Wombert

SMG is a sequential manual gearbox. You just shift up or down, not directly into a gear.

Wombert

Id say this qualifies for trash talking. I may not be the worlds best speller, but I can tell when America is being bashed,which you ,who would be the perfect speller,and educated beyond your intelligence,apperently wouldnt realize if you were hit upside your head with it. [/b][/quote]
Trash talking? This is facts, dude. Facts. I'm not talking bs. If I as a european dare to critizise the US in an american forum, you can bet your bottom dollar on that I do some research before I open my mouth. What I said about oil consumption is 100% accurate. If you like, I can give you precise numbers. Americans use twice as much oil per capita and year as Europeans or Asians. What do you think, why are there blackouts year after year in California? Because air conditioners are running all day during the summers with too few power plants running. Fresh water has to be carried to California in tankers to water fields. Millions of people drive SUVs that get 10mpg. And, as I said time and again here, the current raise in gas prices is not primarily because of the OPEC (oil prices have increased by 17% since January), but because of the high demand from the United States - gas prices increased by 43% since January. For years, the US have been buying gas from Europe in the spring because the refinery capacities are too small. Gas companies have to increase their gas storages because travel season is about to begin. And why is so much gas needed? Hah, you guessed it. Can you say 'fuel-sucking SUVs people don't need because they never use it off the beaten track'? Gas prices here are 5.45 US-$ per gallon. Americans yet haven't ever thought about this stuff. I don't blame them. Thats just typical of mankind. If one day we have sent the environment to Kingdom Come, I bet it'll be the NASA constructing a giant spaceship travelling to a earthlike planet far, far away to save mankind. And that baby will suck a lot of gas. Anyway, I'm off to lunch. Think about it. And next time, make a good case for your point of view. Polemics (if you know what that is) sucks.

mkoesel

It's just an automatic transmission with a manual mode. Lots of cars have them today. BMW calls theirs "Steptronic".

This system, while more fun then a plain old auto, pales in comparison to BMW's SMG or other auto-shifting manual transmission.

mkoesel

F1 and WRC drivers can operate a clutch just fine. Better than you and I could ever hope to. They use sequential manuals because they allow you to concentrate on when to shift instead of doing heel-toe acrobatics and rev matched double clutching.

2005 GT

it sound's like YOU'RE the one trying to start something. :notnice:

f1-cobra

F1 and WRC drivers can operate a clutch just fine. Better than you and I could ever hope to. They use sequential manuals because they allow you to concentrate on when to shift instead of doing heel-toe acrobatics and rev matched double clutching.[/b][/quote]
They also use them because it saves them .0025 seconds on each shift (I'm just guessing at the number, but its something ridiculously low like that). To them, over a race distance, it adds up to a couple of seconds. They will pay big money to gain a couple of seconds.

mkoesel

Exactly. And some enthusiasts will pay for that too, hence we now have them on production cars. Nothing to do with not being able to operate a clutch.

vld

what the heck is a "forighners"

their: of or relating to them; the possessive form of "they"
there: in or at that place, a relative designation of space

Decipher

And the Hatefest continues...

scottie1113

Uh oh, here we go again. That's what lit this thread up last night.

Back to cars. The Lotus Elise has 105 hp/liter, the Honda S2000 has has 111, and the Ferrari Challenge Stradale has a whopping 118.

The first two make maximum torque at close to redline, which means you've got to flog that gearbox to keep up a good head of steam. The Ferrari's comes on at 4750 rpm, about midway through its power band.

None of these cars reflect the way maost Americans drive. We prefer that good old grunt you get from torque made way down low. At least I do. It reflects more accurately how we drive our cars

So there's another partial answer for American Muscle.

Badandy

Well, here in America we believe in something called freedom of choice. If the idiots in Yukon XL's who really don't need the size want one, fine with us. It is not that we are against the environment, it is that we don't like restricting choices and freedoms. That is what my country was founded on.


Wow, interesting theory...


hmmm. What a way to start a useless arguement. Hey, before pulling a vocab word out of your magic hat to use to try to belittle someone, try thinking of your manners. I think you left them at the door.

Badandy

Sure I prefer torque heavy engines, but thats not to say I wouldn't have a great time driving an Elise

scottie1113

Sure I prefer torque heavy engines, but thats not to say I wouldn't have a great time driving an Elise [/b][/quote]
Agreed. That's why we have choices. Before my Mustang, my favorite car was a 1984 Alfa Romeo Spider. Not much hp or torque but a lot of fun to drive.

Flyinlow

Trash talking? This is facts, dude. Facts. I'm not talking bs. If I as a european dare to critizise the US in an american forum, you can bet your bottom dollar on that I do some research before I open my mouth. What I said about oil consumption is 100% accurate. If you like, I can give you precise numbers. Americans use twice as much oil per capita and year as Europeans or Asians. What do you think, why are there blackouts year after year in California? Because air conditioners are running all day during the summers with too few power plants running. Fresh water has to be carried to California in tankers to water fields. Millions of people drive SUVs that get 10mpg. And, as I said time and again here, the current raise in gas prices is not primarily because of the OPEC (oil prices have increased by 17% since January), but because of the high demand from the United States - gas prices increased by 43% since January. For years, the US have been buying gas from Europe in the spring because the refinery capacities are too small. Gas companies have to increase their gas storages because travel season is about to begin. And why is so much gas needed? Hah, you guessed it. Can you say 'fuel-sucking SUVs people don't need because they never use it off the beaten track'? Gas prices here are 5.45 US-$ per gallon. Americans yet haven't ever thought about this stuff. I don't blame them. Thats just typical of mankind. If one day we have sent the environment to Kingdom Come, I bet it'll be the NASA constructing a giant spaceship travelling to a earthlike planet far, far away to save mankind. And that baby will suck a lot of gas. Anyway, I'm off to lunch. Think about it. And next time, make a good case for your point of view. Polemics (if you know what that is) sucks. [/b][/quote]
And you know what?

Those of us driving and using that oil are also the people working their butts off, putting in 60 hours a week, week after week. We have most of the top scientists, biologists, engineers, etc. in the world. And if they weren't born here, most of them want to come here because they want to make a difference and they know they can do it here.

Even the mighty Japan, known for their work ethic, has crumbled. The children of the people who rebuilt Japan after the war are rejecting their parents work ethics because they want more play time. Its been proven in study after study that Americans are the hardest working people in the world. We put in more hours on average than any other developed nation.

So if that means I drive my pickup to work every day and use more gas than a 4 cylinder economy car, than so be it. I'm also at work through every snow storm, and if I know there's going to be a storm the next day, I leave an hour early so I'm at work on time. And I'm a salaried employee, so it woudn't matter if I showed up or not, I get paid the same. My vehicle gives me that freedom and the ability to do that instead of taking mass transit (which wouldn't get me close enough to work anyway).

I also grew up in the middle of nowhere in North Dakota and lived there for 34 years. There was no mass transit there and you needed a 4 wheel drive vehicle with clearance to survive. If you've never been to North Dakota, you have no idea what wide open spaces are. I worked with an engineer from Germany at a coal fired power plant that I worked at. He was absolutely floored by the isolation that was there. You can go miles and miles and miles without seeing another vehicle, person, house, whatever.

Galaxie

How about we cool off on the politics and international mudslinging?

Flyinlow

My sincerest apologies. It just bugs me when people take shots at me (an American). I am not on any boards in another country and don't take shots at their laws, economy, principles, whatever. I believe that countries and cultures are different and theres nothing wrong with that. But its not his right to tell me that its our fault that his gas price is high. Maybe he should look at how much tax his government adds to the price of his fuel.

(Oops, was that a shot?) B)

Decipher

Hmm.. Just to go along with the theme here: MANIFEST DESTINY!!!

So yeah, enough of this bull, eh?

scottie1113

Maybe bull's not bad. Methane powered cars!

I rented a car (a Renault Twingo) in France on a vacation there in 1996. The thing got over 40 mpg, and it was a good thing it did, because even then gas was almost $4.50 a gallon. Taxes, you know. If I remember correctly, for a long time europe also had higher taxes on cars with engines over two liters in displacement. Thus, the evolution of higher hp/liter and more fuel efficient cars.

The same thing was true in Japan. I went to high school there in the mid 60's and every time I pumped gas the prices made me wince. Again, it was because of taxes.

Until the gas guzzler tax here, we never experienced anything like that, which, combined with cheap gasoline prices, enabled us to develop big, low revving high torque engimes.

Do you remember how the car manufacturers screamed when the CAFE standards went into effect? They said they could never meet them.

So now we have a 400hp Corvette that will deliver around 30mpg on the highway and even a Mustang GT is rated at what, 25 or 26? I'd say that's pretty dang good for a car that delivers the performance it does.

justgreat

one point worth considering when talking about gas prices that we pay in this country versus europe: it is not unusual for an average commuter in this country to travel 100 miles rountrip every day to get to their job location. most americans commute with their personal vehicle, this is unheard of for the vast majority of european workers...they have an exstensive rail network and THAT is a major contributor to their high tax rates on gasoline/diesel fuel. they discourage commuting by car, that was a decision that was made a long time back...we on the other hand, decided that the personal auto would be our main source of travel and for better or worse we are now in the situation that we find ourselves.

the peformance of our engines is a reflection of our driving habits...americans want to buy cars that will go hundreds of thousands of miles without major problems and by an large we have that. IF gasoline goes to 4.50 a gallon, you can rest assured that the next generation of i/c engines will not look anything like they do today. jackg 90 seville 94k

StevenJ

The reason for this being...... Pushrods have the cam located on the center of block while over head cams have the cams located right ontop of the pistons. Since it is an ohc engine, it requires more room vertically because the cams are placed ontop of the pistons. Since pushrods have them placed on the block, there is less room needed vertically. Something I learned from researching stuff on the net...


over head cams
push rods (cams are on the block)

*edit This also relates to why Ford is holding back on a large displacement V8. Ford has been developing OHC engines as of recent, the mod motors. It's harder to stuff larger pistons into a ohc engine cause they take up more room than a pushrod with larger pistons due to the fact that more room is needed vertically on an ohc engine for the cams. Since pushrods have the cam on the block, a large block pushrod motor will take up a lot less space under the hood. A ohc motor with the same bore and stroke, and number of pistons, may not fit due to the needed extra vertical clearance to fit the cams.