How often do you redline your car ?

colm_mcm

Regularly - It happens in my normal driving

the picture of the car on the instrument panel was cutting edge in the late 80's.

unkel

Regularly - It happens in my normal driving

Gerry wrote:

I suspect this isn't an accurate representation of Irish drivers though.. most of them prefer to labour the engine, and are afraid of it exploding if its revved past 3k

Indeed. A quick guessculation would show that a 1.0 petrol car never going over 3k rpm will use not much more than 25-30BHP :eek:

dubtom

Every once in a while - Its good for it

My last 2 cars have been auto's, I wouldn't screw any car unless i was on a track.I find I can still speed if need be without the engine screaming. It seems to be the done thing now,exit the petrol station,tyres schreeching, tearing the b****x out of the pimped fiat uno. I didn't realise it was actually GOOD for the car,respect.:rolleyes:

OKenora

Every once in a while - Its good for it

LOL, can't redline mine, give her that much beans in 1st or 2nd gear and it simply kicks in traction control wasting your power, or screams the engine for no real reason other than it makes a lot of noise. 3rd to 4th change is best about 3000revs as well. With 100mph coming at 3000 revs in top gear I don't want to redline it there either.....0-60 is a good bit under 8 secs without ever crossing 4000 revs. In theory top speed is 166mph at redline, get me a long straight private road and a spare engine and I'll test it (probs only about 145-150 in real life)

For the "I always redline it" people, you do realise most cars have less power at the redline than just below it and redlining it in each gear is slower than changing a few revs earlier ? So screaming your engine is doing nothing but wearing it out quicker, change before redline for max power use to keep the car in it's power band and not simply at it's max revs. MAX REVS NOT EQUAL TO MAX POWER and it's power that accelerates you, revs simply limit the top speed.

It's like buying a bar of chocolate and only eating 75% of it in case the last 25% might make you sick!

But if you knew the last 25% would definitely make you sick, would you still eat it ? Thats the same as redlining all the time, it will make your car sick far quicker than a change 500 revs earlier.

Poll needs another choice anyway

OPTION: I never redline. my car has enough power to stay within power band without it.

Munurty

When it takes 18 seconds to get to 60mph and max power is at 5000rpm you need to rev a bit to get anywhere in a one litre:)

mik_da_man

OKenora wrote:

But if you knew the last 25% would definitely make you sick, would you still eat it ? Thats the same as redlining all the time, it will make your car sick far quicker than a change 500 revs earlier.

Well my car has a broken red line for a while before the solid one.
I hit that area most days.
However the solid red line is @ 7000 (ish) and I dont hit that
And I like choclate and I would prob chance eating the last 25%

OKenora wrote:

Poll needs another choice anyway

OPTION: I never redline. my car has enough power to stay within power band without it.

Well It's lucky for some who have high powered cars - Not all of us have that luxury

Mik

Gerry

Heh, people have different definitions of it. The redline is the end of the rev counter, as far as I'm concerned, that or revving the engine until the limiter cuts in.
Before this is the solid red part, and before that, the hatched red part.
The owners manual for my car says its ok to bring it into the hatched red part momentarily.

OKenora - yeah, theres no point in revving it as far as the limiter in most cases, as the power peak has passed.
I'm not sure the OP meant "do you rev the car as far as the rev limiter, every day" - moreso "do you rev the car nearly as far as it".
If you don't rev your car past 4k rpm, you aren't getting all the power out of it.

onemanband

My car has a cool system whereby the redline moves as the engine gets run in. Typically starts at 5,000 rpm when cold and takes about 5-6 mins to move up to 8,500 rpm.

Rarely gets redlined though.

l33t-krew

Regularly - It happens in my normal driving

hmm.

My definition of red lining is to take it up to where the cross hatching starts.

No need to go higher :cool: considering it starts red lining at 6000rpm:p

JHMEG

Gerry wrote:

theres no point in revving it as far as the limiter in most cases, as the power peak has passed.

Yeah, but, there'd be even more power lost by doing a gear change!;)

Try do 0-60mph going 1st-2nd, then try doing it upshifting slightly earlier and going 1st-2nd-3rd.

maidhc

All the time - In every gear.

Gerry wrote:

If you don't rev your car past 4k rpm, you aren't getting all the power out of it.

I bring my car up the red line occasionaly, but never when driving normally as it is little use doing so in a diesel.


For those who say that no harm can come of it I wish ye luck. Any machine is more prone to breaking when it is under stress, and a machine will be under more stress when it is being hammered. A newish car is probably well able to do it, but I wouldn't be doing it to a car that has a bit of work done. Its just about being sympathetic to the car.

blastman

I hardly ever redline (as in the end of the red or bounce off the limiter). But the redline in my car only starts at 8000rpm. It would be rude not to rev it, though, considering the fun starts at just over 5000 rpm!

RobAMerc

All the time - In every gear.

Gerry wrote:

Heh, people have different definitions of it. The redline is the end of the rev counter, as far as I'm concerned, that or revving the engine until the limiter cuts in.
Before this is the solid red part, and before that, the hatched red part.
The owners manual for my car says its ok to bring it into the hatched red part momentarily.

Ok I will try be more clear... The "redline" is when you rev the car until the needle goes into the part of the rev counter that has a "Red Line" beside it.
The rev limiter is something that cuts in to stop the engine blowing up due to over revving. I cannot see where the confusion is to be honest.

Slaanesh

I redline at 12,500 rpm sometimes. Very loud though.

Gerry

JHMEG: correct, but if you aren't going for the last tenth, its better to just change gear.
Another time its worth revving to the limiter is on the track, lets say you are coming up to a corner, and you get to the redline in second. Theres no point in going into third, as you'll waste more time changing back down a second later

blastman - do you have a honda with vtec or some other variable valve timing setup? Those cars love being revved

I wonder though, how many new model celicas are out there with vvti or vvt-li that has never activated

blastman

Got it in one, Gerry

Gerry

RobAMerc wrote:

Ok I will try be more clear... The "redline" is when you rev the car until the needle goes into the part of the rev counter that has a "Red Line" beside it.
The rev limiter is something that cuts in to stop the engine blowing up due to over revving. I cannot see where the confusion is to be honest.

Ok, heres a picture of my car:



The solid red starts at 6k rpm, this is also when the limiter cuts in. But this all varies between cars.

barryfitz

I have no redline, Does that mean i can rev it to infinity! In fact I have no Rev counter, Does that mean my car doent need to be monitored and I can do what I like:D :eek:

Gerry

Yep

onemanband

Slaanesh wrote:

I redline at 12,500 rpm sometimes. Very loud though.

What car has a redline starting at 12.5k rpm??

OKenora

Every once in a while - Its good for it

Yeah, but, there'd be even more power lost by doing a gear change!
Try do 0-60mph going 1st-2nd, then try doing it upshifting slightly earlier and going 1st-2nd-3rd.

LOL, those things we drive on are called ROADS, they are not a very busy racetrack and really should not be driven like one. There may be a top speed limit, but there's no limit on how fast you can get htere, but this still does not make high acelleration good, either for your car or other drivers on the road.

The redline is the absoulte maximum the manafacturer wants you to ever run the car at as it stresses the car to the most they are prepared to accept. If you are going for that last 1/10th that the time for a gearchange will ruin your lap time of the North Circular Road then imo you probably should go back and re-learn how to drive.

Would be interested to know what cars the "redline all the time" people drive ?
Not being smart but want to see are a lot of them smaller engined cars that need the nads revved off them to get anywhere.

Cars here, BMW 330d, Alfa 156 (2.4 re-mapped) and a Supra 3.0 Auto.

JHMEG

Gerry wrote:

JHMEG: correct, but if you aren't going for the last tenth, its better to just change gear.

The difference in my car between 60 in 2nd or 60 in 3rd is about 1.5 seconds, according to the accelerometer. So it's quite a few tenths (15 actually;))

michaelanthony

I'd be afriad the engine would blow up!

tc20

All the time - In every gear.

onemanband wrote:

What car has a redline starting at 12.5k rpm??

i'm guessing two wheels

onemanband

tc20 wrote:

i'm guessing two wheels

Doh!!!

Gerry

OKenora wrote:

LOL, those things we drive on are called ROADS, they are not a very busy racetrack and really should not be driven like one. There may be a top speed limit, but there's no limit on how fast you can get htere, but this still does not make high acelleration good, either for your car or other drivers on the road.

The redline is the absoulte maximum the manafacturer wants you to ever run the car at as it stresses the car to the most they are prepared to accept. If you are going for that last 1/10th that the time for a gearchange will ruin your lap time of the North Circular Road then imo you probably should go back and re-learn how to drive.

Would be interested to know what cars the "redline all the time" people drive ?
Not being smart but want to see are a lot of them smaller engined cars that need the nads revved off them to get anywhere.

Cars here, BMW 330d, Alfa 156 (2.4 re-mapped) and a Supra 3.0 Auto.

So which car were you referring to as regards not revving it over 4000rpm?
I drive a 91 saab 900 turbo ( 2 litre ), it doesn't *need* to be revved that much, but it is worth doing so now, since I've remapped the boost controller ( with a resistor ) to hold boost at high rpm.

NeMiSiS

Ah the joys of VTEC.. puts a smile on my face every day.
TK

AsphaltRisin'

Depends on the car, and how much i paid for it...
But i've got a battered old granada that i drive a lot and that gets redlined quite a bit most days, although i'm not usually goin all that fast, just fairly sideway sideways, or sometimes in lots of tyre smoke flavoured circles....
Might explain why i'm now lining up engine no.3 since i got it, ah well, at 200 to 300 euro a go it's not too bad for 3 0r 4 months of fun out of each engine. well, seein as the car cost a grand anyway.

I_was_banned

onemanband wrote:

What car has a redline starting at 12.5k rpm??

suzuki cuppuccino

667cc engine. revs past 13k :eek:

the insurance group is 13 though

cant justify it.

colm_mcm

Regularly - It happens in my normal driving

I_was_banned wrote:

suzuki cuppuccino

667cc engine. revs past 13k :eek:

the insurance group is 13 though

cant justify it.

Any of them I've ever seen rev out at 7,000.