Hey guys, I was just doin some more reading about olds powerplants. I think it was in one of these forums, someone said, " torque wins races and horsepower is for speed" or something along those lines.

what kind of power/torque are you looking at when you see a cars front end come up on a drag strip?

What is the difference between horsepower and torque? what kind of configurations would give you high torque and low hp or vice versa.

Also does anyone have a rocket 455? theres something about 7.5L that has bad-ass written all over it.

http://www.carcraft.com/techarticles/ho ... vs_torque/

That should help you out some. I dont feel like hearing crap from anybody but if you want to cut and paste it on here im sure others would find it more convienent.

thanks dude. good read.

thats a good article.

cool, I want to build a cold air intake. Anyone got any ideas.

sorry, wrong board.

Usually used to "put down" a ”poser”, who is talking the talk (HP numbers), instead walking the walk (putting his POS on the line).

Whether it actually applies to any situation, depends what kind of racing is being discussed. Land Speed (power) and Drag Racing (torque) would only be two instances.


How far is up? Fronts of 4.5 second Top Fuelers hardly go up at all.

Wheel stands are a different story. The car and the class (particularly tire width restrictions) its competing in, determines how the car/chassis combo is set up. Takes power to pull wheels. Power that could be used to move the car forward, instead of up. In some cases, the traction gain from the weight increase on the tires, is well worth the tradeoff.

All else being equal, it would take less power to lift a light front end.


Picture a “torque wrench” on the bolt that holds the front pulley on your crankshaft. If you used it to turn the crank, the dial would tell you how much torque you are applying to it. Now, if you held it in place, and the engine turned by itself, the dial would tell you how much torque the engine was making.

I'm still working on an analogy for the HP part, cause you can't measure it that way.


Simplest example: Bigger bore/smaller stroke (over square) = more HP, and bigger stroke/smaller bore (under square) = More torque.


All four of mine (one 461 and three 468s) were/are "regular" 455s. I don't know anything about “rockets”.


Mine were/are all 455s. I don't know anything about 7.5L.


Baechtel's articles are always informative. He is a well known author of "how to" books for Chevrolet enthusiasts, and a long time contributor to the various Car(maro) Magazines.

In this case, there is not much that actually relates to raskull's questions.

Norm

I also want to add on and say cam timing/profiles, Intake manifolds, Cylinder heads also have a effect of how much tourqe compared to the horsepower it makes.

Since I posted it, I have learned, that, they stopped using it during the seventies, maybe the eighties.


Never had any interest in them.

Norm

Now, that is funny. I don't care who you are.


Already covered at the link you posted, above: http://www.carcraft.com/techarticles/ho ... _vs_torque

But, it does not answer his question.

Here it is again:


Which configurations would cause which effects?

Norm

http://youtube.com/watch?v=v0qeYd5gcnQ

^^
this is what got me thinking about this all..

you need some serious torque to do something like that right?

In that context theres no definite answer unless i had a dyno to play with and a CNC machine........



You need Power period to do that, and as mentioned earlier, High power cars with certain Suspension setups allow for that kind of weight transfer to gain more traction....In a RWD car anyway with a high power FWD car you need the opposite, the weight transfer has to be non existent as possible to keep traction in that case...

http://youtube.com/watch?v=9O0b90G8Yhg

this was pretty cool.

A CNC machine? Are you sure about that? What are you going to be machining/designing, and how would it affect horsepower or torque ratings? How can there be an answer to the OP's second question if there is no definite answer to the first?

Horsepower is a function of torque. Torque is, essentially, how much of a load an engine can move. Horsepower is the measure of how fast it can do it.

The combinations you can put together are endless, but one can make generalizations that would answer this question.

Give an engine a longer stroke, but keep everything else the same, you will increase torque, but not horsepower (much)

Give an engine a shorter stroke, but keep everything else the same, you will have more horsepower (in proportion to torque), but not torque.

The type of build you would need to make the car do wheel stands is one with more torque and horsepower than stock. It would require a high performance intake, and some good head work so that the engine can work as efficiently as possible. It would need a cam shaft that raises the power band some so that when you launch the engine is making good power.

This is all rash generalization, as it is has proved difficult for me to explain
this as we have no end goal in mind, nor a starting point.



There are about 2 ways to do it. One doesn't require much power. If you counter balance the car enough (IE putting the engine in the trunk), you could get it to do this, with minimal power. The other requires lots of power on hand, combined with a suspension that will transfer the weight fast, and tires that will provide enough traction to lift the car.

Sweet.... 1000fps... gotta love that.