mmarshall

Well, Honda DID convince a lot of people. The Integra sold well for years, mostly to younger buyers...and the RSX and TSX are selling today in their places.

One reason the IS300 didn't get as many gears as the IS200 is that the 300 has a lot more torque (218 ft-lb vs. roughly 150), so with the added flexibility it doesn't need as many gears. In fact, Lexus goes against the grain of a lot of other automakers.....other companies tend to offer more gears with V8's than they do with V6's and Fours, even though the Sixes ( and especially Fours) actually NEED them more. This is something I have pointed out to auto company reps for years, but they just don't listen.
And even at Lexus, the new LS supposedly is going to have a 6-speed automatic even thought it doesn't need one as much as smaller-engined Lexus products. Mercedes and BMW are even going to SEVEN-SPEED trannies on ...you guessed it.....their biggest products instead of the smaller engines that need the extra gears more. Go Figure.

VSsc400

iTrader: (1)

S2000 = in the 2.0L form it produces 240HP and 154TQ.

120HP/L 2.5x120 = 300HP
and
77TQ/L x 2.5 = 192TQ/L

yes the torque is lower but the 120HP/L is already a reality and I at the rate the technology has progressed I can't see why they could not make the 120TQ/L a reality as well in a decade.

The engine is high strung, but I do hear that it is reliable.

SecPole14

*sigh*

That's an incredibly useless example. There are plenty of small-displacement NA cars out there that have specific HP output of over 100/L. But you can't extrapolate power gains like you did in your calculations.
ROFL, If it were that easy we would have had engines like that years ago.

I mean come on, show me a NA engine currently in production that is 2.5L and anywhere close to 300TQ. Getting 300TQ out of an NA 2.5L is F1 ****. Sure they could get 300TQ out of a NA 2.5L. But it's not gonna be a 4 or a 6. It would have to be a V8 revving well over 10K. That's ridiculous, and the power curve would be stupid. And you would have to have a true F1-type 7-speed sequential to control it. Virtually useless on the street or highway.

Sorry dude. It's not gonna happen. The upcoming waves of hybrids will see to that. Besides, HP sells cars, not TQ. And the technology that lets F1 engines get so much HP and TQ out of such small engines has been around for decades. So what? It's ridiculously expensive and tempermental. Modern F1 engines can only last for 500 miles, if that. Not to mention tranny problems, etc.

This is a prime example of why racing stuff should be left on the track.

VSsc400

iTrader: (1)

so basically what you are telling me is that technology is just going to stay where it is with no improvement? would you have believed in 1970's that we were going to have cell phones? sure wireless communications were available but very limited and very expensive. same example here.

I'm sorry I gave you an incredibly useless example. But you saying that we will never have the technology to produce 300HP/300TQ out of a 2.5L motor is also incredibly misguided. *sigh* I'll also tell you that you cannot only go on what the current technology has but have to look forward to what advances can come in the future. ROLF, if we nobody though of advancing themselves and technology we would still be running around in our loin cloths creaming like monkeys

there are many engines that have over 100HP/L but that limit was seen as the holy grail only 10 years ago, the S2000 engine is the only engine that makes 120HP/L... the highest output/L of any production N/A engines technology grows and so can the efficiency of the motor.

Nobody said anything about racing in the streets.

And about your comment on the HP sells cars not TQ. I would not buy a car with 300HP and 40TQ. It just not going to happen.

In any case I am no longer going to visit this thread or post replies here about this since I believe that technology will advance and you think it will never happen and once again have deviated from the orignial subject, so feel free to have the last word.

SecPole14

Thanks for completely patronizing me. You're totally going off on a tangent. Clearly technology will get better. We did not have color LCD flip phones with Bluetooth in the '70s and '80s. We did not have Mac G5s and P4s.

We DID have high-output, small displacement F1 engines in the '70s and '80s. Do you see where I'm going with this?

This really tires and bores me so I'm not going to discuss it any further, either. I'll finish by saying that we will never see a NA 2.5L with 300TQ.

dj.ctwatt

that why license restrictions need to become more strict, and fines need to increase to deter reckless driving
The E55 can reach 160mph in 20 seconds flat. No we do not need super sedans. That's why they make up less than .001% of the market, yeah that number is an overstatement. BMW alone is nowhere near 10%. Again devices and distractions are not good, but it depends on the individual driver. License requirements should cover this, and prevent misuse. Like cell phones, they have become a distraction in cars, but that does not mean we should ban their manufacture all together.
True, but the industry wants halo cars to sell their profitable vehicles, like camry's and pick up trucks. Performance cars are difficult to design, build, test, and certify. Notice how Firebird, Camaro, Supra, and a lot of other cars have been retired? They are not profitable. Us consumers want them but we never buy them. Even the MR2 Spyder was a flop. Mitsu, King of the EVO and Eclipse yada yada is nearly bankrupt. Who is the strongest now? Yeah the bread and butter cookie cutter brand Toyota. Not Mitsu, not Nissan, not even Dodge/Chrysler with the Neon SRT-4 and other cheap performance cars come close.

Brand image. That's why these cars are being built. Even the super luxury cars are designed to sell the cheaper models. . . Lexus makes more money off of ES300/330's and RX300/330 than any performance or super car. BMW as well, it's all about entry level. How many M5's our there do you think there are compared to slow poke 528/525's? People want an image, not actual performance. Yes this ridiculous competition is absurd, but it will end when it ceases to be profitable, and believe me it's not profitable. . . just look at some numbers. I dare you to look at profit margins on BMW(the performance oriented) vs Toyota.

LexFather

I will agree Toyota/Lexus makes good profit off platform shared ES and RX cars. But Lexus and any car company makes more profit the more expensive the car. A M5 costs twice as much as a 525. It does NOT cost near twice as much to build (using your example).
I do agree with the image. Image, IMO is VERY, VERY important in the luxury market.
And I think BMW is right behind Porsche as the most profitable car company.

Faraaz23

1SICKLEX... thats true an M5 is gobs and gobs more than a 525i retail-wise, and while it may not physically cost that much more to physically produce it... but however, what about R&D costs? I can't imagine how much money they put into designing these extremely high outpout M-engines, and suspensions, gearboxes, etc. vs these low-strung 3.0L I-6's. (I'm not stating as a fact, I'm asking you guys). In the end, don't they have to try to recover all those costs?

I read in a major publication once (i forgot which, probably C&D) that the new 5-series was going to be especially important for BMW, because their highest profit margin/car actually is the 5. The 3 makes them the most money on the whole because of the sheer volume that they sell.

LexFather

I agree with you here. Yup, the 5 is their bread and butter. And with sales TANKING, it could spell trouble. Too early to tell. With the new GS and M35/45 and A6 coming things can only get worse for it.

Concerning the Ms, well a lot of the R&D is already done with their racing teams. And with the Ms now offering SMGs (autos), they can be driven by more people which means more sales and more profits.

I see what your saying about the costs but it ain't that much.

Porsche, Lord, I love them but they are so profitable as they share HELLA parts. I think the old 996 was at one point 40% a Boxster. Consider a Boxster is 45k starting and a 911 Turbo is 100k and a GT-2 is amost 200k, imagine the profit margin!

Faraaz23

speaking of the new A6... anyone know anything about it? I'm guessing it'll take after A8... hopefully a beefier engine with power to match the 545 as well as that fly-azz new DSG gerabox!!!

Also, is Audi gonna ever do an S8?? I think they have a V10 sittin around from the Murcielago that could come in handy. Or they could go Mercedes route and slap twins onto their W12. I'm surprised Mercedes is still running unchallenged in that segment.

dj.ctwatt

True, but remember volume too! The M5 is much more profitable per unit than the standard 5, but the standard sells a kagillion times more than the M5. Therefore profit is MUCH MUCH higher. And as a business they could care less about per unit profit, but total profit. Ferrari will never match Toyota's profitability. And as mentioned there's also R&D costs, manufacturing costs, testing/certification costs. Just take a look at the numbers, they are available online, albeit hard to find.

dj.ctwatt

Again, Porsche sells well because of volume. . . which really isn't that large to begin with, primarily because of the high price. Their most profitable car is their inexpensive one, why? Porsche is also one helluva well run company. They know how to exploit their designs and minimize costs. They have tons of different models (carrera, cabrio, GT2, GT3, etc) which are all based off one design. . . where most of the money is spent creating. However they lucked out, as the 911 is a sports car, and backwards engineering to a slower car is much more simple than forward engineering, such as building a performance variant. R&D, or pre-production costs to be more exact, are much more expensive than you think. . . the automotive industry is among the worst, followed by the aircraft industry. The most expensive elements are certification and safety testing, which is different for every country. Tooling and machinery for mass production(even in limited quantities greater than the handful that are used for race cars) is extremely costly.
The whole point is that fast cars will never become widespread, as the aggregate of consumers prefer cheaper cars over fast ones. Markets have and still demonstrate this over and over again. Fast cars are now only used to create brand image, not to market to the mainstream. With the auto industry, volume is of the highest priority, because you want to maximize your gains from the sunk costs of development. Note that even Altima's(V6 variant does 0-60 in 5.9) has much higher volume for the 4cylinder than the V6. . . same with Camry. And Camry, being much slower, still manages to completely outnumber Altima sales (despite the extreme lack of performance). Markets DO NOT prefer fast cars.