Quote from Blackout :

And lorries having plenty of gears, well, you also need to consider that they easily weight 10 times more than a normal car with some load, but only have 3-4 times larger engines. I know the math might not work like that, but just pointing out that they need to pull a lot of mass with relatively low power to weight ratio. If you don't have a heavy load you only use half of the gears anyway, so it's there to ease thing up.

Having a small power to weight ratio doesn't necessarily change how many gears you need, you would need 1/2 that number if you had double the RPMs to work with. The reason why there are so many gears is because the power band is so small you constantly need to be shifting to stay in it, typically not more than 1500 RPM as a power band. At least this was the case with the 80,000 pound trucks I drove.

Diesel fuel per liter pump out more emissions than gasoline, don't be fooled that it's greener. IIRC it's also more costly to make as well due to trying to cut down on sulfur emissions. http://www.petrolprices.com/wh ... sts-more-than-petrol.html

Quote from Christopher Raemisch :

Having a small power to weight ratio doesn't necessarily change how many gears you need, you would need 1/2 that number if you had double the RPMs to work with. The reason why there are so many gears is because the power band is so small you constantly need to be shifting to stay in it, typically not more than 1500 RPM as a power band. At least this was the case with the 80,000 pound trucks I drove.

True, true, I don't know what my point was, probably that you don't all the gears if you are just moving the car with no extra load which a passenger cars don't usually have have.

Quote :

Diesel fuel per liter pump out more emissions than gasoline, don't be fooled that it's greener. IIRC it's also more costly to make as well due to trying to cut down on sulfur emissions. http://www.petrolprices.com/wh ... sts-more-than-petrol.html

Well, I kinda knew that, but don't really care about this CO2 nonsense, it's just load of rubbish dumned down for the masses, it's rather minimal in big scale. There probably is some sort of twisted logic to favor the diesel in taxation. I'm all for greener cars but CO2 shouldn't be the measuring tool.

The old Fiesta petrols sound like diesels because they rattle like hell. Besides, S14 said he wass INSIDE the car anyway, if the car is well soundproofed, who gives two twoddles about the noise it makes.

Also, diesels weren't designed for torque, they were designed to provide an alternative to petrol, as it was the fuel type that was discovered first before the engine. Why make a diesel if you have no fuel of running it with?

There is alot of mythbusting going on in this thread, theres too many diesel haters exaggerating turbo lag, you only get noticeable turbo lag if the turbo is huge on a Ford Transit or even a 1.9TDI theres no turbo lag at all, mainly because 1 the Ford Transits turbo is as small as a 2 pence piece, and 2 because the Volkswagen diesels are clearly the best in the world, and the turbos are made to run without any significant lag.

You telling opinions and stating them as fact again Blueflame?

Has anyone ever led you to anything related to the scientific method?

Diesels are bad because they are noisey (they aren't they just have a horrible sound) and because they are heavy and sluggish. Yea, because that's a fact isn't it. This whole thread is based on people selling their opinions. Non of these people slagging off diesels have driven a VAG diesel otherwise they would know that it's not diesel in general that may suck anyway, it's who the diesel is made by that matters. Diesel cars have won at Le Mans, so that means they are sluggish and have seriously bad turbo lag does it? No. It means jack SHIT. What you diesel haters are saying is based on French tanks and Ford's. Everyone knows diesel is best from Germany, and better when it's from VAG, if you don't know this you're statistically a fool.

I think my point has been made, thanks blueflame for making so starkingly clear to everyone. You made it really easy for me.
:doh:

I've driven VAG diesels - plenty of them. The most recent was an Audi A4 - horrible lag, tiny tiny powerband and rubbish gearing (despite 6 gears you never actually managed to get into the 'powerband'). It was quite quiet though (for a diesel). Our current Merc diesel is a lot better, but this is mostly because it's got better gearing (despite being an automatic). Using 'manual' mode it still suffers from lag. As have all the Transits we've had at work.

The Le Mans victories were nothing to do with any inherent advantage for diesel, just rules that gave them a massive advantage in the end.

Quote from tristancliffe :

I've driven VAG diesels - plenty of them. The most recent was an Audi A4 - horrible lag, tiny tiny powerband and rubbish gearing (despite 6 gears you never actually managed to get into the 'powerband'). It was quite quiet though (for a diesel). Our current Merc diesel is a lot better, but this is mostly because it's got better gearing (despite being an automatic). Using 'manual' mode it still suffers from lag. As have all the Transits we've had at work.

The Le Mans victories were nothing to do with any inherent advantage for diesel, just rules that gave them a massive advantage in the end.

Well, you can say what you want about gearing, I'll take your word for it, as I haven't driven a race car, so gears to me on the real road mean nothing to me. As for advantages, this is the point, there ARE no advantages between EITHER petrol or diesel engines, they both cancel each other out, it really doesn't matter. I've seen tuned diesels wipe the floor with tuned Supra's on like 600bhp and the diesel in question was a FWD Golf . I own a petrol Jetta but I did own a diesel Felicia, I don't care about what engine powers it, in many ways the petrol is more responsive, but a diesel will give you more mileage so the compromise levels it's self out the smoother you are on the throttle means the more efficient your fuel consumption rate will be, so already the responsiveness of a petrol engine is actually a victim of it's own crime.

What do race cars have to do with this gearing conversation? All the cars you've ever driven have gears, and they control the wheelspeed:road speed ratio and the torque multiplication - simple as that really.

Are there no advatages to gasoline? Lighter engines, cleaner burn, quieter, smoother and more powerful. And diesel has large peak torque figures. This is why one is used in cars successfully, and the other is used in ships and tractors. It really is that simple.

Response of an engine has nothing to do with fuel efficiency - an engines ability to change revs and respond to throttle makes it EASIER to drive economically. And driving economically is NOT being smoother on the throttle in the main.

A diesel gives you better mileage per tank (assuming equal tank sizes), but costs more fill up and pollutes more as it empties. If you do a large mileage then you might end up 'up', if not you might end up 'down'.

What, exactly, were the tests in which a 600hp (brake or otherwise) Supra was beaten by a totally standard Golf (assuming, by the fact you took care not to mention any of the tweaks it may or may not have had, it was standard).

1/4 mile? Yeah right!
0-60? Yeah right!
0-5? Quite possibly. Was the Supra traction limited? Was it a wet day?

For all we know in your factual argument it may have been a competition to fit packs of toilet roll in the boot - in which case the Golf WILL wipe the floor of a 600hp (brake or otherwise) Supra.

*The 'brake or otherwise' is in brackets because people constantly quote hp as bhp with no understanding of what the b means. And that annoys me.

Quote from Jakg :

Except Fiesta's are the most boring to drive car in the world - I had to learn in one and it just felt like i was pulling levers and the car was doing it's own thing - I felt no "connection" to the road at all (and not in a sporty way).

I can only wander what you actually think you feel when you drive

My main car is a 2000 fiesta but I've driven a 54 (2004) fiesta as well which handled perfectly fine for a small car. Could push it quite hard and it responded reasonably well. Not to mention it was very predictable, had plenty of confidence that it would stick. Anytime you pushed it a bit too hard, especially on round-abouts you could feel the front end pushing and react accordingly.

The only time it has caught me out was on a wet round-about, turning right. Back end started to go but felt it going and caught it perfectly fine.

Quote from keiran :

I can only wander what you actually think you feel when you drive

Like I said - i have no idea what the car felt like when you "pushed the limit" but the driving position was horrible, and it didn't feel like I was driving at all - it just felt like I was playing with switches and the car was controlling itself. There was no "connection" to the road at all...


At least in my car I feel as if i'm actually DRIVING a car (albeit a rolly understeery pig :P)

Quote from BlueFlame :

There is alot of mythbusting going on in this thread, theres too many diesel haters exaggerating turbo lag, you only get noticeable turbo lag if the turbo is huge on a Ford Transit or even a 1.9TDI theres no turbo lag at all, mainly because 1 the Ford Transits turbo is as small as a 2 pence piece, and 2 because the Volkswagen diesels are clearly the best in the world, and the turbos are made to run without any significant lag.

Not true, I've driven the 1.9 TDI alot, and yes, there definately is turbo lag.

Quote from tristancliffe :

What do race cars have to do with this gearing conversation? All the cars you've ever driven have gears, and they control the wheelspeed:road speed ratio and the torque multiplication - simple as that really.

Are there no advatages to gasoline? Lighter engines, cleaner burn, quieter, smoother and more powerful. And diesel has large peak torque figures. This is why one is used in cars successfully, and the other is used in ships and tractors. It really is that simple.

Response of an engine has nothing to do with fuel efficiency - an engines ability to change revs and respond to throttle makes it EASIER to drive economically. And driving economically is NOT being smoother on the throttle in the main.

A diesel gives you better mileage per tank (assuming equal tank sizes), but costs more fill up and pollutes more as it empties. If you do a large mileage then you might end up 'up', if not you might end up 'down'.

What, exactly, were the tests in which a 600hp (brake or otherwise) Supra was beaten by a totally standard Golf (assuming, by the fact you took care not to mention any of the tweaks it may or may not have had, it was standard).

1/4 mile? Yeah right!
0-60? Yeah right!
0-5? Quite possibly. Was the Supra traction limited? Was it a wet day?

For all we know in your factual argument it may have been a competition to fit packs of toilet roll in the boot - in which case the Golf WILL wipe the floor of a 600hp (brake or otherwise) Supra.

*The 'brake or otherwise' is in brackets because people constantly quote hp as bhp with no understanding of what the b means. And that annoys me.

The Golf has 250bhp it's a tuned diesel, it has less than half the power and beat it down a small road in the dry. Of course, the guy could of lied about how much power his Supra had but he just lost a 'race' and still maintained it had 600 odd brakehorsepower. It wasn't a standard Golf, I don't know where you got this from, I said it was tuned in my original post. I don't know the specs, though I know it has a huge turbo the size of your head and yes, it DOES have alot of turbo lag.

:munching_

Quote from Christopher Raemisch :

:munching_

Quote from BlueFlame :

The Golf has 250bhp it's a tuned diesel, it has less than half the power and beat it down a small road in the dry. Of course, the guy could of lied about how much power his Supra had but he just lost a 'race' and still maintained it had 600 odd brakehorsepower. It wasn't a standard Golf, I don't know where you got this from, I said it was tuned in my original post. I don't know the specs, though I know it has a huge turbo the size of your head and yes, it DOES have alot of turbo lag.

Ah, so we're narrowing the 'race' down a bit now. How small a road, over what distance? Presumably from a standing start? What were the top speeds and times, and the margin for victory?

Nicely done, putting the whole term (brakehorsepower), but it's still silly, as I doubt the engine was set up on a dyno, but a rolling road. As the term Brake is for the output of an engine without gearboxes, exhausts, pumps etc it's much more likely that his is wheel horsepower, whp (or true hp [thp] or effective hp [ehp]). I might be wrong, but so many people quote power figures as bhp when they're not that it just irritates me.

Not surprised it's got lag. Quite obviously the flow rates, pressure drops and energy transfer 'functions' weren't matched between engine and turbo. Sadly, and unbeknowist to most ricers, bolting a big turbo on rarely results in best performance.

But it sounds cool! =)

Quote from tristancliffe :

Ah, so we're narrowing the 'race' down a bit now. How small a road, over what distance? Presumably from a standing start? What were the top speeds and times, and the margin for victory?

I'd say the distance was between an 1/8 and a quarter mile. From a standing start and the margin was about a car length I guess.

And was, by any chance, the Supra catching massively at the end? The main advantage was probably in 2nd or 3rd gear (or both) when the midrange torque and the traction available at the tyres was balanced perfectly for a short time (the same reason many slow diesels often have AMAZING 40-60 times).

Of course it was catching massively, the gearing for a standard Supra is capable of over 150mph anyway right? I mean what is the known top speed for a stock '92 Supra

Probably 112mph since they're all restricted 'cause they're all imports.

Quote from S14 DRIFT :

Probably 112mph since they're all restricted 'cause they're all imports.

Forget the restriction, whats it capable of?

I'd make an educated guess as 125mph for the non turbo ones, and 165mph for the Turbocharged ones (they were kicking out way more than 276bhp, let me tell you!)

The standard turbo cars were good for 180mph, and chances are they weren't producing much more than the given power figure, just it wasn't a typical inflated figure because it wasn't of interest to do so and the car was well designed and most critically very aerodynamic. IIRC a McLaren F1 would only have required 250bhp to break the double ton. The gearing on the Supra is very long, something that will disadvantage it in the case Blueflame is talking about (although he has failed to realise this). Given a nice broad powerband the Supra can get away with it.

Quote from ajp71 :

(although he has failed to realise this)

Failed to realise that longer ratios provide more speed over a longer distance? Orly.