Bimmer32

Please look up the difference between "bhp and hp." Hint: There's no difference except in the calling of horsepower. BTW, 1 hp is equal to .9866 PS in case you want to compare the Japanese's rating of "engine horsepower."

Presenting final engine output from fairly different production dates is quite pointless. You can go down that path by yourself. Hint: It's endless.

Regarding big block and small block, that's a path that can be misunderstood. Do you mean small block in the modern sense, or small block as in distance between the bore, what Ford calls small block, GM calls it something else, etc. Let's leave that in another thread. For the sake of this thread, "big block" is about the traditional sense of displacement, and yes, technically, GM calls the LS engine small block but not in the traditional sense of small block casting.

You're smart enough to google your own question - did you read the v10 link? But personally, at this point in time, I think the high revers use more technology to put their engine one step ahead of the "big blocker." Example, Porsche, Ferrari, BMW, etc. The cost is higher R&D $$. The result is one step ahead. If you want the technicals, I suggest you do the research yourself. You'll find that it's the use of technology to gain output with more stress on hp/liter baseline and not so much on weight; though that is important too if it weighs like anchor.

Would you like a Cartier or a Movado? They both tell time and fashionable, but with most Cartier, you've got a second hand and a date?

SWAJames,

I agree earlier that these are two different philosophies of engine engineering. My preference is in the use of technology to produce the output. If both "camps" were to use the same or similar technologies, they would reach production at about the same time. But keep in mind that we are comparing a 08 production LS engine to a 2004 high reving to get similar or better results. We can go on and on about the chicken and egg thing, but you have to give credit to people who spend more money to get their product to the market first, and particularly BMW, it was rough 4 years ago for the v10 (Porsche too).

Hence, I favor the high reving engines because they use more technologies in their engines. Porsche is a good example of why people will pay the premium for the "whole package," and that package includes the highly refined advance technologies used on production Porsche engines. Hope you didn't buy the Porsche for looks and handling only?

When you start talking about weight, that's the kind of "technology" that big blocks need. The other is "supercharger." But as time goes, technology will make most engines weigh lesser than it's predecessors with equal or greater output. Again, there's the time factor. Both camps can use these techologies to improve on their engine outputs, BUT the fact that high rev engines philosophy can prodcue higher hp/liter than big blocks, it leaves them, in my opinion, inherently a superior engineering. HP/Liter is a more constant benchmarks.

Bring to the table, the same or within one year production of an NA engine from big blocks and compare it to a high reving NA engine, and I'll be convince that big block philosphy is as competitive as high reving engines.

In general, there's a price for everything.

JetBlack5OC

BMW Germany website states the M5 at 507 PS. Using the PS to HP conversion, it comes to 500.05 hp. Explains why it is stated at 500 hp SAE on the BMW USA website.


Once again you didn't answer my nor swajames question.

Your ranting about the V10 having more tech. Put that aside. Why in terms of driving the car is the V10 using two extra cylinders and less displacement, better than using a bigger displacement LS7 V8? Both being normally aspirated.

Swajames ask basically the same question:
GM's OHV approach may be "lower tech" but it gets just as much output out of less physical mass. Why in your mind is one clearly better than the other?


And we are comparing the LS7 from 2005 and the S85 V10 from 2004. And yes the LS7 is a small block, not big block, how could you argue that?

Bimmer32

"Sigh." Your rhetoric is starting to remind me of a member by the name of 700700. Please reread my post. Now you put techs aside, and introduce "driving the car?" Here's my last suggestion:

Why don't you stand near an F-1 engine reving at 13K_ rpm or drive an F1 car around when you get a chance and see if you can be "enlightened." Oh yeah, I've been at the drag strip several times and have seen and heard the "big blocks." Yeah even the ones that produce 1000s of horses. Very impressive, but not enlightened.

JetBlack5OC

You see, that is what I was asking from the beginning. We have asked you the same question 5 straight posts. Oh well guess you don't understand why you like high revving engines. I know why I like them. Your answer is the S85 V10 has more tech, so its better. That is the typical explanation that explains nothing. The thing is these powerplants go in car that you actually drive. You can't tell someone why you enjoy a high revving engine, and what makes it superior to the NA large displacement engine(LS7 or 6.2 AMG).

You have no clue how long and how much of a F1 fan I am. We all know why F1 cars have small displacement, its called rules. Its better to look at Le Mans racing. If high revving engines were the end all be all, every car would be running one. But they don't.

Funny thing is I have argued both sides of this argument on this very form, in many different threads. Defending the very engines you are defending. I just like to hear why people prefer one philosophy over the other. And I usually end up getting the answer you just gave.

Both engines philosophies have their drawbacks.

I am done here, talk amongst yourselves.

swajames

With 2.4 liters of displacement, the only possible way to extract significant power out of a normally aspirated F1 engine is through incredibly high RPM. As a consequence, F1 engines have very low torque. The exact same advantage/disadvantage that we posited for the S85, only magnified at both extremes. F1 engines rev to 19,000 out of necessity, not preference, as there is simply no other way to get sufficient power out of a normally aspirated 2.4 liter engine per the current sporting regulations. The F1 engine is, of course, a V8. The more substantive point is that were F1 regulations to still permit it, you can guarantee that the powerplants would have forced induction.

In fact, one of the rumored specs for 2011 includes a 2.2 liter forced induction V6, with a much lower rev limit than that permitted today (19,000).

That's much closer to the LS7/LS9 in philosophical approach than the S85.

BetterMakeWay

Yes in fact it's just a matter of logic. For example take a 50cc 1 cylinder engine (theoretical). So we have two variables CC and nr. of cylinders. Freeze one constantant and multiply the other by 10 and we get:

Scenario 1: 50cc engine with 10 cylinders (meaning 5cc per cylinder)

and

Scenario 2: 500cc engine and 1 cylinder (obviusly meaning 500cc per cylinder).


Considering the two scenarios and the use of almost the same technology for both engines (as in same materials and so on...) in all the cases you'll get more power/torque from the scenario 2 engine. Due to the fact that we limited both engines in technology and approaches it makes apparently no sense but that's the fact ! Ask any engineer. To compensate for the small capacity per cylinder the scenario 1 engine would have to receive other techonogical enhancements like high revving, more exotic materials to cope with the higher stress, and so on...

Also another reason for less specific output per liter for bigger engines is for sure the argument of less moving parts and more internal balance needed. A 4 cylinder is easier to balance than a V10 one. This is another argument that explains the trend i was talking aobut earlier of 4 cylinder honda s2000, 6 cylinder CSL and GT3, M3 V8, and M5 V10.

This is the simplest explanation i could come up with but it points out the best the ideea that anybody can create lots of power from huge engines (at least for us Europeans 6.0 to 9 liters). It doesn't really matter that you have 2 cylinders less when you have 2 or 3 liters more in capacity (which is huge; heck my car is a 3 liter one).

Bimmer32

Thanks for taking the time to explain to people like JetBlack50C who clearly don't invest the time and mental activity to understand that which they are "fans" of, e.g. F1 engineering. I guess there is a big difference between a "fan" and a "guru" or "enthusiast."

SWAJames, it is true of your statement that force induction is and mostly likely, going to become mainstream, if not, as part of the whole engine development. In other words, most of us now think that force induction is like taking steriods for a NA engine, but as times go by, I think force induction may be considered a defacto to high performance engine in the near future.

Aside from F1 and other races rules and regulation, a good production engine would be a high reving engine with force induction. Because increase displacement (and forced induction as well) can be used by either philosophies to produce more hp, it's the ability to rev higher to produce higher output (as seen with those F1 engineers constraint on displacement) that high reving engines have more potential - at the cost of higher R&D $$.

In all practicality, there probably always will be manufacturers of high performance engine for people of all economic (or preference of what they want to spend on speed) levels as it has in the past.