Hp (Horsepower)

"Yeah, this car has 675HP, and it accelerates so quickly, sometimes I wonder whether I should start it on 3rd gear"


If you're anything like me, you'd want to slap this person in the face, for being stupid, annoying, and a showoff. You just can't deal with those people.
Also, if you were anything like me, you'd want to understand what he's talking about.
So here's a brief explanation of how horsepower (HP) works:

 1 horsepower = 745.699 watts

 This measure of energy was created by James Watt, when he created his steam engine, he needed to rate the capability of his engines somehow, and decided that the horses his engine was replacing would seem fitting, so he made the observation that a horse would (In a track) make around 144 around the circle in an hour, or about 2.4 per minute, for which the horse would need to travel with a force of about 180 feet per minute. 

"Watt rounded off the speed to 181 feet per minute and multiplied that by the 180 pounds of force the horse pulled (181 x 180) and came up with 32,580 ft.-lbs./minute. That was rounded off to 33,000 ft.-lbs./minute, the figure we use today."

 This figure, however, has been greatly disfigured by automotive companies, when  during the 60's, they began testing cars without important (And heavy) pieces of equipment to get higher torque during the benchmarks, and consequently, more horsepower.

 

 My car, Volkswagen Gol, with a 6 valve 1.6 engine, has an output of 101 hp.

Curious Facts:

Did you know that turning your air conditioning unit on your car actually drains your engine of power?

Did you know that the the most powerful car in the market out there is the  SSC Ultimate Aero TT with a power of 1180Hp, reaching 62 mph in 2.8 seconds, and reaching a speed of 270 mph (or 432 kmh)

Sources:

http://www.web-cars.com/math/horsepower.html 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horsepower

Let's talk videogames.

Hey everyone, how's it going?
Today we are talking videogames, I'm sorry, but I really need a break from cars.
More specifically, we are going to talk about Mass Effect 3, and how a lot of people seem to be up in arms against the game's ending, and how they were cheated from the promises that Bioware made to them.
I just don't believe that people should be so angry over this.

 

                                         ("Screw this, I'm going back to sleep")


Now, what I am going to argue here, isn't whether the ending is good or not, because frankly, I doubt anyone really cares enough to lose sleep over it. It's whether I think that ME3 delivered.

First of all, and to be look at things a bit more critically, the campaign is just massive, the amount of decisions to be made in this game are simply too many, and to be able to explore every decision may take hundreds of hours, and it should be taken into account, that each decision has its own consequences, and the ramifications of each dilemma are just HUGE, at least up until the last sections of the game.

 "Yeah, but the game ended horribly,  none of my decisions really accounted for any of the events that ended the story, and there is no difference between the endings except for the color of the explosion that destroys the universe"

Yes, and the ending IS a very important thing in ANY thing, be it a game, book, movie, or even song, and you pay to be wowed, but to change the ending that has already been written is completely unrealistic and to be honest, it defeats the purpose of the game.
The creators really are just artists, and it should be THEIR decision how they want to send their baby out. The same way in which an author, musician, script writer, or painter would wand to send theirs.
You bought the game, you liked it enough to play through it, but you hated the ending. Tough luck, buddy.

Differences between a diesel combustion engine and a regular petrol combustion engine.

 In today's ever-changing economy, choosing a car that not only suits all of your needs, but that also has a reliable mpg (mile per gallon) ratio can be a real pain, especially when there are such great differences in what you can buy.
One of the most important  many dilemmas you will encounter;
Should I get a gasoline engine, or should I go diesel?
 There are many differences between gasoline and diesel engines, and the quickest one we can notice is the price of filling up the fuel tank. Diesel is relatively cheaper to gas. But their differences run way deeper than that.
Here's an explanation of how a diesel engine works. (Please refer to my earlier


1.Intake stroke -- The intake valve opens up, letting in air and moving the piston down. ­
2.Compression stroke -- The piston moves back up and compresses the air.
3.Combustion stroke -- As the piston reaches the top, fuel is injected at just the right moment and ignited,   forcing the piston back down.
 4.Exhaust stroke -- The piston moves back to the top, pushing out the exhaust created from the combustion out of the exhaust valve.




Here's the site in which you can find and animated GIF file showing you more or less how it really works.


http://www.howstuffworks.com/diesel1.htm










 Here's a couple of advantages in having a diesel engine.
-Better mpg. (also, diesel is cheaper)
-Longer engine life. More durable engine. Where you would get 150k miles out of a petrol engine, you can get over 500k on a diesel engine. There's people with diesel trucks that are decades old, that are still committed to driving it until it dies.
-Stronger engines (You see a LOT more trucks with diesel engines.)
-Less harmful for the environment.
-And you get to brag to your friends how your car comes with a rear wheel drive setting.

Break-in period.

Now, what is engine redlining ?

Now we all know that when we first get a car, it is generally a bad idea to redline the engine.
You're not an F1 racer, redlining the engine is calling for trouble, as it not only puts serious strain of the engine (Doesn't mean instant engine failure, but increases the chance that your engine will fail over time)
but it messes with the transmission, and really, all sorts of different things, and over-revving can prove to be a very costly thing over time.
If you want to limit the power, and prevent serious damage to happen to the engine by accident (Or if you simply want to stop a brute and a savage like me from damaging your car (Have a son?))
Then you might do well to acquire a Rev Limiter (Pretty self explanatory name)

Here's one (Picture courtesy of google.com):

Over-revving, or redlining, is something that is an absolutely stupid thing to do, do NOT let anyone tell you otherwise.

It doesn't matter if modern cars come with computers to prevent such things from happening (Some modern cars have computers that will cut the passage of gas to the engine in order to prevent serious engine damage), chances are, if you're taking the car that far, then damage will come before the red line.

Here are some of the things you might damage, if you utilise engine braking, or redline your car.

-Transmission (Few grand to get repaired)
-Clutch (Probably about a grand)
-Engine (Whether it's a blown engine, or just burnt pistons, it's probably going to cost a couple of grand)
-Tires (Burnouts in lower-end cars require serious engine revving, on higher end cars it'll still require you to change tires a lot sooner than intended, especially if you do it often)

A clutch? (With pretty pictures and stuff)

How a car engine really works.

How many of you reading this actually knows how an engine really works?
Well, as of late I've been really curious, and with no previous knowledge I think I can explain more or less how an engine works, as well as what a break in period is.

First of all, let's look at the heart of the matter, the engine. (This post is going to be a rather long post, as I will try to explain how an engine really works in simple words, so excuse me, if my post exceeds 1000 words.)

This is an engine (More or less what MY car's engine looks like, not exactly it because this is VW Gol's from 2010.)

My car has a 1.6m^3 - 4 cylinder engine. What that means, is that my car has 4 piston rings, or, err, cylinders. (And 4 pistons, DUH.)
Now, WHAT IS a piston cylinder?

A representation of a piston cylinder in a combustion engine (Thanks to Brittanica encyclopedia for this post)

Now, you're going to notice that the bottom part of the cylinder (Most commonly referred to as the crankshaft.) works in a fashion so that when the crankshaft spins, it also sets the piston in motion.
Now, when the piston retracts, (Goes down.) the intake valve (Upper left of piston.) opens, and lets in a mixture of gasoline and air.
Now, once the piston goes all the way down, the intake valve closes, and the exhaust valve (Upper right of piston cylinder.) begins to open.
When the piston starts to generate pressure (As it begins to move upwards.) the spark plug ignites, creating an explosion, and generating what we call co^2.
This will be it for today, but I'll try to explain more about how this works in a different post, as this one is beginning to get long.
Please, stay tuned, and drive safely.

Introduction.

Today it is the first day I get to write my blog...Or rather, first TIME.

This blog is going to be about cars. Cars. CARS. CAARS.
One more time.
CAAAARRRRSSSS.

 This is my car(VWGol). Well, not mine exactly, as mine is a darker shade of gray, a lot less shiny, and it's falling to pieces already.
VW Gols are only sold in South America, it is the most sold car in South America.
My Gol already has 3300 miles. (Got it Nov 18, 2011)

 This is a clutch.

This used to be a clutch, until I got a hold of it.


I've burned through 3 clutches, and been into a fender bender.
I've raced with it a couple of times as well, but I will not go into too much detail with that because it might get me in trouble ;)

 Haven't really taken care of the break-in period, as I didn't believe it would be THAT important for the car, and after reading a few articles online I realized I should have been a little more gentle with the engine for at least the first 1000 miles. But hey, I'm being gentle now. Not taking it past 3k rpm, not going faster than 60 until I hit 8k miles.
Every once in a while I'll give it a little gas, just so that the car doesn't end up lethargic.
I'll post some pictures of me and my car in a while.
This blog is going to sort of document and monitor how my car reacts until I completely break it in , and after that as well. I want you to take into consideration that this is my first post, and it's just a brief introduction of what my posts are going to be like.



DISCLAIMER: All images in this post were taken from GOOGLE.COM   All credit for images goes to google.com.
 In the future I'll do my best to upload my own pictures.