I always find this discussion interesting with people saying horsepower is
more important than torque or vice versa. There are always arguments to back
one side or the other. Personal visceral experience is something else. I
suggest driving two fairly equal cars and let your senses decide. A couple
of years ago I had the occasion to drive a BMW M roadster and a Honda S2000
back to back and torque wins out over horsepower for drivability and
performance. Lets look at the data from R&T to see why:
BMW
Honda
Horsepower: 240 @ 6,000 rpm
240 @ 83000 rpm
Torque: 236 @ 3800 rpm
153 @ 7500 rpm
weight: 3070 lb
2790 lb
5 speed
6 speed
final drive ratio: 3.23:1
4.10.1
0 - 60 mph: 5.4
5.5
1/4 mile 14.0@ 99.5 mph
14.1 @ 99.6 mph
Both cars have horsepower and performance almost equal. But look at the
torque for Honda, 153 @ 7500rpm versus 240 @ 6,000 for BMW. To get BMW engine
performance out of the Honda engine you have to wind that sucker up pretty
high which for every day driving is not much fun. And check out rear axle
ratio, gear box speeds and weight for Honda compared to BMW. Honda is 280
pounds less than BMW! You would think with equal horsepower but less weight
the Honda should be much quicker . It seems to me the Honda was made
different to get equal performance with less torque but the same horsepower.
Lets do an experiment: If horsepower is more important, then what if you
swapped the Honda engine into the BMW, do you think BMW's 0 -60 and 1.4 mile
times stay the same? How wants to fund this research?
Jeff
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