25 years of aftermarket performance experience
Joel has always had a passion for cars old and new, but the main passion has been to make them better, faster, more economical, more powerful, more drive-able. After attempting Mechanical engineering at University and a full time job as a Mechanic he soon realized life was only going to allow for one so he dove full speed ahead into mechanics. Joel soon realized that the real challenge was in performance and once qualified was offered a job at Gasresearch Australia, and in a short time became the Dyno tuner and workshop foreman. A few years on and Joel and a friend purchase the fitting shop and form Gasresearch Performance Center. During this time in the late 90’s Joels interests expanded beyond Gasresearch and became a Haltech dealer, fitted Delco EFI to his own 12 second (yes that was a pretty quick daily back then) VK 5.0L with twin Gasresearch Carbies a number of Turbo GQ competition 4x4s and other retrofits, using TunerCAT and TunerPro to re-calibrate factor Memcals for boost and modified engines, building distributors and EFi systems to work, Tuning carburetors and venturing into turbo Diesel . After selling up and moving on to focus on family Joel continued to work as a Dyno tuner in a number of performance workshops, his interest in competition 4x4 which started at Gasresearch gave him the opportunity to experiment with his own Turbo TB42 and then 4L80e Turbo LS 5.7 in his Competition 4x4, during this time he was tuning for many of the 4x4 competitors of the era becoming known for having the best tuned vehicles to drive under all conditions with difficult low speed winching and snappy throttle response required for competition.
In the next 5 years to follow Joel operated a 4wd Dyno in Mornington, not afraid to take on anything he ventured into new and uncharted areas, increased GM Memcal tuning expanded into J3 Chip tuning working with a US software developer to define the Australian based EA-AU Falcon. Other similar products were commonplace and no tune was turned away.
Jumping forward Joel again ventured into business, joining 4B Fabrication. Over a 5 year period the business saw a great deal of growth and success, the Dyno running constantly all day every day pumping out Tunes. Continuing on the same theme Joel continued to tune all manner of vehicle with all manner of software tuning having success in drag racing, circuit racing, drift and 4x4 offroad racing.
A new challenge presented, a position was made for Joel as Calibration Engineer with Harrop Engineering, this exciting and challenging time provided an opportunity to develop the supercharged tune for the Mustang 2300 and 2650 for the later 2018 DI car other development included Y62, Tundra 3URE, and RAM. Tuning the Harrop 1900 upgraded supercharged Exige, E90 BMW, Ultimate Street car winning Monaro and track record beating Toyota 86 Time Attack cars made for challenging and exciting development using multiple software platforms from Motec and Syvecs to WinOLS and Ecutek. Joel performed all internal calibration Development tuning for Harrop Joel and in addition all the retail tuning duties for HPC (Harrop Performance Center) where the focus was on Harrop product, predominantly Commodore, Mustang, 86, Lotus, Ram, Tundra, and Nissan Y62.
Harrop Supercharged 86 Time attack car.
When the opportunity came up to put back into the industry and help share the lessons Joel had learned over the past 20+ years Joel made the move to VCM Performance supporting the HP Tuners network with tuning and training. Included in this role was testing new software releases for new vehicles, developing tune files for sale and supporting the HP Tuning network Australasia wide. Joel developed the Dodge Ram 5.7 Hemi Tune to suit the Harrop 2650 using HP Tuners newly developed Neural Network training software, using the OE method and performed the more difficult retail tuning tasks while training a junior tuner. Due to the limitations we all experienced from Covid Training was hampered such that only online training was available, this proved successful as it provided a one on one opportunity where students were able to cover specific topics and address the issues that were the most immediate need.