New to cars - need lots of info

[Filter]

Hi, I've always been interested in cars. I love how they sound, hearing that roar of a tuner or of a classic car; ever since I was little. In a few months, I will be buying my first car. I currenty only have a permit, and will have my license in a couple of months. What I hope to do, is learn a lot about cars, the parts, learn about engines, modding cars, etc. What I want is information from you guys, and I will look around, search for FAQ's, read posts, ask questions, etc. I want to learn as much as I can about cars so when the time comes I will be able to mod my car. I plan on getting a used honda CRX between the years 88-91.

I want you guys to help me out and in this thread give me very basic information about cars. I don't know a whole lot about them. I need to learn about engines and how they work, what makes them go faster, etc. Once again, please give me some of the very basic information about cars. I will go from there, I love leaning, especially about cars.

I'm also currently in high school, fresmen, and will be taking some classes in school to also better educate myself. I'm also am a graphic artist, and have been making graphics for about 3 years now. If you need a sig, avatar, or even a car logo, let me know .

Thank you.

[curtis73]

Ok, some basic performance stuff.

An engine is an air pump that makes power as a byproduct. Since the engine is an air pump, allowing it to flow more air will help; cold air intake, header, exhaust. Also, since a larger air pump moves more air, it has the potential to make more power. Displacement is your friend. Why? To get an engine to make more power, you have to confine its power to higher in the RPMs. For example, if you have a street engine that makes its best power between 2000 and 5000 rpms, to get it to make lots more power it will only make that power between 4000 and 6000, meaning you have to rev it 2000 rpms more before you feel it. That's fine on a race engine that stays between 4000 and 6000 all the time, but on the street where you have to use that idle to 4000 range 90% of the time its frustrating. That's a pitfall most young import guys don't understand. Using a larger engine means you can make more power without having to rev any higher than that nice streetable 2000-5000 range. Sure you can get 100 more hp with cams and heads, but if you can't get to it, the car could actually be slower.

Another way to get better street power is to use forced induction like turbo or supercharging. They're expensive, but what they're doing is forcing more air into a smaller engine. The net result is that its almost the same as using a larger engine.

An engine makes two types of output; torque and horsepower. They are very difficult to understand, but torque is twisting force. Its what overcomes inertia and gets the car moving. Horsepower is a function of how quickly that torque is being applied. So at higher revs, you get more hp. Letting the engine breathe is what lets it make more power. The secret is, not putting so much focus on HP and forgetting that it can negatively affect the torque in the lower RPMs like I was talking about.

As you learn, you'll find one big truth... more is not better, correct is better. That goes for all things automotive. More suspension stiffness isn't better, the proper spring rate is best for handling. More intake or more exhaust isn't better, correct is best.

There will always be this argument between old farts and tunerz. We older guys really don't detest rice rockets, we just can't stand it when young punks put a wing and a buzzing exhaust on their civic and claim they are better than a V8. I challenge you to be an embassador of import performance. Do it right. Don't think stickers and 5" exhaust, think Evo and STI. That's real performance. I'm 34 and I have nothing but respect for a well-tuned, properly modified import, but I have nothing but contempt for uneducated ricers thinking a wing and a sticker is hot stuff.

You'll get laid more too if you have the fast car instead of the fast-looking car.

[Filter]

Thank you, that helped a lot. I've never really understood an engine, I know that it makes power and you need it to make the car run, but now I understand A LOT more about it, and it's basically just a huge intake so the car will run. And what you are saying is precisely what I am going to do. I'm not in it so I can buy a nice muffler that makes my car sound nice, and have a couple of stickers in my lower left hand corner of the car and say that my car is good, and then when I go to the track and race, it sucks, but sounds like a nice car. I want to HAVE a nice car, not just cover it up with a nice car sound, and some tickers and a nice paint job. It's the car being good itself.

Thank you again. I will be on this website A LOT looking around, searching, and finding out info about cars.

And what IS RPM? I know revolutions per minute, but I've never understood what RPM does and how it works.

[curtis73]

Here is a link that will get you started: http://auto.howstuffworks.com/engine.htm

Then another that will help explain horsepower: http://auto.howstuffworks.com/horsepower.htm

The engine has a crankshaft that spins. RPMs simply tells you how many times per minute it makes one complete spin. 2000 RPMs just means that every minute, the crankshaft has made 2000 revolutions.

[Filter]

Alright, but why is RPM important? What makes 2000 RPM better than 5000 RPM? More spins = more power (tire spins?)?

And I just finished that article, and now I feel like I acutally know info about cars. 2 cylinders = 1 liter, diffferent types of engines and how they work, engine cooling, turbo and superchargers, what mufflers do and how they help, etc.

Thank a lot for helping me out.

[curtis73]

RPM is important in two main ways; 1) engines breathe only enough air to support up to a certain RPM. THe higher the RPM the more air it ingests. Imagine breathing through a straw, you'll only be able to support a certain amount of breath. Then switch to a 2" tube and you can breathe alot faster. So, in many engines, airflow is what restricts top RPM. 2) if you rev it too fast, things blow up. The pistons will literally break off the rods and the engine will self-detruct from the inside out.

Every time you get a combustion event inside the cylinder, the engine is providing power. In a 4-cylinder engine at 2000 rpms you have 4000 combustion events per minute. At 5000 rpms you have 10,000 combustion events per minute. Higher revs means more fuel releasing its energy as power per minute. So, what happens is, more revs mean more power, up until the point that things like the intake, heads, exhaust, and other internal parts start becoming a restriction to airflow. A power curve is bell-shaped. It starts at zero power at zero RPMs, then climbs to a peak (you'll often see horsepower numbers advertised as something like 150 hp @ 5500 rpm) and then it will drop off again above that peak because you're running into where airflow is restricted. So, one of the ways to make more power is uncork the airflow, but then you have to rev to (for instance) 6500 to get that power. You have to be sure the engine is capable of 6500 RPMs without exploding.

Thats a simple explanation, but you'll pick up more info as you go.

Also, not all 2-cylinder engines are 1-liter. The size of the piston and the stroke of the crankshaft can make nearly any displacement. I have a 2-cylinder engine in an old tractor that is an 8.2 liter.