At a pulley party at the end of Fed he had M7 crank pullies and his own brand of WMS 15% pullies.

 

Obviously, Randy is trying to (and arguably deservedly so) gain some market share--- after all, many vendors have benefitted from his evals and likable personality. He ain't doin' charity work, and everybody and everybody's mama is sellin' Alta products.

He does the eval, all the legwork, and someone else comes along and vendors away. It's BS man. Webb should be the only freakin' vendor for non-JCW pulleys and other performance parts for MINI, in my opinion. Or, at least, he should get more than a free pulley out of the deal... poor guy.

 

I don't want to change subjects at all, so sorry for that comment.

You are getting close but it runs much deeper.

By the way i didn't mean M7's crank pulley page (on M7's site) now has our info. Randy's M7 crank pulley page has our info with the M7 pulley featured. Nothing against M7 at all. Sorry if it came across that way. I agree that as far as performance goes, they are going to do basically the same thing.

 

Sorry...

mininutz,
You make it sound like Randy doesn't gain anything from his "LEG WORK"?? Remember he is selling the parts(making money). His "Leg Work" gets people to come to him to buy parts, not to his competitors.

Its all marketing! Everyone has a way to attract customers. Weather it is a Web site add, Magazine add, Track day sponsor, Dyno day, customer service, SEMA car, sponsorships..... it all marketing. His marketing was testing all these parts and saying "hey this one is really good and here is why....." In turn showing people he knowledgable and is a good vendor to buy from.

You make it seem like Randy did all the testing and designing of our parts and other peoples parts. That is where you are wrong. Randy has never had any say in any of the designing of our parts. NEVER. Maybe he said, that blue swaybar is not the best color, but that is as deep as it goes. This is where you might have gotten the idea (from his site):

Some of the products we have directly or jointly developed for other companies include: the H-Sport swaybar, springs, and camber plate set, the Milltek Quick Fit cat-back exhaust, the Magnaflow exhaust, the Alta air intake, pulley, intercooler, and short shifter, the Unichip and Powerchip ECU programs, the UUC brake kit, AP brake kit and Leda coilover kits. We are also currently involved in the development of new products from ForcedFed, Unichip, M7, Alta and others.

Magnaflow called randy and said we need an exhaust, can you make it? Milltek? H-sport (hotchkis)? AP? ForceFed and their elise kit was done before he even had the car! Every single part he mentions of ours (ALTA) was designed before he came along.

I work very hard at what i do, and then to have someone come along and say they did all or some of the work (when they didn't) is quite a poke.

His sentence should have said "we have helped market these parts".

Did Randy help sell our parts?? Of course! One of the ways we MARKETED products was sending our parts(which we knew would perform the way we say) to him and other vendors free for proveing.

I am sorry that was longer than it sounded in my head.

 

I used Alta CAI, before, and liked it a lot, now my car runs with 15% ALTA pulley, extremely happy since last 6000 miles, everytime, i ask a question via mail, i get answers right away, everytime i call them, they do not mind sharing information for half an hour over the phone. I am not trying to say others are not as helpful, but as far as my experience with ALTA has always been wonderful. As far as the other deal is concerned, not my business (for now)

 

Good read, thanks for the link. People should be aware of the adverse effects of really tinkinering with internal engine dynamics.

 

Jeff,

You're right in that I don't know diddly about how much Randy contributed to Alta's products, although he's certainly had a lot of influence on other products like the Unichip.

However, one cannot deny the powerful marketing influence that Webb has had on various MINI performance products. In particular, I think that the combo of the Alta CAI, Alta 15% pulley, H-Sport springs & rear sway bar and Milltek exhaust, are popular primarily because of Randy. You might even call this combo a signature Webb Motorsports kit... no wonder he developed the Unichip for it (and variations on it).

Randy is responsible for sorting this combo together and making it work so well and also empowering many of us to do these mods with confidence. Unfortunately there doesn't appear to be much in the way of intellectual property protection for him! Doesn't seem entirely just...

That said, I love Alta products and I've installed several of them in my car. But I wouldn't have done so without Randy's seal of approval, and I don't think I'm alone in that regard.

 

barnabas,
When ever someone post questions about harmonic balcaners, there is always that person who post the like to why they are a very necessary, and could blow up the engine. But the other side is the amount of pulleys out there, and cars they are on, the miles on each car, and so on. Over time, people will see how the solid type crank pulley doesn't hurt things. Do a search and you will find some very good discussions for and against the pulley. Even Randys write up, on his forum is very good.

Randy was influential to the Mini community for sure. He mainly helped things get out there a little quicker. Our performance of the intake didn't change because Randy said it was the best. Same goes for the Miltek exhaust. It didn't get great results because of Randy. The results were to be had by anyone who spent the time to dyno it. In the early days of Mini performance parts he did the best marketing by testing. If Randy didn't do this, i think the Miltek exhaust, our intake and pulley would still be as popular as they are. Because someone else would have found how good they are and told everyone.

 

Just a little history for fun.

Quite a while back Tony(Mugami) and I had a conversation at a meet. The conversation was about removing the wall or opening the wall behind the stock filter box and drawing cold air into the induction system.

We continued the discussion on line here and on MINI2.

Lo and behold several months later the much ballyhoo'd (insert vendor here) intake came out.

Not heard a peep of credit given to Tony about this.
Obviously he never provided any official input into the wondrous intake directly or no.

Funny how a number of "tech discussions" on line end up being product the less mechanically skilled among us purchase with almost never a thank you to the community that promotes an idea and on occasions crates the idea.

So maybe we should all step down off our collective pedestals and admit that all of us are a bit fu**ed up on occasions.

What say you all?

 

Can a mod lock this thread? I think my question was already answered and it's quickly going to turn into a vendor vs. vendor thread.

 

But it's just starting to get interesting!

There was that GRE issue that you had mentioned, so we're not through just yet... You know, I had to wait until after the Ph.D. to start modding my car. In fact, I didn't even own a car until after grad school. Call me a sucker for delayed gratification.

Man, don't detract from your GRE studies. Get a friend to take away your keys and your computer until you're ready to ACE that thing!!

 

Now this is something that I don't agree with entirely. I don't know. There are many examples of great technology that don't make it because of inadequate marketing. Randy's got the touch, man. Give the man credit. He's got that ineffable "it"...

Ode to Randy:
Randy, Randy. You're a Dandy.
Without you, where would my mods be?
I'm not your stalker just a Pulley Party Flocker,
I'm so obsessed, I've flunked the GRE.

 

and swiss-cheesing the air box didn't start with the Mini. Nor did reduction SC pulleys, Lightened crank pulleys, underdrive accesory pullies, ECU tuning, head work, cat back exhausts, larger ICs, headers or whatever.

It's been my experience that there is a time when markets are ready for stuff, and at that time, there are usually (not always, but usually) several sources for the same idea.

Matt

 

Tuls - any idea of what mods ur friend had on hiz car???? want to know if its the 15/2% setup or somefing else.

Alta - in all of ur testing of ur crank pulleys... any of them blow up?

 

There are hundreds of cars out there with lightened, solid crank pulleys. One failure doesn't a curse make. I f you search around, I think Onasled (sorry if I remember this wrong) had a pulley failure, but it was due to the bolts holding it on, not the lack of a harmonic balancer... Anyway, as I always (and now pretty predictibly) point out, the jury is still out, but every day gives more of a hint to the virdict!

Matt

 

Alta, I have a question.

Why have I noticed a 2 lb increase in boost with a 0% crank pulley?

The rotating mass is less, but the distane the belt travels is the same, im stumped!!!

 

Charge him more!

Matt

 

Can i trade in my 0% for a 3%? lol

 

Measure the diameter and make sure it isn't a 2%

 

True, we don't even know how many miles were on the car before the pulley... Tuls, any idea on this? If the engine had been beat for 100,000 miles before the install, that is a confounder right there !

 

mininutz,
That is funny. By no means was that a discredit to Randy. His success in selling the parts he promoted has kept him in business these last few years. If he wasn't good at selling parts, he wouldn't still be around.

obehave,
There are definately things said online that influence parts being made. Colors people like, materials things are made from, ideas come from everywhere, driving down the road, a customer saying "what if you did this"..... and so on.

But your removing the wall idea was not something we saw and thought about copying. In fact when I was designing the air box (Oct 02) I remove every single part from the engine bay and worked toward fitting the filter and shround into place. Found the OEM bottom needed to be there for the ECU and it also doubled as a nice base for a shroud.(which is why other companies left it there) So with the OEM bottom in place i built the shroud around that. From this, came removing the wall!

In fact it wasn't much time later people we talking about drilling holes in the plastic partition, and removing it with other intakes. I didn't think people were COPYING our idea, in fact i thought, "Hey we must have done something cool!"

But the Dr is right, the idea wasn't something we invented. With all my experience with cars, and looking at intakes on all cars, this is kind of a common sense idea. Cold air, large openeings, free flowing filters and so on.

skuzy,
None have blown up that we have heard about. And only one customer has complained of the car not idling smooth. But many many people have said how their car runs smoother!

not-so-redandwhite....,
That is a new one! Hey a new benifit! Seriously you should check that there isn't a number lasered on the side. It will either be blank, or 0% written.

 

alta -
could u shed some light on the types of testing u peepz had done on ur cranks? randy is raving on about the 2% safe only with the 15%.. whats ur view on this?

thanks for being so helpful

 

Jeff, I didnt see any number on it when I installed it, i checked all over it before I put it on.

when i was topping out before, around the redline, it would hit 10.5 tops.

now, as soon as i aproach redline, it jumps very quickly from 10.5 to aroud 12-13 psi.

 

notsored, u should keep the secret.. otherwise alta will raise their prices of the crank lol !!

 

skuzy,
Sorry i missed these questions!
The testing was just like Randys, in that time was the test. The part is simple to make function correctly, but the POSSIBLE issue with it causing bearing issues over time is not something we can test. But with the 3 years we have been selling them, and the amount of miles people have put on them, and the test that someone did shows very good promise.

ABout the size issue, and what is safe. This persons belief, as is many others, is that the most you should go is 17% total. But there are plenty of people with 19%-and higher(with crank pulleys) that have tons of miles on their cars. Anything above 17% and you need to have an ECU flash or chip programmed for that, along with bigger injectors. In fact i recommend the 19% for guys who do day to day driving along with some autocross. But we tell them to make sure they don't rev it past 6500.

Not-so-rednwhitecooper,
Seems strange unless at the same time you started to have issues with a catalytic converter melting causing a blockage, and increasing boost. The other thing is maybe you were getting a little belt slippage prior to the install. None the less, very strange.