RE: Let turbos be turbos: Tell Me I'm Wrong
Discussion
Have to agree (having spent many years with old style 'boosty' Saab turbo's where you learnt to drive the car using the boost guage more than anything else. Great fun 
The turbo engine in my 135i isn't like that at all, and I do miss that. It's a great engine, just lacks that bit of old fashioned turbo-nutterness
Trouble is the manufacturers are damned if they do and damned if they don't.
The turbo engine in my 135i isn't like that at all, and I do miss that. It's a great engine, just lacks that bit of old fashioned turbo-nutterness
Trouble is the manufacturers are damned if they do and damned if they don't.
slipstream 1985 said:
I swap between a 1.8turbo vag unit and a bmw straight 6. The straight 6 everytime i get in it gun it for what seems like an age then look at the rev counter and still another 2000revs to go with more power just seems great. Whilst the vag unit pulls instantly from when the boost kicks it fades quickly and if off the boil it has nothing. .
I'm suprised the VAG fades quickly, what is the torque curve like?On the much older 2.3 9000 Saab aero in factory tune it delivers 200 ft/lbs at 2,800 rpm and holds above this until over 5,400 rpm
Peak is only 39 ft/lbs above that so it feels pretty linear on boost until nearly the red line.
estacion said:
The 3.0 litre porsche 911 turbo started it all in 1975, and it's still a great car to drive today!
The BMW 2002 mentioned in the article is from 1973, though Porsche did develop the wastegate for a production car which was a big advance in terms of eliminating lag. I think Porsche and Saab are the only manufacturers to offer a petrol turbo engine continuously from the 1970's (Saab sadly out of the game now).There are sometimes, most notably when making the most of a great road, that I'd prefer a more peaky top end similar to my old 328is but for the most part I find the mid range slug of torque from my TDI more enjoyable which I know is a personal preference. So I can see why manufacturers try to play it safe and go for a compromise, but totally agree on how going to every length to hide the turbo is a really dull approach. Why can't we at least hear the turbo working and get boost gauges fitted as standard on sporty models like on the Focus ST. The sound of a turbo spooling and then the whooshing sound of the bypass kicking in is brilliant so I really can't understand why they go to such lengths to develop turbo silencing methods only to then engineer in just a fake induction sound.
MarshPhantom said:
Strange isn't it that petrol turbo engined cars no longer advertise the the fact they are turbo'd yet it's a different matter with diesels.
I think firms like BMW want owners to think it's their engineering genius that makes the cars so powerful, rather than a couple of big old turbos.
This! And it's bizarre some diesels still advertise "Turbo" on the back yet how many diesels can you actually buy N/A these days? Very odd..I think firms like BMW want owners to think it's their engineering genius that makes the cars so powerful, rather than a couple of big old turbos.
Agree with this entirely. I grew up with my Dad having Saab turbos from day one and still love them now.
Interesting comment on the VAG 1.8T. My MK1 Vrs Octy (Revo stage 1 prob helped) would just go on forever. Stick it in 4th and overtake anything you like.................
Current daily is a MK2 Leon FR PD170. Much more punchy delivery than the later CR and the turbo whistles for England.
As enthusiasts we like the character of each defining idiosyncrasy our cars give us. For everyone else they would be a pain as they just want smooth, efficient, no nonsense power delivery. And it is this market that is the bread and butter for the manufacturers.
We must embrace what we still have before it's gone.
Jimbo
Interesting comment on the VAG 1.8T. My MK1 Vrs Octy (Revo stage 1 prob helped) would just go on forever. Stick it in 4th and overtake anything you like.................
Current daily is a MK2 Leon FR PD170. Much more punchy delivery than the later CR and the turbo whistles for England.
As enthusiasts we like the character of each defining idiosyncrasy our cars give us. For everyone else they would be a pain as they just want smooth, efficient, no nonsense power delivery. And it is this market that is the bread and butter for the manufacturers.
We must embrace what we still have before it's gone.
Jimbo
foreverfalling said:
He mentions the golf R as having not much after 3000 rpm-
I don't know what car he is driving... Thats when the fun begins!!! And it pulls to the redline.
+1I don't know what car he is driving... Thats when the fun begins!!! And it pulls to the redline.
The R doesn't really do anything before 3k and then at 4k the pull becomes noticeably harder from lower down in the rev range.
Strawman said:
estacion said:
The 3.0 litre porsche 911 turbo started it all in 1975, and it's still a great car to drive today!
The BMW 2002 mentioned in the article is from 1973, though Porsche did develop the wastegate for a production car which was a big advance in terms of eliminating lag. I think Porsche and Saab are the only manufacturers to offer a petrol turbo engine continuously from the 1970's (Saab sadly out of the game now).MrBarry123 said:
foreverfalling said:
He mentions the golf R as having not much after 3000 rpm-
I don't know what car he is driving... Thats when the fun begins!!! And it pulls to the redline.
+1I don't know what car he is driving... Thats when the fun begins!!! And it pulls to the redline.
The R doesn't really do anything before 3k and then at 4k the pull becomes noticeably harder from lower down in the rev range.
Either way, its too linear.
Crafty_ said:
MrBarry123 said:
foreverfalling said:
He mentions the golf R as having not much after 3000 rpm-
I don't know what car he is driving... Thats when the fun begins!!! And it pulls to the redline.
+1I don't know what car he is driving... Thats when the fun begins!!! And it pulls to the redline.
The R doesn't really do anything before 3k and then at 4k the pull becomes noticeably harder from lower down in the rev range.
Either way, its too linear.
MarshPhantom said:
Strawman said:
estacion said:
The 3.0 litre porsche 911 turbo started it all in 1975, and it's still a great car to drive today!
The BMW 2002 mentioned in the article is from 1973, though Porsche did develop the wastegate for a production car which was a big advance in terms of eliminating lag. I think Porsche and Saab are the only manufacturers to offer a petrol turbo engine continuously from the 1970's (Saab sadly out of the game now).
Crafty_ said:
Thats odd, because the VW site says it makes peak torque at 1800 RPM, so its already pulling as hard as it can long before 4k.
Either way, its too linear.
Pretty sure it's 2500 on the R, not 1800.Either way, its too linear.
After driving one daily for a while now, full acceleration demonstrates a noticeable difference from 4k onwards. I don't know what that's down to (obviously not torque) however there's certainly something going on.
The problem is too much torque low down, flattens the power curve, and makes it 'feel' less revvy than it may actually be.
Simple trend.
If a normalised power curve vs rpm tends to be beyond a linear 1:1 slope in the mid-range, it'll feel increasingly dull at the top end.
Todays manufacturers (BMW and BMW M included) seem to see virtue in low-down torque, and thus low-down power, because it makes a car be numerically faster outright (slightly) and much faster in-gear performance.
But these come at a cost of feeling pointless to rev, and breathless at the top end, even though in isolation those top ends may be very good indeed.
And really it comes down to the driver. You have a gearbox. If you want to go faster drop some gears, rather than rely on very high low down torque.
With the popularity of DSG insta-shift boxes this issue becomes even more perplexing because there is no effort from the driver required.
You could probably tweak torque limiters on the M3/4 so they have a more linear power output (so less low end torque), and they'd probably feel to drive loads better after you got over the idea that the 'surge' of high low rpm torque was a virtue for a drivers car.
Ultimately a turbo delivery applied in such a way is boring. Better to accentuate it's positives than just aim on removing it's negatives, leaving a dull overall engine.
And really the article opens with a complete load of bollarks. Turbo isn't the saviour of the performance car. It's the saviour of manufacturers profit margins.
It's still completely viable to make a proper screamer of an NA motor, it just costs money and *most* consumers of 'performance' cars today don't seem to care about actual engine performance, just paper figures and stats.
You only need to look at the fake noise systems used to see that most customers just expect a farty noise, a kick in the back when they floor it, and their car will tend to win in stats top trumps, and they're happy.
Dave
Simple trend.
If a normalised power curve vs rpm tends to be beyond a linear 1:1 slope in the mid-range, it'll feel increasingly dull at the top end.
Todays manufacturers (BMW and BMW M included) seem to see virtue in low-down torque, and thus low-down power, because it makes a car be numerically faster outright (slightly) and much faster in-gear performance.
But these come at a cost of feeling pointless to rev, and breathless at the top end, even though in isolation those top ends may be very good indeed.
And really it comes down to the driver. You have a gearbox. If you want to go faster drop some gears, rather than rely on very high low down torque.
With the popularity of DSG insta-shift boxes this issue becomes even more perplexing because there is no effort from the driver required.
You could probably tweak torque limiters on the M3/4 so they have a more linear power output (so less low end torque), and they'd probably feel to drive loads better after you got over the idea that the 'surge' of high low rpm torque was a virtue for a drivers car.
Ultimately a turbo delivery applied in such a way is boring. Better to accentuate it's positives than just aim on removing it's negatives, leaving a dull overall engine.
And really the article opens with a complete load of bollarks. Turbo isn't the saviour of the performance car. It's the saviour of manufacturers profit margins.
It's still completely viable to make a proper screamer of an NA motor, it just costs money and *most* consumers of 'performance' cars today don't seem to care about actual engine performance, just paper figures and stats.
You only need to look at the fake noise systems used to see that most customers just expect a farty noise, a kick in the back when they floor it, and their car will tend to win in stats top trumps, and they're happy.
Dave
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