Can someone explain some car terms for me please?

Soldato
Joined
8 Nov 2006
Posts
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Basically im looking at cars and im not 100% what these words are in relation with cars really :p Mind helping me out? What do these do to the car if they are higher in number?

Torque - Does this basically mean how great the car pulls? Basically im looking at a MG ZT and it has 245 Nm Torque. a lot higher than most cars im looking at...

BHP - Always see it, understand the number as being higher = better? but never accutally know what it does or what its all about...

Just helps me understand cars abit more and what im looking for in a car...
 
Its not always down to bhp and torque, weight and gearing also comes into the equation.
cars high in bhp but low in torque (honda vtec's 16v's etc, the higher revving non turbo/supercharged engines) can accelerate fairly quickly but if you try to accelerate in either the wrong gear or at too low a rpm it will go nowhere.
Cars high in torque but average in bhp (ie normal tdi engines or v6 engines etc) will pull in virtually any gear.
Cars which have decent torque and bhp are usually turbo charged petrol or higher end diesels and are good all rounders.

Another way of explaining is bhp= how fast you hit the wall, torque= how far you take the wall with you.
 
[FnG]magnolia;12684857 said:
Someone on the forum has a very funny sig about BHP. torque etc. Something about finding ditches, IIRC?

Like this one?:

sig-1.gif


:p

"Your google search for 'Honda' and 'torque' returned no results"..........etc etc :D
 
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BHP - Brake Horse Power.... this is the overall power output of the engine.

Torque - This is the turning force of the engine.

RPM - Revolutions per minute - The number of turns / strokes the engine does in a minute.

Torque - RPM - Make the BHP!
 
Actually, I meant this one :

"UNDERSTEER" is when you hit the fence with the front of the car.
"OVERSTEER" is when you hit the fence with the rear of the car.
"HORSEPOWER" is how fast you hit the fence.
"TORQUE" is how far you take the fence with you.

But the gif one is quality too :)
 
For an every day useable car, it is generally accepted that a car high in torque is much more "effortless" to drive, which means as said above, that the car will pull in any gear much more easily so the driver doesnt have to work hard. A good example would be a modern day TDi engine.
At the other extreme end of the scale, you could have a race prepped naturally aspirated engine that had a very narrow band in the rev range at which it makes useable torque. This might be say between 6k and the redline. This car might have 170bhp and 170lb/ft of torque, and might typically require a lot of revving and gear changes to get up a steep hill, where as Mr Golf TDI driver with only 140bhp but 190lb/ft of torque can stay in 5th gear and chug along to the top of the hill with relative ease.

That's just a rough example.
 
BHP is simply a measurement of torque at any given RPM.

Engines don't produce 'horsepower' as a force, they only produce turning force (torque). Horsepower is a measurement of this torque, the more torque an engine produces at any given RPM, the higher the BHP will be. That's why Honda engines have high BHP for the torque output, because it holds it's relatively low torque output all the way up the rev range.

Horsepower = torque x rpm / 5252

For example: 200 ft/lb at 4000rpm is 152.3 bhp, but 200 ft/lb at 6000rpm is 228.4 bhp.
 
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I'll have a go at explaining. :D

Torque is how easily the engine can move the vehicle. BHP is how quickly the engine can move the vehicle.
eg.
A diesel BMW has lots of torque and as such if you put it in gear, the engine will move the car with hardly any movement of the accelerator. A Honda Vtec has little torque and needs a good shove on the accelrator to get the car moving.

A Ford Ka(ck) has little BHP and a big shove on the accelerator moves it like thick custard dripping off a spoon. A Ferrari has lots of BHP and a big shove on the accelerator moves it like the proverbial **** off a shovel.
 
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