Performance Trends

Fuel injection is slowly replacing carburetors as the intake weapon of choice, although there are still tons of carburetor fans out there. To keep up with that ongoing demand, Demon and Holley are developing new models. Demon showed a particularly nice triple-deuce setup with their new two-barrel carbs, which would look great on any rod or Corvette project. Mooneyes even had a modern EFI system masquerading as multiple Stromberg 97s!


Street & Performance is another innovator with a line of street fuel injection systems that look good enough for shows. Also growing is the use of superchargers and turbos that can be integrated with add-on programmable engine management systems. Crane won a SEMA award for a new electronic distributor that has an externally adjustable curve, which can be re-set for street or racing in seconds.

Ins and Outs
Premium quality internal engine parts are critical to the success of both racing cars and street machines. SCAT, a leader in VW and V-8 crankshaft development, has added forged cranks and rods for Hondas and Acuras. Premium-quality reciprocating parts will become more critical as better engine management systems allow street engines to obtain horsepower levels previously only seen in full-race mills. This be will especially true for compact tuner cars, where former econo-box engines are now spitting out more than 350 street horsepower, with some reaching 600 horses or more!


Harnessing this power should be a hot market segment in the future. Expect clutches, transmissions and differentials to be beefed up by the aftermarket as well. McLeod has been building super sturdy clutches for American iron for some time, and Richmond has added 6-speed transmissions to its lineup of manual boxes. OS Giken came all the way from Japan to show off some super-duty clutches, limited-slip differentials and close-ratio gearsets, all for tuner cars to European exotics. In the handling department, QA1 Motorsports brought its racing shock absorber technology to the street with units that are externally adjustable for both compression and rebound.


You can see there is a lot going on in the aftermarket industry. More people than ever are determined to squeeze the last bit of performance out of their cars, and developments in electronics and metallurgy are letting them do just that. We can hardly wait to see what comes out at the next show!