Take back the keys!

Originally Posted by David
A recent series of events have made me loose my "loyalty" to Magnus Motorsports and I can't sit by and be quiet anymore.

Here's the basic scoop. Out of "friendship" I have kept my mouth shut for a few years about this intake manifold loosing power compared to just a stock intake manifold on the EVO's.

As a lot of you know back in 2003 or so we started selling the Magnus sheetmetal intake for the EVO's. I figured they worked so we carried them and sold them.

I put one on our original 2003 EVO8 with the stock turbo and put it on our dyno. The car LOST 34 ft lbs of torque and 34 whp in the midrange and up top it couldn't reproduce the same peak numbers, close, but not equal. I contacted Marco about this and he basically told me, "Well you are an idiot, it was never meant to be used with a stock turbo, put it on a car with a big turbo." I didn't like the answer but we swapped it back out and I continued to sell them figuring, "I'm an idiot."

Time passed by, we had a few of them crack and we contacted him again. He told us that he used some different material and would change it so it didn't happen anymore. Al Friedman cracked quite a few. Matt Smith (no nitrous or alky on this car) split them multiple times and repaired them, Marco replaced one for free knowing there was a problem. I figured, cool, he's going to fix the design flaw and everything is good to go.

Then one Friday night I got my normal pile of automotive magazines in the mail. In there was an advertisement for the Magnus intake. Claiming something like 50 whp gains. Well like many people I am a sucker and I got on the phone to my brother. Went something like this, "Hey Daniel, what are you doing tomorrow?" Daniel says, "Nothing, what's up?" I say, "Meet me at the shop in the morning with the red car and let's try this intake manifold again now that the car has the 35r on it."

Saturday morning bright and early we meet at the shop, put the car right on the dyno and make 2-3 runs with the ported stock intake manifold and 65 mm throttle body. The car made 500 and something. We then took the car off the dyno, put the new intake manifold on with the same 65 mm throttle body and put it back on the dyno. Sure enough, the exact same 35 ft lbs/35 whp loss in the midrange with NO gains up top. We were both pissed off we wasted a day doing this. Swapped it back to stock, re-dyno'd one more time and sure enough all the power was back.

I contacted Marco again. First he tells me I'm nuts, he has hundreds of customers using them and they all love them, blah blah blah. He then tells me he finds it odd that only myself and AMS say they don't work. DING DING DING DING!!!!!! I tell him, did you ever think it's because myself and AMS are the only two shops who have dyno's who do back-to-back testing?! He then admits to doing no actual dyno testing of the part, he just made it like the DSM stuff which always worked. (I wonder, did it or didn't it cause this POS sure doesn't) He tells me he is going back to the drawing board with it and will improve it. Asks me to be quiet about it and give him some time. I agree and then tell him about an idea I had for a "reversed header" design on the intake manifold and tell him about some Burns Stainless aluminum parts I had made for doing it. I sent him one to use. Not sure what he ever did with it.

The design never changed. We sold off what little inventory we had and took the product off our website. I WILL NOT SELL SOMETHING THAT I KNOW DOES NOT PERFORM. Obviously it doesn't bother Marco to do this.

Recently the topic of his intakes came up on EVOm and some guy had one split open. I innocently went into the thread and suggested to the guy that he contact Marco about it and I was sure he'd replace it as it was probably and "old design". Marco came unglued on me for this suggestion. Quite odd as I was trying to give him an out to fix it.

I was quiet about this because I thought the two of us were "friends" or atleast had some mutual respect for each other, that was not the case. Just another guy using a friendship for his own gains I guess. I know he was sour over my findings in the intake design and not selling them anymore......

I find it an absolute disgrace that anyone would knowingly sell a product that not only doesn't gain power but actually looses power. People can call me a lot of things but I am no liar or a cheat.

Thanks for reading.