On another thread there is a heated discussion of the S2K top end. One of the issues is the speedometer calibration. Here is a data point.

I have a completely stock 2002. The tires were pumped to 32 lbs cold pressure.

This morning I used my portable Global Positioning System to compare the speedometer reading with the GPS speed. I was under clear New Mexico skies with good satellite reception and approximately level ground.

Using cruise control to lock in a speed, I compared readings from 40 mph to 80 mph (sorry about top end, but New Mexico cops are greedy) and found that

GPS speed = speedometer reading x .998

This means that at a speedometer reading of 160 mph, the true speed is 159.7 mph.

By the way, thanks to XVIPER for steering me to HOWSTUFFWORKS for a discussion of the VTEC enginer.

Tex