RE: Enough exhaust noise already: Tell Me I'm Wrong

[coppice]

Very few road cars sound especially memorable compared to racers. I 'm lucky enough to have heard stuff like Matra MS120,Larousse Lamborghini, BRM P160 and Ferrari 641`F1 cars and Lola T70 and Ferrari 512M sports cars in period (as well as a lot of drag stuff ) and any road car sounds tame in comparison . The last time I heard an Aston Martin V8 (don't ask me which one - they've all looked near identical since DB7 ) I laughed- its cynically engineered and gratuitously loud pops and bangs were the sort of stuff that a ten year old would like . As for most V8 Ferraris ..great if you like chainsaws

[Root Ginger]

Oddball RS said:

I don't really see your problem, try not driving with the throttle 'on' 'off' its not a switch, its just exhaust design, Copper S's went through a phase where they all did it, then a design change and it stops, i'd rather this than fake noise through the speakers and 28 exhaust pipes.

The R53 Cooper S did it for a reason, to cool the cylinders. Whether it's a requirement now, or just kept as part of the DNA I don't know.

[Hungrymc]

CJP80 said:

Which car?

Audi's with the 'sound pack'.... They call it exhaust sound actuator or something. Friend of mine has a diesel SQ5 which tries to make petrol V8 noises sometimes and makes fake booms and drones on overrun (it makes noises I don't think a diesel can make as they have no throttle etc). Apparently some BMWs have it as well.

[Fire99]

Hungrymc said:

This is getting closer to my view. I think it's down to the subtlety of what you call fake. To me, as long as the noise is generated by combustion, I'm ok with it (the GTS is a bit too much while pottering through town - I'd have it on quiet mode).

When the exhaust note is totally synthesized by a speaker, far too much for me, couldn't live with myself.

I think your comment about natural harmonics is a little romantic as the noise and the natural frequencies etc that create it have been engineered in for many many years now. However, again, if it's genuine combustion noise, I'm ok with it.

So can anyone clarify what system the porsche uses ? Is it an exhaust speaker playing a synthesized sound as is becoming common on Audis and BMWs or is it a combination of silencer bypasses and fueling?

Yeah I get my post is verging on the 'romanticised' view and no doubt there has always been some thought to how the car sounds (Rather than it all being some amazing accident)

I guess I'm kinda somewhere near your view in that it all now sounds just a bit too orchestrated. Maybe a touch too precise..
Definitely having 'engine sounds' pumped through the stereo is just a no-no for me.

[Craikeybaby]

Hungrymc said:

CJP80 said:

Which car?

Audi's with the 'sound pack'.... They call it exhaust sound actuator or something. Friend of mine has a diesel SQ5 which tries to make petrol V8 noises sometimes and makes fake booms and drones on overrun (it makes noises I don't think a diesel can make as they have no throttle etc). Apparently some BMWs have it as well.

I understand that the i8 uses this technology, other manufacturers looking into it too.

[Tony33]

Hungrymc said:

I think your comment about natural harmonics is a little romantic as the noise and the natural frequencies etc that create it have been engineered in for many many years now.

I agree, I recall a decade ago, Alfa Romeo assuring the Alfisti mourning the replacement of the V6 with a GM unit that it would be modified by Alfa engineers to give the "traditional Alfa" sound. There are very few cars that are simply bolted together from off the shelf parts without specific engineering to determine their characteristics, there is very little that is natural - just the methods of engineering has changed.

As others have stated the optionality can take priority over a sense of purity and the definition of what is “pure” is so subjective. How about a nice carburettor with a throttle cable and a choke you completely control instead of all these new fangled computers deciding for you? Many years ago enthusiasts complained that power steering took away the pure feel and yet we have a new generation of enthusiasts mourning the replacement of hydraulic systems and so it goes on…

[jamieduff1981]

fausTVR said:

Hungrymc said:

fausTVR said:

I just want the real thing or what's the point? Today PH has saddened me.

I'm really not too impressed hearing that puffed up, preening ponce proudly parading along the avenue in his 'turn around damn you, and look at me' mobile. The contrived racket is not an enhancement, if only because of what it says about the owner.

Quite a few on here should just get their kicks the gaming world and leave the rest of us to enjoy the authentic world as it's meant to be.
I love the sound of a mighty engine very much, but this fakery is like giving the late Pavarotti a tambourine and a cheap megaphone to work with.

Rant over.

Serious question : where do you draw the line? Excessively noisy conventional exhaust? Switchable exhausts? Fueling on over run? Speakers in the exhaust?

I guess I ask the question because with current technology, it's quite possible to make all cars very quite without any real performance impact (a kilo or so of weight max) so in a way, is any fairly current car (the last 20/30 years) that is noisy a bit fake ? TVR could easily have used available tech to make the cars sound quiet like everything else - they chose to use noisy exhausts.

(As I've said before - I draw the line at speakers in the exhaust and I'd drive that GTS on quiet mode around town - so yes the clip is ridiculous, but the car can be much more subdued than that - journalist wanting to have something to write about)

Good question. It is a grey area because most, but not all, car exhausts will make a sound of some kind. For me, speakers, added fuelling and to a large extent switchable valving in the system are 'faking' it. The barry boys in fart-canned shoppers are merely housefly annoying because although it is only the tricked-up acoustics of the pipework its self, no racing car sounds like that, so the object is defeated in any case.

Yes, as you say, TVR could have made their cars far quieter had they chose to, but they only went as far as having generous pipe diameters and modest silencers to allow the engines to say their piece with a natural voice.

I saw an Aston 1-77 You-tube clip a few days ago. They made a big play on the start up sounds and it occurred to me that I was only hearing the exhaust and not the engine. The sound has become quite far removed from what I see as the reality of what we should hear.
I no longer hanker after owning a modern Ferarri because I simply don't enjoy their high pitched strangulated and shouty voice. It's a sound more akin to an amplified zip-wire than a big engine.

I'm admitting with all this that I got old and still want a powerful car to sound like a Spitfire's Merlin on full chat.

That's not strictly true. TVR actively mapped cars to pop and bang - or at least deliberately avoided refining maps to engineer out pops and bangs.

As a 1990s TVR owner myself, but also a fan of the modern Jags which have come under fire on this thread I think the TVR owners are hypocritical to claim their cars are the "real deal" and other cars are fakery - because in truth no road cars have actually needed to pop and bang since the introduction of electronic fuel injection, and anything that used to pop and bang on carburettors was usually considered to be badly tuned.

I love my TVR and its obnoxious noises, and I also love my Jags and their obnoxious noises. There's a far stronger case for owning a V8 F-Type on the basis that the car will run quietly unless asked to be noisy than there is for trundling around town in a Cerbera waking up babies in prams everywhere.

All this thread is is a bunch of dinosaurs either objecting to other peoples' immaturity in order to feel better about themselves, or people with noisy cars justifying why only theirs' should be allowed to be noisy and why everyone elses' cars are fake whilst missing the irony that the whole concept of a car is a man-made entity.

Lastly - I'm not sure how much experience you have of listening to Merlins or any other aero engines for that matter - but in real life all you can hear is mostly exhaust noise, with a bit of propeller noise and some minor accompaniments from airflow through radiators and gunports etc subtly hidden within. The only time you can hear any mechanical noises is when it's turning over on the starter motor.

[jamieduff1981]

jimbop1 said:

tommy1973s said:

It's a generational thing. The xbox etc generation get their kicks in a fake world so artificial sounds are fine with them. Engineering / acoustic integrity is about as relevant to younger people as worrying about apostrophes. To me, it's like one of those pianos you see that play themselves. Better than I ever could, but I'd never be happy with technology faking what I - or the engine in my car - couldn't do unaided. I'd feel a bit silly owning something that was set up to make an average engine sound like a supercar. It's the aural equivalent of putting 'M' badges on a boggo 3 series or 'RS4' badges on a 2.0 TDI. You're trying to pretend you've got something better than you have. Sad, sad, sad.

Back in the real world, I have an old modded n/a car with a custom-made system set up on Bob Watson's rolling road to give optimal results etc. The priority in the engine build etc was to maximise torque / power for real-world driving. It sounds savage too (tickover sets off car alarms), but that was just a bonus. If the engine is right, it'll never need any b/s. If the engine is dull, it'll need all the help it can get.

So the GTS and F Type are trying to pretend they are better than they actually are because of how they sound?

Does the custom made system on your n/a car include a big bore, straight though exhaust? Isn't that kind of making out your car is better than it is?

+1 - What a load of hypocritical, elitist bks. I'd feel far more of a prick driving Tommy's old banger through town setting off car alarms at idle than I would driving an F-Type with the exhaust left on quiet mode.

As for this "xbox generation" terminology going around...



I've built numerous engines too so the catch-all insult needs to be adjusted to include people who do have hands-on experience but just don't agree with a particular point of view. Good luck with that.

[Simon Henly]

Surely any noise produced by the engine/exhaust should be a product of the tuning and design required to extract the desired performance not the target.

Anyone who starts an engine/exhaust design with the intention of creating noise is a fool in my not so humble and absolutely correct opinion.

[MogulBoy]

Simon said:

Surely any noise produced by the engine/exhaust should be a product of the tuning and design required to extract the desired performance not the target.

Anyone who starts an engine/exhaust design with the intention of creating noise is a fool in my not so humble and absolutely correct opinion.

Seriously? I would say that you risk missing the point here - unless you are focussed on one of the dictionary definitions of noise which is a loud or unpleasant sound or an unwanted sound?

The commercial imperative is that companies make cars that make money so the end product has to be seen as desirable to those who are in a position to pay the asking price and it's clear that many folk crave this kind of aural stimulation...

Perhaps the solution is that cars should be silent on the outside but come with headphones/earbuds so that each passenger could choose the sounds they want from their personal touchscreen. You could then programme your car's acoustic hub to overlay your chosen sound layer on top in real-time post production process that could immerse you in a full-on WRC anti-lag fest whilst your passengers perceive themselves to be in a flotilla of Venetian gondolas.

[jamieduff1981]

MogulBoy said:

Simon said:

Surely any noise produced by the engine/exhaust should be a product of the tuning and design required to extract the desired performance not the target.

Anyone who starts an engine/exhaust design with the intention of creating noise is a fool in my not so humble and absolutely correct opinion.

Seriously? I would say that you risk missing the point here - unless you are focussed on one of the dictionary definitions of noise which is a loud or unpleasant sound or an unwanted sound?

The commercial imperative is that companies make cars that make money so the end product has to be seen as desirable to those who are in a position to pay the asking price and it's clear that many folk crave this kind of aural stimulation...

Perhaps the solution is that cars should be silent on the outside but come with headphones/earbuds so that each passenger could choose the sounds they want from their personal touchscreen. You could then programme your car's acoustic hub to overlay your chosen sound layer on top in real-time post production process that could immerse you in a full-on WRC anti-lag fest whilst your passengers perceive themselves to be in a flotilla of Venetian gondolas.

Quite. By extension, surely choosing a V6, I6, O6, V8, V10 or V12 for their lovely sound potential when a turbocharged I4 can clearly carry out the function of moving the car is a cringeworthy, immature prat?

[Gary C]

I like a nice engine sound, but surely it needs to have some integrity.

Dumping fuel for no other reason than to make a pop seems to be lacking any integrity to me in the same way a flamer kit does.

[Blown2CV]

This whole thread seems to be missing the major issue which is that cars don't make noise by accident anymore, and if these 'fake' tricks weren't manufactured, your cars would all sound like a lot less than they are, pensions specials etc.

[Hungrymc]

Gary C said:

I like a nice engine sound, but surely it needs to have some integrity.

Dumping fuel for no other reason than to make a pop seems to be lacking any integrity to me in the same way a flamer kit does.

I get your point. But again it's about where you draw the line. I can garunteed that every 'interesting' car of the last 30 years has an engineered exhaust note. I'll also garunteed that all after market systems are designed with one eye on sound even if they are marketed as free breathing (most running on a standard manifold). So again, although I do see your point, I think that the 'integrity' you're looking for doesn't really exist. If that's accepted it then comes back to where you draw the line which is very subjective. If you draw it at fueling or timing on overrun, fair enough but I don't personally see that as any different to the other games manufacturers play with exhaust sound..... Apart from speakers in the exhaust - I can't get my head around that (but I accept even this is subjective).

Compare it to styling. No cars are styled in the wind tunnel, it may be used as part of the dev but the styling is a combination of many factors : packaging, legislation and the bit that may lack 'integrity'.... appearance etc. By deffenition all these attributes are a compromise around technical needs and more subjective wants which don't directly contribute to the cars primary function.

[paralla]

The OP is wrong. If the noise is not to his taste there is a button to turn it off.

Why would anyone not be happy to be given a choice?

[braddo]

paralla said:

The OP is wrong. If the noise is not to his taste there is a button to turn it off.

Why would anyone not be happy to be given a choice?

At first glance that button always looks to me like a pair of binoculars or boobs.

[mackie1]

paralla said:

The OP is wrong. If the noise is not to his taste there is a button to turn it off.

Why would anyone not be happy to be given a choice?

Out of interest, how many £1000s do you have to spend to get all the buttons? Also it appears that the manual mode works the wrong way round which I'd not expect from Porsche!

[Tony33]

braddo said:

At first glance that button always looks to me like a pair of binoculars or boobs.

German sense of humour? Fake boob button for fake sound?

[Gary C]

Hungrymc said:

Gary C said:

I like a nice engine sound, but surely it needs to have some integrity.

Dumping fuel for no other reason than to make a pop seems to be lacking any integrity to me in the same way a flamer kit does.

I get your point. But again it's about where you draw the line. I can garunteed that every 'interesting' car of the last 30 years has an engineered exhaust note. I'll also garunteed that all after market systems are designed with one eye on sound even if they are marketed as free breathing (most running on a standard manifold). So again, although I do see your point, I think that the 'integrity' you're looking for doesn't really exist. If that's accepted it then comes back to where you draw the line which is very subjective. If you draw it at fueling or timing on overrun, fair enough but I don't personally see that as any different to the other games manufacturers play with exhaust sound..... Apart from speakers in the exhaust - I can't get my head around that (but I accept even this is subjective).

Compare it to styling. No cars are styled in the wind tunnel, it may be used as part of the dev but the styling is a combination of many factors : packaging, legislation and the bit that may lack 'integrity'.... appearance etc. By deffenition all these attributes are a compromise around technical needs and more subjective wants which don't directly contribute to the cars primary function.

Yes, I sort of agree with you and the line is subjective. I would draw it at dumping fuel (unless that was part of an anti lag system that had a reason to be on the particular car). This despite having a peco exhaust on a manta GTE that popped and banged but It was great as a kid but maybe I have grown up (or got boring)

I have an 89 carrera and it makes a noise like not much else, not just the exhaust, being air cooled it's not got much sound deadening and it sounds so mechanical. if porsche produced a 991 with a speaker system to make it sound like it a 3.2 (not that they would want it to I'm sure) it would be awful.

A bit of integrity is important to me an a performance car. My old Evo burped and kicked on overrun partly due to the over large turbo and Motorsport development imperative that was subsequently lost in later models. We're later cars better cars ? Yes, was my EVO v more of an event. Oh I believe so.

[hondansx]

Agree that it's gotten a bit contrived now. Had a Boxster S; it sounded absolutely incredible at high revs. As such, it didn't need the other theatrics. I ended up feeling like a wally driving it and preferred the quieter, but more 'authentic' sound of my 997.