Official 'Let's discuss Torque vs HP thread...

Hack · Feb 14, 2006

jerry S said:
Hack, you say Torque like it is a bad thing.

Re my engine, it is a 351W bored .040 over. I have posted the dyno below this message. Basically, my torque peaks at 3600 rpm while my engine makes power to about 5600 before it flat lines. My timing is still way off. I am at 28 degrees total advance whereas I should be at 32-34 considering my 10.5 CR. I should pick up some power when I get the timing right. Crower tells me this cam's power band is 2200-6000 so spinning it faster won't get me any gains.

Nope, just a 358W so not so much weight.

I was trying to get the most out of it. I think I am limited by my heads (RPM Performers). I will either port them or just get new AFRs. with a peak hp of 300 rwhp behind a C6 with a crappy torque converter and a trac-loc in desperate need of a rebuild, I am guessing that my drivetrain loss is 25% giving me 400 hp at the fly (with the timing being so retarded. I should pick up 10-15 rwhp when I advance to 32-34+).

I don't know, looks like a great street build to me. Other than tuning I wouldn't change a thing. Unless you just have a lot of extra money and nothing to spend it on.

I do still firmly believe that if someone built another engine with similar cubes and set it up to rev to 7,500 or more it would make more power and be faster than yours. That's assuming that they've set it up well.

Let me say this again, I'm not saying a build like yours is bad, just that it will be out-performed by a higher revving engine with similar cubes... an engine that makes more hp than torque. Your engine probably costs less, will last longer and is more suited to street driving, though. As I said before, a build like yours is what I would want to do for a street engine.

Edbert · Feb 14, 2006

jerry S said:
Nope, just a 358W so not so much weight.

My 357W weighs just a tad less than the C-code it replaced.

EDIT:
Jerry, I don't claim to speak for Hack but I think you guys are in agreement. All he's saying is that with a profile setup for higher RPM operation you could juxtapose the hp/tq numbers. Two cars at a drag strip, both have 358Ws, one's power curve flat lines at 5,500 and the other at 7,500 we know who would win the drag race. But take those same two cars out for Saturday cruise around town and we know who will be the happier driver. I think you have the perfect combination of power curves for a hot street car, once you get the total timing dialed up a bit your hp figure should climb appreciably. I also don;t think the RPM heads are really losing you power over the AFRs, at least nothing the seat-of-the-pants dyno would show.

72Grande, check out Jerry's lat/long numbers, plug them into google earth, at least it will explain the temperature and barometric figures if not the furrin language stuff

reenmachine · Feb 14, 2006

jerry S said:
I know. I asked them about that not less than 3 times because it seemed strange to me to make so much torque compared to HP. The shop assured me that although the graph says newton meters, it is actually torque. They say that at the bottom of the graph where the results are displayed, it says torque and not NM.

The shop is showing a total lack of understanding of what they're looking at here. Torque can be expressed in Newton-Meters, Foot-lbs., or a gazillion other units of measurement. It is still torque though! Because the graph says "torque" doesn't mean that it's in a particular unit -- that is ridiculous. It is clearly being displayed in Newton-Meters, the most common metric unit for torque (look at the other set of readings on your torque wrench). This makes sense given the language the software is in. The shop just needs to go into the preferences for the dyno software and change the display units for torque to ft-lbs.

Edbert · Feb 14, 2006

reenmachine said:
Torque can be expressed in Newton-Meters, Foot-lbs., or a gazillion other units of measurement.

Oh yeah, well my car makes 71,240 calories per second at 6,250 RPM!

reenmachine · Feb 14, 2006

Edbert said:
Oh yeah, well my car makes 71,240 calories per second at 6,250 RPM!

Precisely.

reenmachine · Feb 14, 2006

jerry S said:
I know. I asked them about that not less than 3 times because it seemed strange to me to make so much torque compared to HP. The shop assured me that although the graph says newton meters, it is actually torque. They say that at the bottom of the graph where the results are displayed, it says torque and not NM.

OK, I Google Earthed your coordinates and this makes much more sense. You live in metric-land (lucky!). I'm surprised that the power isn't expressed in kilowatts (kW) instead of horsepower on your graph. 1 hp=746 Watts, or .746 kW.

jerry S · Feb 14, 2006

reenmachine said:
The shop is showing a total lack of understanding of what they're looking at here. Torque can be expressed in Newton-Meters, Foot-lbs., or a gazillion other units of measurement. It is still torque though! Because the graph says "torque" doesn't mean that it's in a particular unit -- that is ridiculous. It is clearly being displayed in Newton-Meters, the most common metric unit for torque (look at the other set of readings on your torque wrench). This makes sense given the language the software is in. The shop just needs to go into the preferences for the dyno software and change the display units for torque to ft-lbs.

Well burst my bubble and serve me a dish of hot, steaming crow!

So I don't have the torque monster I thought I did. Although saddened, I take solace in the fact that I still have a 400/400 engine, which ain't nothing to sneeze at, with a 125 shot of juice in the mail. I will still be having fun this summer no matter what.

67GTA-FB429 · Feb 14, 2006

All I know is that I am cranking out 490ft-lbs and 372HP with a BIG BLOCK, baby!!

And high revvin motor cost a lot of money and are no where near as sexy as a BIG BLOCK!! Just ask the girls...bigger is better.

10secgoal · Feb 14, 2006

Jerry it still isn't un normal. I was at 275/360 to the wheels. And a little gas was 345/473.(P.S. install your kit yourself. Your shops consistant lack of knowledge is something I would not what them to prove again with the installation on a nitrous kit.)

67GTA-FB429 said:
All I know is that I am cranking out 490ft-lbs and 372HP with a BIG BLOCK, baby!!

And high revvin motor cost a lot of money and are no where near as sexy as a BIG BLOCK!! Just ask the girls...bigger is better.

Girls don't want to be split seam to seam. They want something that can do it ALL NIGHT LONG!!

Edbert · Feb 14, 2006

They raced the 260s/289s at Indy back in the '60s, there were more than one group building them but the most famous was Dan Gurney. He teamed up with Weslake and made the engines called "Eagles". They were overhead cam designs and had 8 @ 1v webber side-draft carbs arranged where we expect to see exhaust ports, the exhaust came out of the top-middle and curved back into the slipstream.

I don't know how many RPM they pulled but it was over 10K, output was WAAAY over 500hp too. I seriously doubt they were production blocks though.

EDIT:

jerry S · Feb 14, 2006

10secgoal said:
Jerry ..... install your kit yourself. Your shops consistant lack of knowledge is something I would not what them to prove again with the installation on a nitrous kit.

you are so right. The dutch are just a bunch of pig farmers who dabble in other fields while possessing only the skills of pig farmer for whatever it is that they do.

1. The shop that prepared my mustang for the RDW inspection set the total advance to something like 40 degrees + and the car detonated the whole way down and back. It sounded like I had a can of marbles in the engine block.

2. the second shop set the timing to 28 degrees. So I went from being over-advanced to severely retarded. Then they did not know that I had the wrong push rods in there, telling me to get 2.5 inch long rocker studs even though I kept telling them I thought that I had the wrong push rods in there and to pull them out and measure them.

3. when my power brakes did not work, the second shop said that the MC was all wrong even though I kept telling them to check the electric vac. pump to make sure it was pulling 21 inches of vacuum. All the guy did was put it against his thumb and see that there was some suction before pronouncing it perfect. When I insisted that they test the vacuum and they discovered that it was pulling only 13 inches, well then, problem solved.

4. My Omega Speed Master was running perfect, losing only .3 of a second per day. I took it to an Omega certified watch repair facility here in the NL for its 3 year check up and when I got it back, it was running fast to the tune of 27 seconds a day. Definitely not within COSC specs. I took it back 3 times and they could never get it to run less than 10 seconds fast or slow per day. I sent it to Italy and it is back to .3 seconds per day. Perfect.

5. I had 5 porcelain facings put on my teeth. My previous ones I had done in America and they lasted 18.5 years. One of the facings installed by the dutch dentist fell off after 4 days.

I can go on, and on, and on with at least 50 more examples.

As luck would have it, there are some SBF guys in Germany who can take care of business. They are called US Army and they pour every dollar they earn into their cars. One of the better cars is an 86 coupe, TT 383W (dart block) putting down over 1000 hp. These guys know what they are doing and will take care of me.
There, done ranting.

reenmachine · Feb 14, 2006

jerry S said:
The dutch are just a bunch of pig farmers who dabble in other fields while possessing only the skills of pig farmer for whatever it is that they do.

Now that made me laugh out loud. So what are you doing there? Or are you a native?

jerry S · Feb 14, 2006

reenmachine said:
Now that made me laugh out loud. So what are you doing there? Or are you a native?

I am an ExPat American (from Dee-troyt, muthaf****) who realizes only now how good I had things back home.

Jimmys66 · Feb 14, 2006

jerry S said:
I am an ExPat American (from Dee-troyt, muthaf****) who realizes only now how good I had things back home.

You obviously, haven't been home lately. I get there several times a year for business. Other than going for a race or for the Dream Cruise, I stay home in Kalamazoo.

DarkoStoj · Feb 14, 2006

michigan crew

jerry S · Feb 15, 2006

Jimmys66 said:
You obviously, haven't been home lately. I get there several times a year for business. Other than going for a race or for the Dream Cruise, I stay home in Kalamazoo.

Actually from Farmington Hills. We moved from the City in 1976 when some "citizens" decided to relieve a kid of his 10 speed on our front yard. They beat him to deat with a baseball bat I left on the front porch, so yes, I know what you are talking about. I don't think that things have changed in Detroit for the better in the last 30 years. I would love to go back but me and the missus is stuck here for the time being.

90bluegt · Jul 11, 2006

Guys -
There's a reason they cross, you need torque to get you going and you need horsepower to keep you going. Horsepower alone will not get you going quickly that's were the torque comes in.
Once you get into the upper RPM's horsepower is all you need to stay moving. Horsepower is better than torque, but you need loads of torque to get to the horsepower quickly like you want. See what i'm saying? A good balance of both with reward you with good times in the q-mile and fun on the street.

dodgestang · Jul 11, 2006

How many times are we going to see this one again. Let me see if my diesel can pull this one back into the archives.

Hack · Jul 11, 2006

90bluegt said:
Guys -
There's a reason they cross, you need torque to get you going and you need horsepower to keep you going. Horsepower alone will not get you going quickly that's were the torque comes in.

Not really true. Torque is a measure of twisting force. It's like the ability to hold tension on a torque wrench. It does not equate to moving or turning an object.

Horsepower is a number that defines the ability to turn the wrench or move an object.

There are calculators online where you can input the weight of your car and the time/speed through the traps and get horsepower. You don't get torque from the sites. Why is this?

It's because the torque that your engine produces CANNOT be equated to your car's acceleration. That is why people calculate horsepower. Horsepower can actually be used to determine how quick your car will be.

Edbert · Jul 11, 2006

Hack said:
Horsepower can actually be used to determine how quick your car will be.

Another "yes and no" here.

You have two cars that both make 400rwhp, one has a torque peak of 400ft/lbs the other has a peak of 350ft/lbs (ignore average torque measurements for now). Are you saying that since they both have the same HP they'll be even in a race?

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