Right, well all i understand is that torque is a rotational force. In a car its the rotational force put down by the wheels.

As many of us know , the s2000 has a low torque, but a healthy amount of bhp 237!

What i dont understand is why is the s2000 faster in some scenarios. I know on a track torque doesnt matter too much because of the sweepng bends.

At a guess if i say raced car "x" with more torque up a hill would he overtake me? For arguments sake say a subaru wrx (similar sort of performance). Or i came out of a sharp bend.

Theres been scenarios for example with an astra vxr, and i was quiet a bit faster. The astra has a fair wedge or torque as its a 2.0 turbo.

I guess though bhp and torque are related?

Also i guess there much more coming into play, like gearing, weight etc.

If anyone could clear this up, apologies if im coming across like a tool! Im sure a lot of people being honest dont have a clue either.

 

I share your confusion but can't offer an answer, I own an S and have a VXR as a company car, it's safe to say that I don't push the S as hard. But the difference between the 2 is striking, I (personally) find the VXR frighteningly fast at times and yet the 0-60 times aren’t dramatically different.

 

Torque at the wheels is what matters.

High revs allows shorter gears and hence more torque multiplication than normal gearing as per a car with a 6500rpm redline.

Deisels have lots of torque but don't rev that high so they need longer gears.

Bhp/ton is still a good measure of low down acceleration IMO. Outright BHP for those 100+mph moments

 

Power = torque * rpm (divided by some constant), so if you made a car with a certain amount of torque at 3000rpm and another with the same amount of torque at 9000rpm, the latter would have 3 times the power but the same torque.

You might think that they'd perform the same, as both are producing the same amount of turning force. But (and this is the important bit) in any real world situation the latter would be in a much lower gear (3:1 in fact), which means the amount of torque at the wheels would be 3 times more.

At least that's how I think it works.

 

BHP = torque x revs. So a car with a low torque figure can still produce good power figures if it revs high. hence an F1 car produces not much torque but huge power.

The way i understand torque is that it is the shove in the back you get when you suddenly floor the throttle. Hence in a diesel car you get that shove in the back at low revs that makes it feel quick. In the s2k you get that shove in the back if you floor it with the revs high eg in vtec.

The way i understand bhp is the continuing acceleration as the revs rise. eg when you floor it in vtec and the revs go up you keep feeling the shove in the back. In a diesel you feel the shove in the back initally and then it goes away.

Obviously the gearing has a big part to play too.

 

Don't know if it helps at all, but I once heard it described by comparing it to a boxer. Power is how fast you can punch, Torque is how hard you can punch.

Clear as mud.

 

Mathematically, the torque on a particle (which has the position r in some reference frame) can be defined as the cross product:

T = r x F

where

r is the particle's position vector
F is the force acting on the particle,

or, more generally, torque can be defined as the rate of change of angular momentum,

T = dl
......dt

where

L is the angular momentum vector
t stands for time.

As a consequence of either of these definitions, torque is a vector, which points along the axis of the rotation it would tend to cause.

HTH

 

This might help too Adam:

http://craig.backfire.ca/pages/autos/horsepower

 

The Wiki on Brake horsepower has some good links:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horsepower

 

Its nothing to do with where the torque is produced etc, using wiki links etc doesnt really show an understanding.

As Einstein says, if you can't explain something technically simply, then you dont' understand it yourself.

The reason they are fast is to do with the gearing and high rev limit as to why the S is fast with a low engine torque output.

You only feel rate of change of torque, hence you feel the vtec kick but this is nothing compared to a turbo diesel.