Re: 16v vs. 8v: Fact vs. Myth

[Dan Ruddick <druddick@vt.edu>]

At 12:59 AM 11/9/96 -0500, you wrote:
>OK, being that I have had 2 8v's and 1 16v I think I can sum up the seat of
>the pants feeling I get from them all.  The 8v's simply have more torque at
>low rpms!  It's not horsepower.  That has nothing to do with pulling fast
>off the line.  Torque is the force that pulls the car faster as it's applied
>.  Of course without horsepower once you stop applying it you'll slow down. 
>Anyway, if I'm in fifth doing 40mph in my 16v it takes about 1-2 seconds
>longer to get to fifty than it does with my 8v.  I also remember thinking
>how unimpressed I was with my friend's (Jdoc's)  Scirocco 16v because I
>never drove it over 3k rpms when I took it out.  Now I know where the power
>is.  The other thing brought up is the wieght issue.  The 8v (with AC, no
>sunroof)  is only 200lbs lighter than the 16v's (sunroof, AC) which won't
>make that much difference off the line.  I think Shawn told us that 100lbs
>counts for .2 seconds in the 1/4 mile.

        200 lbs!  you're talking about almost a 10% difference in weight!
For that matter horsepower is a function of torque and rpm, so if two motors
have the same horsepower at a given rpm, then they have the same torque.  As
an example, let's say the cars both have about 80 horse at 1000 rpm(this is
probably off) and the 8V weighs 2200 lbs and the 16V weighs 2400lbs. The 8V
is going to have 27.5 lbs/hp and the 16V is going to have 30lbs/hp.  Again
the 10% difference in terms of raw acceleration results in the 8V being 10%
faster, until the 16V comes on cam and blows the doors off the 8V.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Dan Ruddick
Virginia Tech
'87 Scirocco 8V
"Yeah, but what are ya gonna do?"  -Homer Simpson, philosopher
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

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