I'm curious what people are paying to rent a chassis dyno. I've been wanting to get my car on one for a while now but I feel like every shop I talk to is asking $300-400 an hour with me doing the tuning. I expected more in the $150-200 range per hour.

 

Make a trek to Portland and I can try to squeeze you in on a weekend for that ~$100 rate.

But to answer your question most shops will charge their hourly rate + a little for wear and tear on the dyno equipment. Hourly rate these days is 200-300 for higher end shops, so 300-400 sound about right, but yes, pretty steep. We typically charge one hour, ~$285, for 3 baseline pulls. It takes us right around that time to load, strap, warm up, unstrap, and unload.

 

I've only ever run my car at one shop/dyno around here, Advanced Engine Dynamix, in Corona, CA (insert obligatory: "IT'S WHERE GREG PETERS FILMED HIS VIDEOS!!!1!!"). The tuner there, Toby, charges $200 an hour whether you're tuning or he is.

Your car/tune seem pretty well-sorted at this point. What are you planning on playing with? FWIW, on my most recent visit, we got the car strapped down, and did seven or eight pulls and tune revisions in an hour. That was running ECUtek software and reflashing the whole tune between pulls, which takes about two minutes each time. You'll be able to make any revisions quicker obviously.

 

I would take Curly on the offer if I were you (or if I were closer!). Just because I want to meet him . One of these days I'll trailer up there.

I pay $125/hr for dyno time. They have various packages, but hourly works best for me. They charge a little more if they do the tuning.

 

Yeah, at $100 or $150 an hour I probably would've jumped on one a while ago.

I'd like to fine tune my spark map a bit, see what actual power the car is making for 6 speed health, possibly dial in some closed loop lambda and some areas in the fuel map. Honestly I'd kinda like to get on one just to play around as well. There have been a lot of times where I'm driving around and would like to adjust settings in real time but I don't usually plan tuning out enough to get someone else to drive.

Curly, I'll keep that offer in mind. I don't have a towing setup, but I've been thinking about getting something (here's where you can roast me for looking at VW Touaregs...). I doubt the car would blow on the dyno... I suppose I could get a 1 way Uhaul rental if it did.

 

We've got a fenced in parking lot you can store it at if the worst happens. The issue with long haul trips is usually something happens in the 8 hour drive, not the 1 hour dyno time. Loose turbo hardware, leaky lines, hole in the radiator, that sorta thing. So I hear ya on the tow package, it's convenient.

 

My tow rig dilemma right now is that I'd like to have one to go to UMC and ORP once or twice a year, but don't really want a big truck for a daily. Knock on wood, my car has been very reliable on roadtrips, but like I saw at ORP last year, who knows when a clutch is randomly going to let go (or something else).

It's just hard to find a car that tows, gets half decent mileage, isn't crazy expensive to maintain, isn't a pain to drive around town etc...

We will see...

 

Is this a good time to recommend a low roof short wheelbase Ford Transit? I'm biased but I'm gonna toss a vote in for a small Ford Transit. Not much worse, if any, on gas than a midsize SUV, more stable to tow with, hella room for spares/tools, simple and reliable (motors usually go up to 200k without complaint if maintained regularly). Oh, and you can sleep in it comfortably at the track.

I've only ever left the track with a non-drivable car twice, but both those times I was really happy I didn't have to get a tow home. Watching you pull off those 16+ hour round trip drives to AutoX events during the summer has been rad, but also gives me anxiety haha.

 

One of the other Miata guys here in AZ tows with a high roof Ford Transit Van and swears by it. He loves the storage and towing capacity, camps in it, and even hauls his dirt bike in it when he goes off-roading (with the bike, not the van.) When I finally have to retire my beloved Ford Flex, a Ford Transit Van is a strong contender for my next tow vehicle.

 

The two biggest reliefs I feel on those roadtrips is after the last run of the event and when I pull the car into the garage. One time I remember going to start the car literally the day after our trip to Montana and the fuel pump was dead. The turbo died right after our trip to Winnemucca one year. I've gotten lucky, but I don't think it's going to stop me this year. I'm still pretty sure I'm hitting Summer Camp next month.

I do have a buddy with a ford van and he seems to love it. This would also be my daily which would be used for skiing and camping, so that's a consideration as well. To be fair, my 07 Impreza has been fine, I certainly don't need anything lifted to get around.

ETA - The Touareg tows like 7700 pounds and gets as good of mileage as my Subaru if not better, but I'm wary of the reliability and maintenance costs.

 

No input about dyno costs, but I’m a huge fan of Enterprise Truck Rental. I use them to rent a 3/4 ton pickup every time I tow to an event. It’s not cheap, but it’s far, far less than insuring, maintaining, and paying registration on a truck this size, let alone the purchase price. They’re always near-new, low miles, and are usually pretty well-optioned. I haven’t done the math to know exactly how many events I would need to do per year to come out ahead by owning a truck, but it’s a lot more than I’m interested in, or could afford.

I own my trailer, but U-Haul open trailers really aren’t that bad (that’s where I started) other than weight, which these trucks don’t even notice.

I get around 13mpg towing a 20’ enclosed trailer with the diesels, and they’re not at all bothered by the weight. Only if it’s really windy do I start to notice the trailer back there.

 

I have thought about the enterprise rentals, and thankfully we have enough people in our local SCCA group that I can usually find a trailer to borrow or rent. I don't remember what my hangup with those was, maybe just the number of miles they include? Unfortunately it's about 5 hours each way to our nearest tracks, so between rental mileage and gas it adds up quickly.

Turo was also on my list, and I remember finding people who specifically listed that you could tow with their vehicles, but Turo made that against their policy recently. Not completely surprising, but I remember seeing full size diesel pickups on their for pretty reasonable rates.

The ultimate takeaway form this thread is that instead of whining about things being expensive I should just accept that they are expensive, and that if I want to do them, those are the costs.

 

TL;DR: dyno is expensive at $300, so buy $30,000 van instead.

 

Hell, at this point maybe I should just install a dyno in the garage.

 

It's basically $30,000 off now.

 

If you do this, I'll come out and give you $199 an hour to use it.