Company registered in Germany, managed by VAG which is German and founded by an Italian, has been moved to Italy in its history and has for a long time depended on Italian design.

Sans a minor border shift to France… there’s not really anything French about a car built to German Technology standars with Italian heritage and design.

Wikipedia:

Founder(s) Ettore Bugatti (Italian)
Headquarters Magdeburg, Germany

“Bugatti was founded in Molsheim, France (Germany at that time) as a manufacturer of high performance automobiles by italian-born and french naturalized citizen Ettore Bugatti, an eccentric genius.”

“Italian entrepreneur Romano Artioli acquired the famous Bugatti name in 1987, and established Bugatti Automobili SpA. The new company built a factory designed by the architect Giampaolo Benedini in Campogalliano, Italy, a town near Modena, home to other performance-car manufacturers De Tomaso, Ferrari, Pagani and Maserati.”

Our calculator has all the detailed math built into it… this post has some oversight for sure…

As far as pressure ratio vs density ratio goes… I’m adding that feature into our horsepower calculator as we speak… maybe I should write up all my work as it’s been a while since I’ve blogged on here…

I’ll give you an example i just ran on the beta version of the new calculator…

160 hp engine at 2.0 pressure ratio with a 60% efficient supercharger puts out 188hp
Same setup adding in a 70% efficient intercooler spikes the density ratio giving us a final power figure of 272hp
Both figures are less than the ideal power figure of 320hp because the density ratio lags the pressure ratio based on the heat rise due to the compression process…

water/Alcohol injection also follows this same principal where you trade off some volumetric efficiency (as the water/alcohol mixture displaces some intake air) in exchange for lower intake temps and a higher density ratio… doing this properly gives an overall positive result on horsepower where you trade off 5% of your volumetric efficiency for example for a 20% increase in density given you an overall boost of 15% horsepower …

All this math is coming in the power calculator version 4.0 … and people will be able to get exact modeling of their engines including the inherent VE of the motor and how that affects intake flow as well as full temperature modeling for the supercharger and intercooler and water injection system to find a realistic (rather than idealized) setup to reach their power goals safely

I just wanted to point out what I think is a slight error in the beginning of this entry. I think I have seen it correctly in another post, but here you say that a 1.5 liter motor would ingest 1.5 liters of air per revolution. Since we are typically talking about 4 cycle engines, it should be 1.5 liters for every two revolutions.

The pressure ratio is a little hard to figure too. If you pump twice as much air through the supercharger than the engine would normally ingest, you will only get a 2.0 pressure ratio if there is a perfect intercooler and no temperature rise. Even if you have 100% adiabatic efficiency compression there will be temperature rise and you will see more than a 2.0 pressure ratio.

Maybe people would appreciate an entry talking about the different types of efficiency and what they mean. The terms get thrown around a lot, but I don’t think people really understand them. A description of how an intercooler, even with no restriction, lowers supercharger boost and increases hp would be good too.

Peter

In the late 1980′s-early 1990′s, there weren’t a lot of cars you could buy that would run 14 second 1/4 miles stock. The 5.0 was kind of the beginning of technology brining back performance after years of almost no performance unless you could afford a turbo Porsche. The mid 70′s-80′s where times when Mustangs, Camaro‘s, and even Corvettes were under 200hp, 16 second quarter mile machines. Sad times for american muscle. The 5.0 was that start of the comeback, along with the IROC Z28 Camaro’s of the time.

A big reason the 5.0 is a legend is how HUGE and affordable the aftermarket parts selection was. In the early – mid 90′s, you could pick up a couple year old 5.0, and slowly modify it to your desired level of performance based on your budget. Exhaust, a cold air intake, and some 3.73 gears would have you well into the 13 sec 1/4 mile range. Get into the literally hundreds of cam, head, and intake combos and you could be in the 12′s or even 11′s real quick. Or save $3k, slap on a Paxton or vortech Supercharger one afternoon and be done! No pulling off bumpers, fender liners, and fenders to put a supercharger in an old 5.0. Basic knowledge and hand tools and it could all be done with just the hood open. Superchargers galore, nitrous, everything was available and relatively cheap for the 5.0. And because it was a fairly simple old push rod engine, most enthusiasts could work on the car themselves.

The 5.7 IROC Z Camarro and Trans Am were about the only other affordable V8 performance cars of the time. They were a little faster than the 5.0 stock, but not nearly as aftermarket part friendly, or easy to work on. Plus due to emission laws you could not get the 350 Chevy (5.7) with a manual transmission. If you wanted the manual in the camarro, you had to go with the 305 engine which was not at all modification friendly. Another huge appeal of the 5.0 at the time

So whether a 5.0 fan or not, i think ALL performance car enthusiasts today should be aware of the history and happy about what the 5.0 helped do for automotive performance, especially for america. The 5.0 was in some ways the start of the “comeback” of the power people wanted. Did you know what was the ford Probe was supposed to be the next generation Mustang in the late 80′s? But the 5.0 was so popular, they realized a front wheel drive V-6 Mustang was not going to fly.

Hope that info helps you understand more about why the 5.0 is considered such a nostalgic theme to it, it is really kind of a legendary motor in it’s time. Much like old Hemi Chrysler’s, Cobrajet Fords, and Tri Pack Chevys of the old muscle car days of the 60′s.

The 4.6 has come a long way too. When it came out in 1996 it was a DOG! The Cobra had the 315HP 32V version but for young people at the time almost $30k for a Cobra was out of the question for most. The aftermarket was weak for the GT 4.6, and the days of swapping cams, heads, and intakes in the driveway were gone. So for those of us that had 5.0′s or at least got to work on and drive them back in the day, the memories are good……