How to Spot a Psychopath

I just received the following:

Date: Mon, 26 Mar 2007 11:32:33 -0700 (PDT)
From: Rick Head
Subject: Big Money for your Endorsement
To: dan@dansdata.com

I want my site for my electric supercharger reviewed on your site, specifically for the "volt and amps reveiwed" section of http://www.dansdata.com/danletters105.htm
* If you can put a two line statement that approves of my product and has my link, I would be happy to throw $500 dollars your way. Let me know if this is a possibility, my site is http://www.electricchargers.com and my e-mail is stventures55@yahoo.com

I wonder if his name's actually Richard Head. The domain's registered to a "Jesse Bushong".

Never mind - Dick Head is a great name for him. There's your link, Dick! For free! Enjoy!

As I explain on the page where Dick for some reason wants an ad (but which he clearly didn't read - he didn't even get the title of the letter right), devices like his are a big old waste of money.

They may - may - add a few per cent to your car's power, over at least some of the rev range (less and less as the engine turns faster and faster). But the very fact that you can just bolt these things on and drive away without messing with your engine management system indicates that nothing much is happening. If you add any real forced induction system to a modern car, it'll freak out the engine electronics.

Dick is, to be fair, only charging $US99.95 plus shipping for his fan, versus the $US300 or so that you can easily pay for what appears to be much the same thing from bolder dealers. But hey, who knows; it's not as if Dick even provides any specifications for the device in question. There could be a computer fan in there for all I know.

It doesn't really matter either way. Pretty much anything that runs directly from 12 volts isn't going to be powerful enough to noticeably boost any current automotive engine. You just can't suck enough amps out of a normal car's electrical system - for a proper electric supercharger you need 24V or higher power (to keep the current down), from separate batteries.

(The scam-warning page I link to above, by the way, is from these people, whose $10 electro-charger plans sound quite plausible. You can tell, because there's work involved.)

Oh, and Dick also offers you the amazing chance to "receive another 20HP" by buying a new ECU chip to go with your similarly useless electric blower! What a deal!

And so, here's my endorsement:

Shoreline Technologies' electric supercharger is not "the only quality Supercharger on the net". It is one among many, and all of the simple bolt-on versions are pretty much a scam.

Shoreline seem to know this, and so seek to promote their products not by proving that they actually work, but by bribing people to endorse them.

(Oh, and by using forum spam. Classy!)

Shoreline's attempt to pay me off suggests to me that they are either unable to read, or simply under the impression that everybody is as dishonest as they are.

Do not buy their products.

(I am, of course, still perfectly happy to receive donations from Dick, or anyone else. I encourage anybody who's impressed by my honesty to shower me with riches forthwith.)