Ford gets a clue

I dunno, my 5.0 only has 55 Hp/liter.... about the same as a Taurus.... but man, does that car kick ass. I think your entire premise is invalid.

And if I put a blower on it, I should be at 500hp? Think again.

Brad

IMO, talking about horsepower is just part of the performance equation. One also has to look at the torque rating of an engine. Your old 5.0L may be on the low side for hp/litre but it delivers a lot of torque. Torque is what accelerates your car not hp. Historically, American consumers prefer a car with a good torque curve over one with high end hp. That is why the domestic auto makers tend to gravitate toward larger displacement engines which provide a broad flat torque curve. Foreign buyers are comfortable with high winding lower torque engines that deliver better gas mileage mainly due to their smaller displacement.

I would take an engine with a nice broad torque curve over a high winding small displacement engine. I don't want to have to drive a car like I stole it to get some performance from it. Other's preference may be different.

BINGO.

Rob

Torque times speed is the horsepower. Either have high speed or high torque. Engine adapts to a changing load by something called a transmission and drive train. Any higher horsepower engine can have more torque - simply adapt to a changing load. And so we install transmissions. This need for 'high torque' was a big spin to promote low performance, obsolete technology V-8s to the naive. Need more torque? Then select a lower gear. Need more acceleration? No way around higher horsepower. Any engine can be geared for more torque.

Meanwhile, how to make an engine 'feel' more powerful. Make noise. A truly high performance engines not only accelerates faster. It also leaves a driver unaware of how much faster the vehicle is accelerating

- because energy goes into acceleration rather than into noise and vibration.

Let's see what true sport cars do. Mazda Miata: 85 Hp/liter. Lotus Elise: 105 Hp/liter. Audi TT has two engines with turbo: 100 / 125; or 78 Hp/liter without. Porshe 911: three engines - 90/88/100. Porshe Boxer: 89/88. Honda S2000: 108. Pontiac Solsitce 74. Chrysler Crossfire: 67 and 103 with a supercharger. Ford Mustang:

52 / 62.

All are only fuel injected unless stated otherwise.

Some sport cars are nothing more than standard performance. Then hype promotes a myth just as hype also sells Listerine, Geritol, and younger skin from the Pond's Institute. A sports car typically does what all cars are expected to do 20 years later. If I recall correctly, Porsche was doing 70 Hp/liter in the 1970s. 1960s Corvettes and Shelby Mustangs also once did those numbers. So what happened?

'Bean counters' started designing all Ford and GM products. They promoted myths to motorheads so as to blame it all on anything but auto company management. Myths such as high torque V-8s. Engines were not 'detuned'. They were cost controlled - which is why costs increased and performance decreased. Read stories about GM's Mona Lisa room to appreciate why they had to promote myths about lower revving engines. Yes, you cannot machine engines to 0.0001 tolerances when using technology only capable of 0.001. Those HP/liter numbers demonstrate what a decent sports car does when using current technology manufacturing machines. Those who make lesser products mask their lesser designs with more pistons and myths.

When hp/liter number increases, then the engine curve becomes broader; across a wider range of RPMs. It makes a vehicle easier to drive. To solve the narrow torque curve of low performance gasoline engines, then increase engine displacement. Mask the defect with a bigger engine: "More Power". More power moves the entire curve vertically; causes that curve to be wider (horizontally) at its base. To move that curve vertically, then increase displacement. But innovative engines widen the curve without increasing displacement.

Look at some numbers. A car at 3000 pounds has a 200 HP engine. A

60,000 truck then must have many thousands of horsepower? Of course not. Trucks only need 300 and 500 Hp engines because the engine adapts to a changing load. How do we solve the narrow curve for gasoline engines? Either we grossly oversize the engine to mask an engine that does not adapt to changing loads. Or we innovate using technologies such as the 70+ Hp/liter engine, turbo and superchargers, and hybrid technologies.

To an accountant, such innovation only increases cost which is why both Ford and GM feared even the hybrid; why top management stifled innovation even when given $millions by the US government in early

1990s to innovate. We should be asking what happened to that $100 million.

Higher revving engines are more fuel efficient because heat of combustion spends less time being absorbed by the block. Why must a rotary engine spin even faster? The surface area verses displacement is so much higher as to require very high revs. Too much heat would otherwise be absorbed by the block. Superior engines rev higher. But when a company's manufacturing is still using 1960 machine tools, et al, then it is easier (less expensive) to make lower revving engines. Accountants also fear 'unnecessary' capital expenditures. They cannot measure innovation; therefore cost control it.

As technology improves, then engines have a wider operating range - provide more useful power over a wider range of RPMs. This is but another factor found in higher Hp/liter engines - what engineers would design when allowed to design the best rather than cost control.

Under a 'bean counter' such as Jacques Nasser, that technology could not be implemented. But as seen (finally) in those 2007 models, Ford engineers were permitted to implement engines with a wider operating range - standard performance engines. Engineers were finally able to abandon long obsolete 50 Hp/liter crap engines.

Appreciate why companies make crap products when top management are 'bean counters' or lawyers - especially managers don't even use the product. To appreciate the problem in Ford, read DeLorean's 1970s book "On a Clear Day, You can See GM". Those same symptoms still exist where companies are in trouble - and then start blaming the workers or running to government for protection. World's best innovators are American. When a product is not world class, then first look at the top boss. Those 50 Hp/liter engines were a classic symptom of bad top management and probably why some arguments between William Clay and Jacque Nasser may have been violent.

Sooooo... why are all stern drive boats, including Volvo, powered by iron block Chevrolet & Ford engines? Only one gear ratio too...

& Toyota couldn't cut it in the ski boat field. Their V-8 was a disaster.

Rob

No, it doesn't. This is just complete nonsense. In general, "more hp/lt" means optimizing for power at high RPMs, which hurts torque at low RPMs. An engine with lower hp/lt is much more likely to show higher torque at lower RPMs.

You obviously haven't had the pleasure of feeling 460 ft-lbs of torque at the rear wheels just off idle. I have and it FEELS GOOD! All that toque available across the rpm range puts a big SEG on my face. Why limit myself to having to keep the engine RPMs in a narrow high winding range to get some acceleration? I like rolling into the throttle in third gear at 2,000 rpm and feeling like I was shot out of a sling shot all the way to the redline without ever having to change a gear. A close second in rolling along in third gear at 2,500 rpm, mashing down the throttle and melting the rear tires into the pavement for as long as I feel like it just because I can. Get my drift?

Isn't this the rice burner mantra?

Try 460 ft-lbs of rwtq. It will make you tingle all over. ;)

First, the Mustang isn't a sports car. It is a Pony car. There is a difference. Besides, my '89 LX makes about 100 hp/litre. The GT500 makes 93 hp/litre off the showroom floor and a whole boat load of torque from idle to redline. Throw a twin screw blower on a GT500 and it will make close to 130 hp/litre with just a new tune and never having to remove the valve covers.

Cars aren't developed to what you, or I, think is correct. IMO, the overall quality of all new cars are very good. There really isn't that much difference between them when comparing apples to apples.

Bean counters can't design anything. They aren't engineers.

You wouldn't want an engine built to a 0.0001 OR 0.001 tolerance. Every engine needs "slop" built in to it so the parts can receive lubrication. Technology has advanced to where all automakers have the ability to machine parts equally well. IMO, this is why quality between brands is so close. What sells a car comes down to style and marketing more than quality. I don't think Toyota makes cars that are light years ahead of GM and Ford but they have succeeded in convincing a large part of the population that they are far superior. Kudos to them for pulling it off and shame on Ford and GM for letting them get away with it.

All I can tell you is I prefer the Corvette Z06 pushrod engine over a Honda S2000 engine. You probably know why.

they are producing 800-1200 ft-lbs of TORQUE!!! It is torque that gets the load moving, not horsepower.

I agree with you 100%. This guy doesn't have a clue. He fails to realize that the drop in Hp/Tq figures were do to Ford changing how they get those figures. In the 60's & 70's they used to get their figures from the crank. I believe they now get them at the rear wheels (if I remember right). I forget the formula that you use to figure the HP/Tq at the wheels when the info has come from the crank, but if you reverse the formula, He would see that there was actually little or no drop off in those figures. Mike, it looks like this guy is set in his ways, and no sense in arguing with him.

66StangMan

Yeah, maybe... But when the light turns green and I mash the gas, the only thing that passes my 5.0 are the car's taillights!!! Yahoo! What a frickin' joy that car is to drive! That's what a sports car is all about. Big, long, smokey burnouts, tons of torque off idle and an engine that sounds like the world is coming to an end.

And for the record, all of the 'big 3' produce cars that make 100hp/litre.

If you want to drive a Miata, fill your boots. Ford owns 20% of Mazda so at least the profits are going somewhere good.

Brad

PS: Porsche was an inch away from bankruptcy recently, so I don't think people really care what horsepower per litre cars generate.

If you say so...

That said, I will never get rid of my puny 55hp/litre 5.0. It came out 20 years ago and today it still kicks the crap out of 95% of cars on the road. Go figure. Sounds like there is an awful lot of bench racing here.

And Razz, my cousin had a 1989 5.0 that dynoed 240 bone stock. This 5.0 was something fast so he dynoed it... What a surprise... still with the air silencer in it, stock timing, 5-spd and 2.73s out back. It was an impressive car in 1989. Still is today.

Brad

In the old days they used to get the hp/torque numbers without accessories (air conditioning, alternator etc.) or exhaust attached to the engine. Now the numbers are based on a fully loaded engine that is run as it is configured in the automobile and with the exhaust system attached. I think all the hp numbers are still relative to the crank and not the rear wheels.

Shoot, this isn't arguing. Do a search on me in Google Groups and you will see some epic threads that I consider a full blown argument. Most times they have nothing to do with cars. ;)

Any engine can be geared to produce that torque. Simply change drive train ratios. However more speed at that torque means more horsepower. To sell low performance and obsolete technology engines, the myth about 'torque only from a V-8' is widely promoted.

Horsepower determines acceleration. Only higher horsepower engines can also provide speed necessary at that torque. Narrower operating range is found in lower performance engines.

Meanwhile varrroom of a low performance V-8 is irrelevant. Point is whether Ford will survive - whether Ford can sell cars at a profit - or would sell low performance and lower reliability engines that mean higher costs and no profits. As demonstrated by recent numbers from

2007 cars, 'car guys' were permitted to design. Only a 'bean counter' would advocate selling those lower performance V-8s that cost more to build and that have been obsoleted by innovators ('car guys') from the competition.

Mustang may get an average performance 320 Hp engine. However why would Ford waste time doing that when so many Mustang owners are happy with a low performance 210 Hp engines? The discussion is not about silly torque myths. The subject is Ford's survival - what Ford must produce to remain competitive and what lawyers, business school graduates, and communication majors did to harm Ford Motor.

Ride a bicycle and get back to us on that... just try changing the gearing and see what happens.

You'll soon find the limiting factor is the torque you put out.

I take that back in part... if you have strong legs you'll start skipping chain or break something when starting in gear for quicker acceleration.