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Frequently Asked Questions »
- How will the remap affect my warranty?
- How will the remap affect my fuel consumption?
- How will the remap affect the longevity of my engine?
- Can it be reversed?
- How much will it cost?
- I have other modifications...
- I intend to make further modifications...
- Remapping or chipping?
- What if I want to sell my car?
- What about my insurance?
- What is 'Horsepower' or HP?
- Our warranty
Torque?
Torque is the power of a rotating force, which is the product of one of two equal, opposite, and parallel offset forces and the distance between them. When this is applied to a car this means the effort exerted on a shaft to move the vehicle along. When torque is great enough to move a shaft through a given distance in a given time this is expressed as power and measured as horsepower.OK, if you have a centre nut on one of your wheels and then put a socket on it with a 1ft bar (bear with me on the imperial). The car will be at rest until you put a weight on the end of the bar to try and turn the wheel. So if you now put 50lb on the end of that 1ft bar and the car moves, the force that has moved that car from a standstill, at that speed, is 50 lb ft. So if the engine of that car produced the same amount of twisting force at its peak it would have been said to have a Torque of 50lb ft.
Now if you take that theory one step further and double the weight on the end of the bar and let go, the wheel would rotate again, only this time because the amount of force pushing the bar down was greater, the wheel would move off quicker and with more ease. Apply this once again to the engine producing the force and it would have been said to have a Torque of 100lb ft.
So you can see the more Torque you have the quicker the wheel would move off from stationary.
This is all fine and good on a light car as it means my 0-62 time will be decreased?
Yes the theory does indeed point to that, however do bear in mind that if a car produces 100 lb ft of torque and your car does 0-62 in 10 seconds, it is NOT going to do 0-62 in 5 seconds if you give it 200 lb ft of torque due to the inefficiencies of the engine, transmission etc, but it will be significantly reduced.
What about overtaking?
The same theory applies to overtaking. The more force you can use to make the wheels go from say 50mph to 70mph the less time it will take to get there.
Why is torque important if I tow a caravan etc?
The more torque you have the more weight you can move forward from a standstill. Or in other words if the wheel you are trying to turn is stiffer it may not turn at al with 50 lb ft - it requires more force to turn it. Therefore if you increase the force by 50lb and the wheel turns then need 100 lb ft torque to move it. Apply that to a car with a trailer, you require more force to propel that whole unit (car and trailer) forward than you would with just the car. So once again with more torque you can move your car and trailer off from a standstill quicker and with less effort than you could before.
Now if you take that theory one step further and double the weight on the end of the bar and let go, the wheel would rotate again, only this time because the amount of force pushing the bar down was greater, the wheel would move off quicker and with more ease. Apply this once again to the engine producing the force and it would have been said to have a Torque of 100lb ft.
So you can see the more Torque you have the quicker the wheel would move off from stationary.
This is all fine and good on a light car as it means my 0-62 time will be decreased?
Yes the theory does indeed point to that, however do bear in mind that if a car produces 100 lb ft of torque and your car does 0-62 in 10 seconds, it is NOT going to do 0-62 in 5 seconds if you give it 200 lb ft of torque due to the inefficiencies of the engine, transmission etc, but it will be significantly reduced.
What about overtaking?
The same theory applies to overtaking. The more force you can use to make the wheels go from say 50mph to 70mph the less time it will take to get there.
Why is torque important if I tow a caravan etc?
The more torque you have the more weight you can move forward from a standstill. Or in other words if the wheel you are trying to turn is stiffer it may not turn at al with 50 lb ft - it requires more force to turn it. Therefore if you increase the force by 50lb and the wheel turns then need 100 lb ft torque to move it. Apply that to a car with a trailer, you require more force to propel that whole unit (car and trailer) forward than you would with just the car. So once again with more torque you can move your car and trailer off from a standstill quicker and with less effort than you could before.
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