CK6Speed

iTrader: (1)

Well, not exactly, My 2004 RX330 was the 1st model year of the 2nd generation RX.. The 2005 MDX model generation has been out since what? 2000? The new MDX will be out shortly since that is what this topic was supposed to be about so it will be interesting to see how good or bad that truck really is. Keep in mind, my wife and I were ready to buy the MDX because the current RX300 at the time just didn't do it for us. We learned of the early release of the 2004 model RX330 so that is why we waited and ended up buy one of the first RX330s in the market in my state. I think the RX350 isn't due for a redesign until at least 2009 model year.

Neo

iTrader: (3)

The MDX was sold in Fall 2000 as the 01 model. For our needs, my wife and I picked the MDX over the RX300 in 02. If it was down to the RX330 and the MDX, I think the choice would still be the same. The RX330 is a nice enough vehicle. It just does not meet our needs.

SteVTEC

Honda's rev-up naturally aspirated VTEC engines were state of the art and "high tech" back in their day, 15 YEARS AGO. Their benefits at the time was that you now had the ability to get relatively high power out of a smallish engine, while still maintaining the lighter weight, smaller packaging, and much of the efficiency benefits of smaller displacement engines as well. However, with all good come some bad. To make lots of peak horsepower and high HP/L the internal engine geometry and plumbing from the intake manifold to the exhaust system must be optimized for that. As such, you end up trading off low-end torque. Peak torque is also sacrificed since in order to support an 8000 rpm valvetrain you must use stiffer valvesprings which result in higher friction. Spinning the engine itself up to 8k results in enormous amounts of friction as well. And since there's little low-end torque, response suffers while cruising, and the gearing cannot be too tall since you still need power in top gear to climb highway grades with a small load and the A/C on without downshifting. There are certain minimum thrust requirements in top gear, and when you have a small engine optimized for top-end and not low-end, gearing must remain on the short side. The result is a fundamentally compromised engine that must turn higher RPM on the highway, and with greater levels of friction than your normal 2.0L engine. Greater power can be produced, but ONLY at very high RPMs, and as a result the power is not always easily accessible during normal driving, AND with a huge cost in efficiency.

Witness Exhibit A, the "rev-up" and non rev-up versions of Honda's K20A DOHC i-VTEC engine, as seen in the Acura RSX.

RSX: 2.0L: 155 hp @ 6500 rpm, 139 lb-ft @ 4000 rpm, 9.8:1 CR, regular fuel, 27/34 mpg
RSX-S 2.0L: 201 hp @ 7800 rpm, 140 lb-ft @ 7000 rpm, 11.0:1 CR, premium fuel, 23/31 mpg

So yeah, rev-up VTEC engines can make big power and big HP/L out of a smallish engine, but not without penalties. City mileage drops by 4 mpg, and highway mileage drops by 3 mpg. The rev-up engine does manage to produce 1 lb-ft more rated torque, but look at what they had to do to pull that off? Compression is bumped from 9.8 to 11.0:1, and premium fuel is also required. If you did the same to the non rev-up engine it would probably have a good 145-148 lb-ft of torque.

The problems with turbocharging back in the day was that for one, turbochargers were still relatively primitive. In order to produce any meaningful power you needed to use larger turbos which were very laggy and would result in poor response. Also, to fight off detonation a lower static compression ratio was needed, but the result of this was poor thermal efficiency and reduced mileage. On top of that, turbos added to the cost of the engine, added weight, and also added reliability concerns. Yes they did give you torque, but laggy torque with delayed engine response. Aside from engines like the 2JZ-GTE with its trick twin-sequential turbo system which was enormously expensive to produce and and had huge packaging constraints, one could argue very well and probably successfully that a high-revving naturally aspirated VTEC engine was "superior" and the most advanced form of engine design.

But that was 15 YEARS AGO

Technology does not stand still, folks. Scientists and engineers are always finding new ways of doing things, trying to figure out how to overcome the obstacles of engine design, and the end result - how to offer the maximum power possible while consuming the least fuel doing it. Whoever does that best wins.

So a big problem with turbocharged engines in the past has been poor part-load efficiency, and resulting poor fuel economy vs a naturally aspirated engine. This is due to low static compression ratios in the 8:1 range, and the fact that laggy turbos back in the day would not stay spooled at lower cruise RPMs. So now your smallish engine suffers from not only a lack of boost, but also a low compression ratio, and you still have your minimum thrust requirements to meet. The solution? Gear that puppy up to higher RPMs. Of course now you're paying double for your efficiency hit since now you're in a higher friction state also.

The solution: direct injection technology, better knock sensors, better cooling systems, and better turbos. If you can significantly increase the knock limit of the engine, you can raise your compression ratio back up and recover your thermal efficiency. A BIG help in this department comes with direct injection, which sprays fuel at extremely high pressure directly into the cylinders rather than through port injectors at lower pressure through the intake manifold. Since high pressure fuel is extremely COLD, you get a cooling effect with the intake air which is hot from the turbo, and now you have significantly more knock resistance. You can raise the CR back up, and also crank the ignition timing back up as well. Better knock sensors allow you a little bit more margin as well, and better cooling systems do the same. Modern turbochargers have advanced by leaps and bounds vs 15 years ago too. They're significantly ligher, are much lower inertia, bearing technology has advanced significantly, manufacturing tolerances are much tighter, and reliability has been improved significantly as well. There are also variable nozzle and variable pitch turbos out there which increase their flexibility and operating range.

So now you have an incredibly knock resistant engine that can be equipped with a modern "high-tech" turbocharger (variable or not) that will spool extremely quickly and have minimal if any lag, yet still has enough capacity to flow at the top-end to give good peak horsepower.

Witness Exhibit B: The VW/Audi 2.0T FSI (Audi A3), vs the rev-up K20 (Acura RSX-S)

A3 2.0T FSI: 200* hp @ 5100 rpm, 207* lb-ft @ 1800 rpm, 10.0:1 CR, premium fuel, 3263 lbs, 24/32 mpg
RSX-S K20: 201 hp @ 7800 rpm, 140 lb-ft @ 7000 rpm, 11.0:1 CR, premium fuel, 2840 lbs, 23/31 mpg

* Like most German power ratings these are a tad conservative, by maybe 10-20 hp/tq in this case as per stock chassis dynos

Both of these engines have roughly equal peak horsepower, but note that the 2.0T FSI engine only needs to rev to 5100 rpm vs 7800 rpm for the Honda. There is significantly less friction at 5100 rpm in a 2.0L I-4 than there is at 7800 rpm in the Honda, so therefore the 2.0T FSI will make its 200 hp more efficiently than the Honda. But this is really just getting warmed up. Look a the torque. Not only does the 2.0T make far more of it, but it occurs at a much lower RPM too. At 60 mph in top gear the Acura is running about 2900 rpm and has about 70 hp available. To produce that much power in the 2.0T, it only needs to be just past the spool point, or about 1800 rpm, over 1000 rpm less. This means that the 2.0T can be geared much higher, set to run at a much lower RPM, and hence lower friction and higher overall efficiency. Straight from engineering textbooks, internal combustion engines operate at peak efficiency at relatively high loads and low RPMs. The 2.0T engine allows this state of operation much better than the Honda does since maintaining lower RPMs (and lower friction levels) is easier due to its superior torque response. And what do you think will happen if you suddenly nail the accelerator at 2500 rpm in the 2.0T vs the Acura? In the 2.0T you'll get a nearly instantaneous surge of torque and acceleration and no need for a downshift at all. In the Acura, absolutely nothing will happen and you're not going anywhere without at least one, or perhaps two downshifts. And despite all of the extra power, and the 2.0T engine being installed in a significantly heavier car to the tune of 400 lbs, it STILL manges better fuel economy than the Acura too, by 1 mpg overall. That is astounding. Since both of these are 2.0L I-4 engines also, packaging advantages of the smaller engine physical size is also retainedAnd of course the 2.0T FSI is a Ward's 10 Best Engine this year because of this outstanding performance through both state of the art technology and just plain GOOD DESIGN. There is not a single Honda engine on the Ward's 10 Best Engines list for 2006, however. Their time has passed.

Honda is not stupid. They know they've been had, and that's precisely why they came out with this 4-cylinder turbocharged engine. There is no way to make a "rev-up" K24 engine either, at least not from the factory, and with factory reliability that they could warranty. But now the problem is that Honda has arrogantly been talking so much smack for the past 15 years that they've now become two-faced liars. We don't NEED higher displacement, and we don't NEED turbochargers to achieve high performance and high fuel mileage. Our high revving naturally aspirated engines with VTEC will meet or exceed your engines' performance without any of that stuff. And now now they've had to eat their own words too. There is also the perception problem by Honda fans. Honda has been preaching the same line for 15 years, and people have been believing the same thing for 15 years. But times change, and technologies change too. VTEC was state of the art 15 years ago, but NOT today. And now their fans simply do not know what to believe anymore. if Honda was not arrogantly talking so much smack as if nobody would ever one-up them, they would not be having this perception problem that they're having. Heck, even BMW's Valvetronic system blows Honda right out of the water too. Honda has been arrogant and lazy and the cost of that is that now they're behind and playing catch-up.

Although if you go to the Honda forums you'll see the fanboi/apologist crowd working overtime trying to spin that as honda intentionally "holding back" their engines. Yeah. Right. The problem is that they generally do not understand engine design and just don't know any better, but Honda does (hence an I-4 turbo), and I do too. So the good news is that Honda is finally starting to make "high-tech" modern engines again (and turbocharging is a big part of that for 4-cylinder engines), but not without silently admitting defeat on their long era of high-revving NA engines. Except to see this I-4 turbo in a lot of future products also. Perhaps a "TSX Type-S/R" and maybe a high-end Civic, among other cars too.

STIG

Hey Steve, did you write all those? WOW!

STIG

Wal-Mart knows how to do the business.

SteVTEC

BTW I disagree completely with the notion that "4-cylinder cannot be luxury". Audi had a lot of success with the 1.8T engine, and now with the 2.0T FSI as well. Are you going to say that Audi is not luxury? These were Ward's 10 Best engines too, some of the finest engines in the world. Mercedes also had a C230 Kompressor which was a 2.3L, and later a 1.8L 4-cylinder. These cars are fairly popular also, and I've driven one in Europe, an E200 Kompressor. It was incredibly quiet and also fairly torquey also. Although the earlier 2.3L version from what I understood was very noisey and harsh. I don't think this engine ever won any awards, but it gets the job done.

And the argument that 4-cyl cannot be luxury assumes falsely that most people actually care, and know what the hell an engine is in the first place. Do you really think even HALF of BMW owners understand what an Inline-6 engine is and what makes it special? Yeah right. What about Audi owners? Do you think the majority of them understand the difference between a boosted I-4 and a small V-6? Nope. My wife does now know or understand a single thing about engines. The only thing she cares about is if the power is there or not, and that the engine doesn't sound like it's going to explode while doing it. And this is typical. Only us gearhead enthusiasts which are the vast minority of the automotive buying public have even the slightest clue about engines.

Mike, you are using this argument to attack Acura because it's very clear that you don't care for them, and I just don't buy it. If the manufacturers focus groups and market research showed that customers perceived 4-cylinders as a serious issue to being "luxury" or not the manufacturers would not offer them. But it's not, they can, and they do. The TSX performs very competitively with the 2.4L 4-cylinder and the 6MT. And in fact its biggest problem with the automatic is not the engine but rather the GEARING. The gearing of that car for that engine is flat out sub-optimal (to put it mildly). There is plenty of room to shorten up that gearing a TON, or make it a 6AT, and nobody would be complaining about performance. I still cannot figure out why Acura would gear that car so poorly, but they did. So you can go ahead and attack them on that and I will have no argument. That they are "not luxury" because they could not spend the money needed to retool their 5spd automatic to give decent performance in the TSX.

STIG

point very well made. i agree with you. I like to see the arguments with the facts backing up rather than otherwise.

SteVTEC

Yes, and I forgot to mention that the 2.0T FSI engine is still going to be a bit heavier though. A turbocharged engine is generally about 100 lbs heavier than a naturally aspirated one, and that's a lot of weight on the front of the car messing up the balance. There is the turbo itself, its associated plumbing, and I'm pretty sure the VW/Audi engine is also an iron block vs aluminum. You don't NEED to have an iron block with boost, but it's in the best interest in terms of durability, especially if you plan on modding. Note that BMW also went from a 3.0 NA magnesium alloy block to a regular aluminum block with the 3.0 TT. Magnesium is extremely light, but not strong enough to handle boost on that engine.

So the 2.0T FSI can still keep most of the packaging advantages of a physically small engine, but not all of the weight advantages. The Honda crowd can still claim having the best balance.

Edit: http://www.roadandtrack.com/assets/d...data_panel.pdf

A Civic Si vs a VW GTI both have 61/39 weight dist. So even though the VW engine is definitely heavier, you can design the car with that in mind and still maintain balance. Of course they may have compromised something else though, like interior space, or only god knows what. Nothing is for free in engineering. To get something, you must give up somewhere else. Speaking of which, with direct injection and a turbocharger that Vdub engine will also be more expensive to produce. The Vdub has a starting price that's $2000 more than the Si. Technology ain't cheap either. And that opens up the game for the domestic crowds to argue. No they don't always have all the whiz-bang technology, but they do have simple GOOD engine designs that are big, NOT inefficient (an LS2 V8 gets 28 mpg hwy with 400hp/tq), and don't need all of that "junk". How else do you think they get 300-400 hp V8 engines for less than $30k?

GFerg

TLe2006

the center console looks busy. I like how it looks so far under disguise.

bitkahuna

iTrader: (20)

Agreed on both points.

GSteg

iTrader: (15)

It does look busy. I still cant grow over the steering wheel though. It looks cheezy to me.

At least those 100+ buttons are available for those who dont like the i-drive systems in BMWs

For some reason, that color scheme and design screems "mercedes benz" to me. I like it

GFerg

The dashboard design reminds me of the Volvo XC90 except with a ton more wood trim and buttons.

The steering wheel is the exact wheel used in the Civic and now RDX. I guess its going to be the new company steering wheel.

Not sure if I am going to like that grill.

Edison_Chen

You guyz are right the dash is filled with buttons. It looks very complicated.

STIG

these guys are drinking too much red bull. that's a good sign that acura engineers are working hard for this car. I am liking what I am seeing here even tho, i cant really see much.