Is More Flow Better, Is The Smallest Intake Port That Flows The Most The Best
What your not getting once you apply enough torque to move an object like a car work is also taking place, the amount of work able to be done is all we care about which hp is able describe to us. Torque on a dyno graph has less importance because it can't express the amount of work to be done, in that sense it doesn't matter if a dyno just spit out a hp curve that's all the info we need. So torque is important just not necessarily the amount of it. A 500 hp engine is more powerful the a 250 hp engine but engines with 500 tq vs 250 tq we have no idea which is more powerful, You only want focus and credit one part of the process, When saying HP is King your accounting for both tq and time (rpm).
And torque is per revolution average if it takes more revolutions we have to be talking over time which is power, a dyno don't sit at every rpm for a minute to measure how much torque is being made. The tq measure at a certain rpm would be same in a split second or years at that rpm.
I get everything. (Sigh, here we go again . . .)
What does a dyno
actually measure? I don't want to hear that it measures power, because it doesn't (only by proxy).
A dyno measures torque and RPM and then converts that on a rolling graph to power.
I repeat: a dyno measures torque and rpm.
Yes, we all know that TQxRPM/5252=HP, but the dyno still measures the force and not the power rating when it loads up. Each time the dyno loads up, it is applying a little more static resistance that the engine needs to overcome (with torque) to spin faster. The cumulative effect appears to be continuous, but is in fact made up of small static points that have no interval (yes, that sounds like an oxy-moron, but it depends on which philosophy you subscribe to).
That's the thing about time, it does not "flow" the way we think it does, and it is not continuous (except in our perceived reality). Everything is just "there" and time simply points to a position. I'm not going to go down that path.
Back to our engine . . . is a 520hp engine
really more powerful than a 500hp engine? It is at a certain rpm, but what about elsewhere? And how do we get to that 520hp rpm point and are we able to hold it there?
This is the beauty of electric engines and why they are so useful to point out the difference between torque and power (even though they are inextricably linked) compared to combustion engines that don't have a linear torque curve.
An electric engine accelerates a mass which has to overcome not only inertia, but all the other dynamic – and exponential – forces that it meets, such as rolling and air resistance. That's why we need to produce more power (see, I said it!) to accelerate faster.
BUT, as we accelerate, our combustion engine loses (or gains) torque as it progresses through the rev range, so it cannot compete with the electric engine until it is making the same amount of torque – which is for a very brief time. By then, the electric engine is well out in front and the combustion engine has to change gears!!!
More torque will make more power at any rpm. Peak HP is only useful if you can keep the engine at that particular point. But in racing that never really happens. Unless you are driving an electric vehicle, in which case you have the same amount of torque at any point and can apply it.
I will add only one thing: you really need to get it out of your heard that torque is "one rotation" – it is not. Torque is simply the force applied in a rotational manner. Of course I understand what you mean, but that doesn't make it right. Sorry.
There's a lot of rules of thumb or general wisdom that can be explained by physics, but those always break down at some point.
This is really one of the most misleading statements I have ever read in my life.
Physics doesn't "break down at some point". Physics is universal. If you think it is "breaking down", then you simply haven't understand what is going on.
There will always be an explanation to what is happening – you just haven't worked it out yet. By "you" I am referring to the third-person you. At least I hope I am. Our
understanding of physics may "break down", but the physics itself is there to be discovered.
