LAST CALL!!!! SP6 Rolling Road day........

[chris watton]

So, could it be that the S6 engines, despite their faults, perceived or otherwise, do make, more or less, the stated BHP?

[whitey]

well maybe the standard 3.6/4.0 litres quoted at 350/360 are down a few bhp from that ie 340-350 but the S engines are not near the 380-405bhp the factory have been quoting.

[chris watton]

whitey said:

well maybe the standard 3.6/4.0 litres quoted at 350/360 are down a few bhp from that ie 340-350 but the S engines are not near the 380-405bhp the factory have been quoting.

I have always wondered about the S versions, tbh, I drove a Tuscan S, and it didnt exactly make me want to go out and trade up to one (it certainly didn't feel like 50+bhp more, ever in the upper rev range), it is nice to know the 'vanilla' tuned engines are near their factory quotes though - I got used to the 4.5 V8 quite quick when I had the Chim, but the 'lowly' 3,6 in the Tam still surprises me with the way it just pulls harder the higher the revs.

>> Edited by chris watton on Sunday 16th April 12:27

[whitey]

indeed, as an original Red Rose customer, I am still dissapointed that my engine was 41bhp short of the 380 quoted originally especially when a standard 4.0 back in 2001 was dynoed at 373bhp on Nobles rollers by joolz.

The factory are currently re-building my engine to latest S/Sagaris spec but I am not expecting more than about a 10-20bhp increase. This is going on yesterdays results, not what TVR have told me.

I will get it on SRR when I have 3000 miles on it.

Of course, the variance of yesterdays results could mainly be down to how the engine is set up and tuned. Also if the engine is worn/valve clearances out.

[sideways mostly]

Interesting.Just got my 3.6 back from its 12k so would like to try to test her now- on the same road for consistency.If I get my act together I'll post the result to add to the record.(Couldn't make the organised event as I was in Italy).
I had a Tuscan S before and my experience was it had a lot more torque-I was a bit suprised at how much I had to wring the 3.6's neck (but very happy to do so and it bloody well flies.)From a perception point of view I felt the S had a lot more punch at the bottom end. Possibly the differences are due to build variability? The S was owned by a very well known boxing promoter...you wouldn't want to short change him on the spec thats for sure.
I have next week off so I might tell the missus we are going for a drive in the country....

>> Edited by sideways mostly on Sunday 16th April 15:38

>> Edited by sideways mostly on Sunday 16th April 16:11

[darty]

Whitey,

My car is an August 2002 car with 18,000 miles or so. It has not had a rebuild and is completely standard (not de-catted). Racing Green have looked after the car since I bought it in October 2003. It was last serviced last April and is going in for the 12k plus tappets on Tuesday.
My result was at 7,000 rpm as I requested that SRR did not take it above that... although it was still pulling and may have achieved another 2-3bhp above 7k.

Very pleased with the result.

Darty

[vixpy1]

darty said:

Whitey, My car is an August 2002 car with 18,000 miles or so. It has not had a rebuild and is completely standard (not de-catted). Racing Green have looked after the car since I bought it in October 2003. It was last serviced last April and is going in for the 12k plus tappets on Tuesday. My result was at 7,000 rpm as I requested that SRR did not take it above that... although it was still pulling and may have achieved another 2-3bhp above 7k. Very pleased with the result. Darty

The best Tuscan i have ever tested.

[targarama]

Mine.

Note, Austec use a different axis on the RHS for the torque line. Higher lines at flywheel, lower lines at wheels.

3.6 with 13,000ish miles BTW. Didn't want to rev over 7,000 - might be a few HP, but not worth blowing the engine up for just to see what it does.

>> Edited by targarama twice 'cos I'm a spaz on Sunday 16th April 16:55

>> Edited by targarama on Sunday 16th April 16:56

[chris watton]

WOW!!!! TARG!!!! What an excellent result on the RR!!! You must be well pleased with that! I bet your T350 has as much power, if not more, than a lot of 4litre S specs out there!

[jellison]

Ooh this is funny - the T350 making 350 ft/lbs and more power than all of the Tuscan S's Charlie have ever had on SRR.

Think this and the couple of SP6's that have made big torque and over 400bhp at Austec has to be taken with a Huge pinch of salt. Torque is roughly proportional to engine size (tuning levels being the same on different sized but other wise the same engine).

Exactly the same shape torque curve as Nellys car that made and that is a 4.0 litre and now way a 3.6 will more (no way).

Whitey - hope yours make near the 367bhp (don't take it over 7! - get those miles on pronto)and 300 - 310 ft/lbs will be good. (That is Griff / Chim 500 torque with a litre less so perfectly respectible). See ya soon.

Glad none went bang. We (3 of us out for a blast to Goodwood - Cerb, Griff and mine) were going to pop round, but open roads seemed the better option.


>> Edited by jellison on Sunday 16th April 19:18

[whitey]

Targarama, I really think you need to get yours on the SRR to compare to these other results.

Has anyone actually had their Speed 6 remapped and if so, was it worth it?

cheers
Whitey

PS. Why am I always hungover on an easter monday....

[trackcar]

whitey said:

Targarama, I really think you need to get yours on the SRR to compare to these other results. Has anyone actually had their Speed 6 remapped and if so, was it worth it? cheers Whitey PS. Why am I always hungover on an easter monday....

I've had a play on a sp6 mapping and gained very little. I can't remember the exact figures but it was about 10bhp or less throughout the range. The car I had in had perfect fuelling already so this sp6 car I had in was like a cerbie 4.2 in the accuraccy of it's mapping.

In fact it was such a poor increase that I've never offered sp6 mapping to customers as i consider it very poor value for money, you would never notice the difference out on the road and I think you'd be hard pushed to measure any difference on a stopwatch.

If i ever find any sp6 mods that increase performance I'll consider again remapping, but unless i start to see a trend in some cars that responds well to remapping it's pretty pointless... if your car is in good condition it'll be very hard to improve upon from the factory.

[trackcar]

whitey said:

a standard 4.0 back in 2001 was dynoed at 373bhp on Nobles rollers by joolz.

that Tuscan at 373bhp was an ex dealer demonstrator, and i've never been able to replicate that hp from any other std cars .. it appears that some of the early cars may have exited the factory with non production spec engines for the dealers to demonstrate.

One telling story i heard once was that when the factory needed a demo car for the media it used a demo car from a southern dealer as it was known that they regularly got the fastest demo cars (faster than the factory's own car at that time) and therefore would put up better performance figures.

I think the figures you're all seeing from SRR on the shootout are representative of what you should achieve from a good std car, ie very close to what tvr claim for the lower engines but certainly not more.

[targarama]

whitey said:

Targarama, I really think you need to get yours on the SRR to compare to these other results. Has anyone actually had their Speed 6 remapped and if so, was it worth it? cheers Whitey PS. Why am I always hungover on an easter monday....

Yeah, guess so. This is why I asked the 'how do they compare' question in the thread at the top of this forum a while back - shirely someone has used both RRs (need to search the Cerbie forums as I think one of those might have been to both). Maybe the torque on mine is a little higher than it really is but it does go rather well I must say. On the track is holds is own in a straight line with Tuscan S's so I know its rather nippy for a lowly 3.6.

Jellison - let me know if you're having a party on Nov 5th this year. I'll come round and piss on the bonfire for you. Austec are a respected TVR indie and I'm sure they wouldn't 'enhance' the figures on purpose.

[jellison]

targ (don't take offence non intended) - loads of threads on the the Austec figures tending to be very flattering for torque but within 5% Noble and SRR on power (but even that on a 350bhp lump is 17.5bhp!)

Presumeably you have a dame good one - and that is great. They do vary soooo much compared to the big manufacturers though - weird.

370bhp IS dam good and anything over 300ft/lbs is pretty good.

I am tempted to rock up to Austec when I have my next ecu mods (have a moddied exhaust so should have gained a bit now). Whitey is at least in a good position to compare cars having had a 500Chim, TuscRR and been in mine (knowing what both ours made on the same day at SRR).

[targarama]

As you know, all our cars are fast and a few HP or ft lbs here or there is not a problem in the bigger scheme of things (like whether the owner can drive well enough to use the horses effectively).

I'll try to get down to SRR at some point in the near future.

[nelly1]

Ok then....I must admit to being a tad disappointed with the figures I got on saturday (compared to what the car made on Austecs' rollers).....

BUT the Austec run was done over 9 months ago, and although I haven't really detected a loss in OTR performance (remember the car was off the road for the best part of 5 months having some minor reconstructive surgery!) I can't say whether anything has changed in the intervening time.

The point I'm trying to make is I don't (and never did) want this to turn into a 'Rolling road x' is better than 'Rolling road y' thread.

All these things prove is that on a given day, the participating cars made a particular power under near identical conditions. Hell, you could drive round the block after your run, refill with fuel from a different pump, strap it down again and get a whole new set of figures.....or a dodgy connection could shake loose...and so on.
This is NOT a dig at any rolling road, but there are so many variables that can affect a run.
I know - I'm a dyno. test operator for a living and we've got our own rolling road.

I certainly don't feel short-changed when I go out for a blast just because I have a piece of paper with a lower number on it!

I was surprised at how similar the figures for the cars were - given the difference in build dates / model types - but I've said before....5 cars out of the many thousands out there hardly constitutes a fair sample size!

It's just a pity the majority of SP6 owners are so afraid of things going pop that the very mention of rolling roads or track days sends them scurrying for cover!
IT'S WHAT THEY WERE BUILT FOR FFS!!!!

For the record - the bloke with the highest figure of the day (step forward Chris!) was absolutely bricking it before his run - now he's sure glad he did!

Thanks again to Charlie and those that turned up - let's hope they become as frequent as the Cerbie ones - if for nothing else but to meet up and have a bit of a grin.

[rev-erend]

Great day - sorry I did not bring my car : the missus wanted it to go shopping .. no really - she is scared of the SEAC

I was really impress with the speed 6 results all being so close - all bhp figures were vere close for all the 4.0 engines and the torque figures were close to but as everyone knows bhp impresses at the pub but torque is best on the road.

My SEAC just steals into the frame with 296 ft lbs of torque - V8 is much better for lighting up at round-a-bouts and in the car park thought

[andyvdg]

Was one of the cars on Saturday a "standard" 4.0 (as opposed to RR or S spec) - what
did it figure ? I'm wondering if all 4.0 engines are the same.

The Sag/Tuscan II S/Tuscan S all made about the same bhp/torque.
Darty's car was about 10bhp more at the wheels than those.

One possibility is that the standard cars are lower bhp again.

Another possibility is that the rebuilds are all to the same spec. I'm sure
someone told me once that the difference between an S and a standard 4.0
was just the ECU.

3rd possibilty is that there is no difference between an RR/S and a standard spec.
However my S car feels more powerful than my previous standard 4.0, and the 3.6 T350
felt less powerful than that again.

Cheers,

Andy.

[nelly1]

Andy

The first car up was Phils - a standard 4.0 with about 20,000 miles under it's bonnet IIRC.

The fuelling was a bit on the lean side, but it made either 334 or 343bhp (damn my feeble memory!).

Neill