<VV> 95s Vs. 110s

[Tony Underwood]

At 10:12 hours 03/08/2005, BobHelt at aol.com wrote:
>In a message dated 3/8/05 7:13:23 AM US Mountain Standard Time, 
>tonyu at roava.net writes:
>
>>I know about GM's hp plots and I
>>also know that they're not quite what they're cracked up to
>>be.   Aftermarket dyno pulls do NOT show the same data as GM's postings.
>
>
>
>****Oh, really? Aftermarket dyno tests are more accurate than GM data?  If 
>so, then show me the data. Let's see some proof.

I recall this topic being brought up in Communique articles... particularly 
the mention that a 140 engine actually makes around 120 hp and not 
140.    Real world horsepower tends to be not quite what the General 
claimed.    I relate back to my earlier comment about how an independent 
outfit blueprinted/rebuilt a 283 Chevy and dyno tested it on a MODERN 
dyno.   That 195 hp (factory rating) 283 would not produce 195 hp no matter 
what they did to it.    This was not a fly-by-night outfit, it was done by 
the engineering staff of a major automotive performance magazine, done in 
their contracted machine shop facilities.

Now:    How do we explain the discrepancy between measured power and GM's 
claims?

Likewise another test figure that got discussed, regarding the '60 vintage 
80 hp (factory rating) engine which was only able to manage 72 
hp?    Likewise the venerable 110 engine which could only manage around 100 
or so hp instead of its advertised 110 as rated by the General.


...sorry I can't post specific dyno pulls to demonstrate my point; I just 
read the data, didn't save it.    It wasn't all that important to "archive 
it away" at the time.

The only sure fire way to find out is to perform some genuine dyno 
tests  on several Vair engines and see once and for all just what they 
actually can produce in FACTORY trim.   No mods, no tweaks, just factory 
hardware in good working order, tested to the limits of what it can crank 
out.   It would be interesting to see some torque curve graph plots as 
well, particularly  on the 95 hp engine which sure seems to run better than 
the "official" factory specs would suggest.



>>The cars get driven all the time... and I do have a fairly educated ass
>>here and I CAN feel the difference in seat of the pants driving.
>
>
>
>*****My, how scientific!  All yours are strictly subjective comments. Show 
>me the data.


...I can show you my hill... ;)


Seriously, the feel of the cars with the different engines *is* evident and 
you can tell them apart, particularly the 95 from the 110/140 *especially* 
in traffic conditions, particularly my hill.   And that's what I'm talking 
about, traffic and driveability issues when you end up working the engine 
in stop and go conditions.



>>   The 95 is smooth and responsive at low rpm
>>while the 110 feels twitchy and jerky particularly when lugging it in 3rd
>>gear in traffic.   No need to downshift the 95; it just pulls out.
>
>
>
>*****Maybe your 110 needs a tuneup.


C'mon Bob, you know me better than that.    I'm talking lugging an engine 
in slow traffic...  the 95 behaves better.



>>I've towed with both a 95 Vair and a 140 Vair.   Put an extra 800-1000 lbs
>>worth of trailer behind the car and *see* which engine feels better in
>>traffic.
>
>
>      ****traffic, Huh?  Sure, I'll give you that at speeds below about 30 
> mph. But how about highway speeds where the 110 pulls better?



*   *   *         Bob:

My *entire point* is about which engine behaves better in loaded conditions 
in *Traffic*, stop and go driving with some load behind it... starting out 
at a stoplight at the base of a hill and having to climb from a sitting 
start... that sort of thing.

It's no contest which engine will pull out more smoothly and briskly in 
such an instance; the 95 shines here.    Every time I approach my house 
this is demonstrated... the house sits atop a respectable hill with  a 
rather steep approach, a hard pull in 2nd gear for most anything that 
approaches it.    It is *particularly* evident when there's an 800 lb 
trailer loaded up with a couple of Vair engines and transaxles behind the 
car with that 95 hp engine starting up that hill.

After all, I gotta go up that hill to get to the house...   and ten miles 
of city traffic awaits me each time I come back from Richard Durham's place 
after liberating various Vair driveline parts such as engines, transaxles 
etc....  need to go back down there again when the weather breaks, get some 
more stuff while the "getting is still good".

I've also used a Vair to flat-tow several other Vairs back and forth, when 
in a pinch and the truck wasn't available or practical for whatever 
reason.   And when you *Are* pulling a heavy trailer behind a Corvair 
coming up hills and starting/stopping in traffic, that unscientific 
seat-of-the-pants feel for the vehicle's performance will certainly make 
itself evident.

Now:

I'll wager that not a lot of people are radical enough to actually in this 
day and age use a Vair for towing a trailer or another Vair... (other 
obvious examples such as a certain beige station wagon need not be 
mentioned here),   This means that most people into Vairs today haven't 
experienced using a Vair as a working tow vehicle.   I have.   And if I had 
my 'druthers I'll pick a 95 hp for towing around town ANY day.   That, and 
preferably a Powerglide auto...  such as what's in the Lakewood as we 
speak.   Hell, I might even get frisky and incorporate a trans cooler ala 
Tech Guide along the way.   Churning a torquey 95 hp engine against the 
converter while pulling that trailer through traffic and up the hills is 
gonna make the sort of heat that the existing PG might not appreciate.

Smitty might have some input here since he's no doubt had some heat issues 
of his own to deal with when hauling that trailer of his up and down the 
mountains.



>>   There was even something in a
>>Communique article (IIRC) about how a 140 engine only managed ~120 dyno'ed
>>hp in real world figures...  which means GM fudged 20 hp out of it.   This
>>was some years ago (anybody recall?).
>
>
>
>*****Shows how the memory can confuse things. The 140 hp engine only 
>developed 109-112 SAE net horsepower, not 120.


Keep in mind that I wasn't talking about NET hp.   I was talking about the 
actual brake horsepower that the 140 engine produced as measured by 
aftermarket resources according to the standards used at that time, NOT any 
net rating.    I am well aware of the differences between the unfettered 
BHP and SAE measurements.   I was talking about an independent shop which 
had done a story on a build-up of a Vair engine and had tested a 140hp 
engine and found the figures lacking a tad  from the factory 
specs.    Again, sorry I have no stats to show... it was a car magazine I 
read about 20 or so years ago that belonged to another club member.    The 
magazine was old then, dated from the late 1960s as I recall.    Still, it 
had lots of fascinating data that I read with much interest.


>The difference between 140 and 112 represents the difference between gross 
>and net horsepower, SAE corrected. See the GM 140 Engine Test Report 
>available from Clarks for the data.

...which puts us back to GM's engine stats again.   Just how accurate are 
those figures?

Reminds me again of the early-mid '60s 327 F.I. engine which was rated at 
375hp which I always thought was a fantasy to begin with.  Turns out it 
actually made about 35 hp less than that on any HONEST dyno of the day, and 
the carb'ed "365" hp 327 would outrun it on a dragstrip any day, proven 
again and again time and again.   What's more, it's very likely that the 
"365" hp variant also made nowhere near an honest 365 BHP... and again I've 
driven a 'Vette with such an engine as well as other 'Vettes with different 
engines...  just doesn't add up to GM's claims.

It's my opinion that some of these claims and output plots were as much for 
advertising as they were for "tech" purposes.    Later, the trend went the 
other way, with manufacturers sandbagging on outputs (so as to avoid 
insurance penalties) like on the Chevy L-88 427 and Chrysler's 426 Hemi and 
Ford's SCJ 428, all under-rated.


Frankly, I'd rather see a dyno pull that I can watch, rather than look at 
some specs that somebody calculated with a computer program based on old vs 
new standards without ever actually putting an engine on a dyno.    Some 
current day performance magazine tech sorts do this, using sophisticated 
programs which are touted as being "very accurate" but once the car hits 
pavement it becomes another issue.

What did the engines actually produce?   Who really knows?

AGAIN:

I'd like to see ANY dyno specs, HONEST specs done on a Corvair engine which 
were measured by an outside agency, and not rely upon some 40 year old GM 
publication.  We've already seen demonstrated that some of those GM specs 
simply don't add up right on the money... close enough for "government 
work" as the military might say, but it's lacking a bit for the nitpickers 
which frequent this list, myself included.   I'd truly be interested in 
seeing what the various Vair engines *actually* produce on a modern dyno 
under controlled conditions... and THEN compare the results.

It's hard to know what to believe and what not to believe when it's a 
subjective measurement printed on a piece of paper.


>>Now:  If the 95 is such an "inferior" engine, why the Hell was it built in
>>the first place?   And why do so many people I know like it for pulling
>>stuff?
>
>
>
>****Well, the 95 was the low cost entry engine.


...are you saying that the 95 engine cost less to build than a 
110...?    It usually got included with a 3-speed gearbox with a wide gap 
between the gears, which is where the broad torque curve of the 95 came in 
handy.   It would pull well without requiring an extra gear and closer 
ratios to lessen the period between shifts so as to exploit a narrower 
powerband that more ambitions cam timing would bring.    The 95 didn't 
*need* a 4-speed.   So, if cheap was the issue, then one could say that the 
3-speed gearbox was indeed cheaper than the 4-speed.   And a buck is a 
buck.   But the engine itself was no cheaper than a 110 to manufacture.


>It was the standard engine. The 110 and 140 engines were extra cost


The 140 cost more to build, granted... it had additional hardware on 
it.   The 110 would have cost no more to manufacture than a 95 since the 
only differences between the two engines was cam timing, combustion chamber 
volume, and distributor curve.   There must have been another reason for GM 
to have gone to the trouble to produce the 95 hp other than "cost"... 
unless of course we look at the notion that it existed solely as a reason 
to charge more money for the 110 engine...?    We *are* working with 
beancounters here so that wouldn't have really surprised me much.


>premium performance engines.    Nobody said that the 95 was an "inferior" 
>engine.



...I believe you said:

>the 110 is so superior to the 95 that
>there was hardly any reason for the 95, except as a low cost leader for
>Chevrolet


...yet it should have cost no more to assemble a 110 than a 95.   And GM 
made a *bunch* of 95 engines.   Why would they, if it was so inferior to 
the 110?   Why not just use the 110 for everything?


>Just the the 110 engine was superior in most respects.


But not for what I'll be using it for... and I'd still argue that point 
about "in most respects".   The 95 got no respect even though it did (and 
does) perform quite well.   It still to this day offers advantages that the 
110 doesn't contribute.   That is why I want a 95 in that Lakewood.


>>By the way...  that ~1600 "half-throttle" rpm stall speed of a Vair PG is
>>right where the 95 has its torque advantage and that lower rpm torque
>>continues up through 3000 rpm, just right for accelerating in and out of
>>traffic on the main throughfares... and for pulling a load behind it... and
>>it does it while burning regular gas.
>>
>>*****Not according to GM. Their data shoes 110 hp engine produces more 
>>torque than the 95 at speeds OVER 1600 rpm.


But loaded against a converter at the bottom of that hill with a trailer 
behind you, the 95 engine still pulls out better.   How does this get 
explained?   And why does the 95 seem so much more tractable in traffic and 
stop and go driving?


For years and years I'd been up and down that hill to my house in just 
about every sort of Vair imaginable except an Ultravan, with just about 
every engine combo/transaxle available.   There are "educated guesses" and 
there are *educated evaluations*.   The stronger pull of the 95 engines 
coming up that hill was no guess and not my imagination.


Last comment:

I have NO doubt or argument that the 110 engine is BETTER on the open roads 
and highways at highway speeds, particularly for passing power at 70 
mph.    And, as Smitty mentioned, it can make more horsepower at highway 
speeds if you're pulling a slab-faced box behind you and you need more of 
that 3500 rpm range torque to get you up Christiansburg Mountain on I-81 
without getting run down from behind by a Ford Excursion driven by a 115 lb 
woman with an ego problem.

But not everybody spends all their time driving on the open 
road.   Sometimes it's 10-15 miles through downtown or in congested traffic 
just to try and get to where you need to go.   THAT is where the 
flexibility of the 95's low end power comes into play and that's why I 
appreciate the engine, not for what it can't do but for what it does do, 
and does well.



tony..