what's enough BHP?

[boholoblanka]

Afternoon all

Ive pulled the trigger on a Suzuki Across PHEV, which is a Toyota Rav 4 in all but name. Its over 300bhp which to me is a lot, but some of the heads I work with were saying its not really considering weight etc. And they may have a point. Now it is swift I must say, especially off the line.

what's the consensus here? is this a decent level of power? Im going from a 140bhp Prius plus so I don't really have a frame of reference

[Truckosaurus]

Power, schmower. It is torque what matters

Also, for the car in question is it really '300bhp' or is it a 200bhp ICE and a 100bhp electric motor, but in reality neither engine is producing max power at the same time?

[GT03ROB]

300bhp in most things is more than adequate.

People will be along & tell me I’m talking nonsense, but really it is very adequate

[E63eeeeee...]

It's apparently 6 seconds 0-60. I reckon you'll be fine. It'll be faster than the Prius. 300bhp is more than enough for all driving situations unless you like to drive like a knobhead, in which case it's more than enough for 98% of driving situations.

[LasseV]

boholoblanka said:

Afternoon all

Ive pulled the trigger on a Suzuki Across PHEV, which is a Toyota Rav 4 in all but name. Its over 300bhp which to me is a lot, but some of the heads I work with were saying its not really considering weight etc. And they may have a point. Now it is swift I must say, especially off the line.

what's the consensus here? is this a decent level of power? Im going from a 140bhp Prius plus so I don't really have a frame of reference

300 hp is more than enough i would say. I have 275hp car and it does offer more performance for road what you can realistically use.

[coldel]

Power to weight ratio is more important. 180bhp in an Elise is very much more than adequate!

[Xcore]

Bhp/tonne is the only metric that matters

[E63eeeeee...]

Xcore said:

Bhp/tonne is the only metric that matters

Not really. If you do lots of motorway driving, for example, power and drag become more relevant. This is why different cars are useful in different situations and we don’t all drive around in 180bhp Elises.

[Sporky]

In answer to the thread title, all of them.

[cerb4.5lee]

Weight definitely plays a big part I reckon. 300bhp in a TVR will feel pretty decent, whereas 300bhp in something that weighs 2000kg not so much. If you have a heavy car then you also need plenty of torque as well I reckon.

I have 1 car with 425bhp-406Ib/ft torque weighing 1600kg(0 to 60 in 4.1 seconds) and that always feels quick and up for it to me. Whereas I also have a car with 330bhp-270Ib/ft torque weighing 1600kg(0 to 60 in 5.5 seconds) and that doesn't feel quite as up for it in comparison obviously. I also have a car with 330bhp-516Ib/ft weighing 2300kg(0 to 60 in 5.7 seconds), and while it isn't slow...it never really feels very fast to me.

[coldel]

E63eeeeee... said:

Xcore said:

Bhp/tonne is the only metric that matters

Not really. If you do lots of motorway driving, for example, power and drag become more relevant. This is why different cars are useful in different situations and we don’t all drive around in 180bhp Elises.

My VX220 kept up with a C63 going for it on the motorway, the in gear acceleration was marginal in difference.

The benefit to not driving an Elise on the motorway has nothing to do with power and everything do with your spine not being rattled down to its component parts

[cerb4.5lee]

coldel said:

Power to weight ratio is more important.

Xcore said:

Bhp/tonne is the only metric that matters

I'm another one who thinks that this makes a big difference to how a car feels performance wise as well.

[E63eeeeee...]

coldel said:

E63eeeeee... said:

Xcore said:

Bhp/tonne is the only metric that matters

Not really. If you do lots of motorway driving, for example, power and drag become more relevant. This is why different cars are useful in different situations and we don’t all drive around in 180bhp Elises.

My VX220 kept up with a C63 going for it on the motorway, the in gear acceleration was marginal in difference.

The benefit to not driving an Elise on the motorway has nothing to do with power and everything do with your spine not being rattled down to its component parts

Yeah, there are lots of reasons for picking different cars. As for your VX220 it probably has about half the frontal area of a C63, so as mentioned drag is a factor. A 900kg c-class with 200bhp would fare less well at speed.

[coldel]

E63eeeeee... said:

Yeah, there are lots of reasons for picking different cars. As for your VX220 it probably has about half the frontal area of a C63, so as mentioned drag is a factor. A 900kg c-class with 200bhp would fare less well at speed.

The key is at speed, normal A road driving averaging 60mph I would be surprised if it mattered that much. I would think any car with a 200bhp per tonne is going to be going along at a fair rate and the aero difference at 60mph is going to be negligible.

Might have to go off and google this one, worth a 10 minute browse.

[JonDerz]

It will depend on what you’ve driven.
Everyone will have different opinions on what’s fast or not depending on their experiences.

[coldel]

Interesting that there isnt much in the way of comparing the impact of drag coefficient, side by side testing (although if you sit and do the maths I am sure you can work it out) but what I did find is that the VX220 drag coeffecient is around 0.36 which is generally accepted as higher than a C class mercedes. The most modern c class apparently has a 0.26 coefficient only bested by a Tesla!

[superlightr]

JonDerz said:

It will depend on what you’ve driven.
Everyone will have different opinions on what’s fast or not depending on their experiences.

yep.

had various Caterham 7's very quick to 60 mid 3secs but getting to 120 it was shacking itself apart !!
E63AMG Very quick everywhere !
911 turbo's Insane quick everywhere ! 182mph on a vmax day.
LR Defender very slow anywhere except in the mud
RS6 - fast even when towing the caravan !

[ziggy328]

I've been lucky enough to have had quite a few cars over the last 20 years - my current plastic car "feels" way quicker than it probably is - so I agree on BHP/ton as a good measure, but I also think their is a feeling element to it as well. As an example, I've never been a biker, been on the pillion once - fk me, 30 mph felt like 120!! Never again.

[cerb4.5lee]

JonDerz said:

It will depend on what you’ve driven.
Everyone will have different opinions on what’s fast or not depending on their experiences.

Totally agree. I think the OP will really enjoy the uplift from 140bhp to 300bhp for sure.

I remember going from 72bhp in the 1988 Metro 1275 Sport, to 150bhp in the 1989 Sierra XR4x4 and I was over the moon with the uplift in performance. Even though the XR4x4 was the much heavier car.

[FamousPheasant]

I agree with approx 300bhp for a normal, sub 1800kg, car for daily driving. I found 500bhp overkill for UK roads and not that fun after a while.

For a fun 2nd car,I'm firmly in the less is more camp - with weight being the key rather than big power.