Puny Little Horses

[Tom]

The next (erratically timed) newsletter will be out tomorrow, so setting up this thread for people to complain, praise, shrug, comment, rant, hijack, and/or generally carry on about it.

[dr bob]

Following on to the newsletter theme --

Two different cars with identical 135 horsepower ratings. Both 2 liter engines, both turbocharged. One a flat-4, one an inline-4. One from Japan, one from Europe. Similar weight too.

The European car had mighty Swedish horses dragging it along. Cruises very comfortably at 90+. Did even better after some engine management changes and a slightly bigger turbocharger. The other struggled to cruise at 70, and was really busy doing it. It actually struggled to exceed 70 at all if there were hills or even wind. It's strong suit was slogging through snow. Puny Subaru ponies.

I did a little work with an Italian red-car company in the 1980's, on combustion management and their need to get cars to pass California's stringent emissions requirements. The Cali-compliant versions struggled under the emissions restrictions. Mighty Italian horses on a hood badge humbled into whimpering ponies. Owners would remove all the add-on pieces, and import grey-market heads and cams in an effort to bring at least some of the performance back.

US cars were similarly hobbled. Porsche suffered some pretty serious market damage when forced to add thermal chambers to the heads and exhaust to try and manage tailpipe HC. Crazy engine management settings to meet NOx cramped the normally fierce German horses, and caused a bunch of failures in heads and head studs. Anybody remember?

Better electronic engine management has certainly helped make mighty horses possible again. Of course, all of this pales in the face of the electric supercars efforts. Mighty torque numbers dominate marketing these days.

[blueline]

Another fun-to-read newsletter Tom! As always, your words bring a smile and maybe some timely perspective, things we could all likely benefit from.

[bigdstwinturbo]

Thank you, once again, Tom for putting a smile on my face with your regular, as always eagerly anticipated, eloquent reflections. I think that the last time the car industry was remotely realistic regarding labeling and power output was when Citroen made their “2CV”. For the less informed non-polyglots: “2CV” stands for “deux cheveaux”, which means “two horses”, alluding to its power and which was about right.

[V951S]

@Tom I always look forward to, and enjoy your intro storyline to each email.

"These days, horses are found mainly in romance novels and climate-controlled wellness stables. Ask a horse to plow a field in 2026, and it will go straight to HR."

The wry humor gets me laughing out loud. Keep 'em coming.

[JasonLP]

Good one