.
7) Tape this assembly to the hose from the shop-vac.
8) Crank up the Bar-B-Q and get’ter smoking real good.
9) Turn on the shop-vac and point it at the smoke and watch what happens.

A 3 hp shop-vac with a 2in hose will draw around 2300 CFM or enough air to feed a 1000+ HP engine. What you’re going to see is that the air/smoke that flows around the “tornado insert” that you made in step 4 will “swirl” for about 2.3 inches (or one inch for each 1000 cubic feet of volume) pass the obstruction. Then it will straighten out and flow normally. You cannot cheat the laws of physics. Why do you think they don’t demonstrate the tornado the way I just did? Because it would show it’s a fraud.

 

Well it may not have been a cup. It was a glass jar with a tube going to the fuel pump. What I saw was that it went 2.7 miles at 60 miles per hour without and 3 miles at 60 mph with. Don't know how much gas was in the jar.

Anyway, I made one out of a cookie tin with tin snips and put it in my 73 olds ( because it has a carb.) My truck is fuel injected, so the olds is easier.

Now how to test it without a dynomometer?

Guess I'll track the gas mileage for a while a see.
Dan

 

Dan, Why don't you find a place on the open road where you can arrive at a certain point at an exact speed (say 40 mph) and right at that point floor it. Then have another exact point where you will record your speed. Make sure it is soon enough that you keep it floored all the way. Try it without the home made tornado and see where you you get to say 70 mph. Then put in the tornado and try it again right away so the temp, humidity, wind etc don't change. If you speed at the second point is much better, then maybe the tornado works for your car. Also, don't involve gearshifts in the process as it will add an uncertainty factor. But if you have an automatic, you will need to use a lower gear if it locks in and dosen't downshift anyway. Then you may have to start your test at a lower speed.

I thought the tornado spun, but now I hear it just sits there and plugs your intake????????

 

Just a thought. Whether this thing works or not. Be sure that if you make one or buy one, that it is very sturdy and will not break any pieces off due to vibration etc. If any metal "fan blades" get loose in your engine, it will cost you a lot more money than any gas you might save is worth.

Personal opinion based on reading and some college physics and thermodynamics courses etc... These things don't work like the other guy mentioned, because the air plenum in our trucks is way too big for any swirl effect to last. Now if they had mini tornados right at the intake valve then maybe this would work. But then again, Detroit has spent millions of dollars over the past decades to induce swirl in the combustion chamber so any additional swirl might have no effect or could even cancel the effect designed into the engine.

Just opinions.

Jim Henderson

 

hey y'all, i put one in my exhaust collector today, now my truck sounds like winston cup car and goes 190 in the corners
and gets 48 mpg
sorry, couldn't resist, but 70 bucks will buy a lot of gas, i dont need no beer can stuck in my engine