vega

Hi there,

I know I'm a fairly new member here, but I've been reading all the posts since december 2003. I love you guys almost as much as I love the new mustang. Keep 'em photochops and other stuff coming.

I was wondering why US muscle cars (which I am in love with) always have so much engine litres compared to the horsepower in comparison to european cars. I mean, is the reason why they do this, like for upgrading the engine? I mean, my car now is a V6 3.0 ltrs, and has 240 break horsepower. Surely it will be hard to upgrade that engine any higher than 240 hp, but the V6 Mustang has got 4.0 litres and 'only' has 208 hp which will be of course easier to upgrade.

Not to be a nagging new member, but could someone explain the main reason (if there is one) behind this phenomenom?

Wombert

1) heritage. american cars have always been like this. compared to european
ars, they get too few horses out of too many liters at a way too high fuel consumption. but that's what makes them fascinating and different.
2) gas is, unfortunately, very cheap in the united states. the US consume more oil in a day than russia, saudi-arabia and mexico produce together (or approx. 25% of the world's oil usage). so 5% of the people in the world consume 25% of the oil. the result is pollution of the environment. yeah.

but hey, I don't care. complaining won't help. when the economy has finally been blown to smithereens, mankind (it's not just the americans) will understand. and in the meantime, I will continue to love Mustangs

André

You have got to look at torque figures also, besides the 3.5L duratec engine should replace the antique 4.0L truck engine in a year or two in the base Mustang, with around 250HP and similar torque it should take care of your concerns.

V10

It's all about torque (lots of it) at low RPM.

428CJ

remember this as well, we are many times talking about different engines. For instance the 4.6 DOHC engine is much larger than the 5.7 OHV GM V-8. A larger displacement does not necessarily mean larger size.

Many times these "high tech" Japanese engines have awesome HP/liter except people forget the sheer size of them.

mkoesel

The reason is simple: generally a motor with high specific power output (hp/L) will cost more to build than a motor or low specifict power output. Consider the 5L Cammer in the concept GT/R Mustang. It makes 440hp, which is 88hp/L. That's more than your 3L Jaguar V6 (80hp/L). But that 5L motor will cost gobs more than a 300hp 4.6L or 5.4L, mainly because it will have to rev higher to get that extra power, which means it will need to be made of stronger components. In addtion it will be harder to control noise level, emissions, and get good fuel economy - things that Ford probably did not really make high priority when designing that Cammer which would make its costs even higher if they ever wished to put it in a production car.

bison

The main reason is that most high-ouput engines have 4 valves per cylinder instead of 2, More airflow into the combustion camber results in more horsepower per liter. The increase in torque is much smaller.

There's a myth that high-output, small displacement 4v engines get better fuel economy than larger displacement 2v engines, but there's little evidence to support this. Consider the V6 Malibu: its 3.5 liter 2v V6 produces 43 more hp and 58 lb ft more torque than a 2.4 liter 4v 4-cylinder Camry, but it has the same EPA fuel economy rating.

There's nothing wrong with most European and Japanese engines that couldn't be fixed by giving them an additional liter of displacement and removing half the valves and cams. B)

kevinb120

Wait untill you see how much it costs to add 100 hp to a stock german engine :shock:

ZwerRacing

Listen to Kevin I have a BMW 330ci and it makes about 225 hp to the crank in a 3 liter engine and then we have the new mustang making 300 hp in a 4.6 liter engine. So therefor they 70 hp/L and 65 hp/L respectively. But the BMW engine is already maxxed out for about 5000 you can get a supercharger and around 300 hp which would give you 100 hp/L. Whereas with the mustang we can add a kb blower for about 4000 and get around 600 hp which would give you 130 hp/L for a lot less money. Basicly the larger dissplacemant engines have more potential for hp.

scottie1113

Let's not forget that for decades most American cars were OHV pushrod engines, like the 5.0 in my 95 GT vert. Lower RPM's but making tons of torque, and mine runs on 87 octane, unlike most higher hp/liter European cars. They were simply cheaper to build than an overhead cam engine, they were sold by the millions, and gas was cheap, especially in comparison to Europe where taxes on fuel are very high. That has changed, though gas continues to be a relative bargain here in the US.

While my car has "only" 225 hp and is stock, it wouldn't take a whole lot of money to bump it up to around 300hp. But why would I want to do that when the 2005 Mustang will come out with at least that much for an opener? And while that may be only 65 hp/liter, those are some pretty strong American ponies and again, they only need to drink 87 proof go juice.

Complexity is another issue. I've had a DOHC Jaguar (old XK-150), a DOHC Alfa Spider, and an SOHC BMW 320i. While they were fun to drive, they were very expensive to maintain and dollar for dollar couldn't approach any American muscle car in terms of performance, with the possible exception of handling, and even then they were only marginally better.

A lot of is also due to production numbers. How many Jaguars like yours have been sold compared to, say, the Mustang? If you mass produce a car you can sell it for less than a car which is produced in smaller numbers. You may appeal more to the balance in someone's checkbook than to someone desiring so called status or exclusivity, but I maintain that a car like the Mustang gives very little away to Europe's finest and at a very much more affordable price.

Without a doubt, the Mustang delivers more bang for the buck than any other car available today.

justgreat

don't be fooled by the numbers...the ONLY definitive way to gauge the performance of an engine are with the power and torque graphs to show WHERE in the rpm band the hp and torque is made and in what quantity.

generally speaking, the euro and japanese engines are "peaky" in their power delivery...the power is made high up in the rpm range. some of this is due to the ohc design that almost everyone uses these days but that's not the whole story. audi for one example uses a long stroke design to better "fill in" the bottom end. that's why for certain type of driving (around town, stop light to stop light) ohv design is much better for low end grunt. the classic example of this were the 80's porsche turbo motors that were sold over here w/o alteration to compensate for american driving habits and the owners complained that on the bottom end they were lacking...this is not to say that the engines were slugs; only that you have to be careful when comparing numbers...they don't always add up the way you think they might.

my 4.5 ohv v8 in the caddy makes 235 torque and very little gets away from me at a stop light....on the turnpike, that's a different story. jackg 90 seville 94k

snakeeyes

Amazing. Everywhere I go on the internet their are forighners with superiority complexes talking trash about Americans.

future9er24

foreign cars, but not necasarily people, suck. but hey, im just a stupid American

scottie1113

I didn't see any trash talking here, just a legitimate question from a guy in Belgium who admittedly loves American muscle cars. What's your problem with that? Could it be that you can't spell, or are you just drunk?

And for future 9er24 who said foreign cars suck, why did you say that? Have you ever driven a BMW, Porsche, Audi, Mercedes, Jaguar, Volvo, or any Italian car? I doubt it, and your ignorance is showing.

I'm not prone to making statements like that as a norm , but your comment simply got to me. I didn't bother to check your profile, but it sounds like you're about 18. And yep, I guess you're a self admitted stupid American.

future9er24

yes i have driven a BMW, but i dont particularly care for them

scottie1113

I just checked your profile and saw that you're 15. I think I overestimated your intelligence and experience. My apologies to you, lad. That explains everything.

future9er24

and im not talking just preformance wise bc i kno American cars arent always the best performers. i just meant that they don't, at least for me, feel as good. its not something i can explain easily. its just...weird...American cars have always appealed to me more, and most likely always will

oh ya and it takes one to know one

Edit: BTW, pretty good guess on my age

scottie1113

and im not talking just preformance wise bc i kno American cars arent always the best performers. i just meant that they don't, at least for me, feel as good. its not something i can explain easily. its just...weird...American cars have always appealed to me more, and most likely always will

oh ya and it takes one to know one

Edit: BTW, pretty good guess on my age [/b][/quote]
I can appreciate that sentiment. I've been driving since 1964 and came back to a Mustang.

Perhaps when you have a few more years of driving under your seat belt you'll appreciate others cars besides American ones. There really are some very good automobiles out there. If in the end you still prefer American, that's fine. To each his own. Just don't be so judgemental, especially with so little experience.

Maybe you could do a little spell check on your next post. Not to flame you, but it doesn't help the weight of your comments at all when they're fraught with typos and grammatical errors. We all make typos from time to time. Can you find the one I left in?

steve19970

Ooh ooh...was it "others"? Oh, and judgemental is wrong too--I checked dictionary.com. It seems that judgement is a viable substitute for judgment, but judgemental does not appear in the dictionary.

Hehe...couldn't resist. I'm an engineer, but man, you should see the grammatical errors.

scottie1113

Bingo and bonus points, Steve! "Others" was incorrect, as was "judgemental". The word is actually judgmental. Check Webster's.

Nice work for an engineer. I used to help a TA friend of mine (he had a master's in English) proofread essays from engineering students ( I was one for a year). Finding a complete sentence was a rare occasion.

What kind of engineer is you?