A&Q about 350Z
Q:
I think its been pointed out before, but when it comes to choices, Americas automotive market has a lack of choice somewhere behind China and North Korea. I believe its fighting for 3rd place with India, although they did just take large steps to open thie market up, after the Morris Oxfords they've been building under lisence were shown to be a little out dated (although they are still more sophisticated than a Ford F150).
I believe that was the gist of my first post
The American car buying public have become victims of thier own ignorance, and the manufactors are milking it for all its worth.
A:
uhhh, sarcasm.
thats the second time this has happened.
i guess this means that i need to take a closer look at what i think is funny...
A:
Isn't the biggest advantage of pushrods having a really compact engine?
For those familiar with toyota engine codes. the FE suffix denotes the "fuel efficient" version. Imagine if toyota produced a GE version.
A:
I would have to politely disagree with some if you in that Americans are not that far behind in technology. I don't think you can buy a car or truck without rear wheel disc brakes any more. Also OHC engines have been around a long time on American made cars. The 2.3L SOHC ford for example. Or the old 2.0L OHC in smaller GM's. Today everyone uses them except for small block chevy's. Ford's V8s are OHC engines, mustangs have had the 4.6 Single or Dual OHC cams since 96. Cadillac Northstar engines are DOHC V8s. Chevy trailblazers have a DOHC inline 6. Chryslers 3.7 and 4.7 engines are also SOHC. If you want to talk about pushrods, why change designs when you can get 500 hp out of a simple pushrod LS7.
A:
Actually, there are a lot more than you might think. New cobalts and Focuses have rear drums, as well as most new minivans.
Because if they made a DOHC LS7 they could very well get more than 500 horsepower out of the engine. Or make a smaller displacement engine that can make 500 HP.
A:
look at it this way.
while american car companies are struggling to make 1 hp/cid,
the mark of a good european car is 100hp/L.
being that there are 62 ci in one L, and 1 hp/cid = 62hp/L
you can see that we are pretty far behind.
which yould you rather have?
i mean really, your average crate 350 V8, the most popular hot rod engine, comes with only 290 hp, and thats out of 5.7 liters.
A:
Yeah, maybe I should have worded that differently. I know there are alot of drum brakes out there still, I work on them all the time. And I like OHC engines as much as the next guy but I guess I am just old school at heart. The gist of my post was that Americans are moving toward those designs but are also slow to give up old technology.
A:
Ok this is great.....Yeah you make 100 hp/1 litre thats great. Torque is what wins races....If that is what you want to talk about if you want good reliability then you get a honda DOHC.
Thing that you guys need to realize that you are comparing apples and oranges.
These are 2 types of different setups! case closed
A:
No, not neccessairily.
A:
Wrong, wrong, wrong.
And again i say, WRONG!
I think i'm going to go on a shooting spree if i have to go through this again.
A:
oh, but you explain it SOOO well.
Torque is what gives you POTENTIAL to win races.
it is the measure of how much work an engine can do, in absolute terms.
Power is the measure of how QUICKLY an engine can do this work.
an engine from a semi only makes about 3-400 horsepower.
an F1 engine makes nearly double that, but an F1 engine could never pull a semi.
the semi engine makes around 1600 lb/ft of torque, while an F1 engine makes around 300 lb/ft
the torque gives the semi engine the potential to pull the trailer. if a semi engine were to rev to the RPMs that a F1 engine can, it would make astronomical power. fact is, it cant because of the way it is built.
A:
But let's not confuse terminology... Torque is force, not work. Power is potential to do work.
Torque is a static measurement. HP is a function of that force applied over the span of the circle over a period of measured time.
A:
Well its really difficult to explain the differences between torque and horsepower. I was going to bring up the semi and the F1 racer concept, but i didn't have the time.
A:
yeah, but it makes more sense (to me) that way.
oh well.
A:
Actually if you geared a F1 engine down (and gave it sufficient cooling) then it could pull a truck with no problems.
Of course the large diesel engine is rated for continuous power for thousands of hours, where F1 engines are rated for one race, reaching that power severl times.