well i was cruising down the street. and red lights happened to be there ..
then this red 99 prelude DOHC VTEC with exhaust and intake im guessing its about 210hp .. rolls his window down and ask to race . so i said sure.
mine was a 02 c230k coupe . and all i had was intake and just installed a magnaflow custom exhaust on that same day. so decide to give it a try.

then it turns green and i killed it by 5 car length .

 

ummmm......... NO! I don't think so.

 

Aww come on, more details of the actual race next time its like backstory.....backstory....green light and pew I won.

And how do you have trouble believing that a C230k beat a Prelude hochi?

 

because preludes are at least 300-400lbs lighter than a C230K

 

I've driven both cars and the preludes pulls harder than the 230K does. I think the 230K is a joke performance wise. But I love the whole AMG look and the big brakes. I think that car is more for show than anything.

 

Its a HONDA.... In my ML I have yet to lose to any honda that I have raced and I think my ML could take down an unmodded prelude. First off they have 200HP (at redline) and only 150 lb of tq(at 5,200 rpm). My ML has 215hp and 233lb tq. I cant find a tq curve for the honda but the curve for the mercedes is flat and makes a lot of torque(over 200lb from 3,000-4,400rpm) for a long RPM range vs most hondas which TQ and HP peak at redline. Second off the prelude has a 4 speed auto or a 5 speed manual. If it was a 4 speed auto then it would of gotten smoked bad the gear ratios would be to long for such a small 2.2 liter I4. The only advantage the honda has is weight and my guess is my ML would kill a 4 speed auto and might be even with a 5 speed untill higher speeds. But I have no doubt any C230 could beat them. You have more TQ over a longer RPM range and more gears, as the old saying goes HP sells cars TQ wins races.

 

sorry to break it to you but if you race an unmodded prelude, you will lose.....badly. stock for stock, a prelude is faster than a C230K.

 

anything goes on the street.

 

How much does the ML weigh and how much does the prelude weigh?

Please please please find out and then find the law of physics that says the heavier a subject the more power it needs to be moved, due to the gravitational force being massxgravity thus gravity is constant at 9.etc and mass is the variable.

Off the line any car can beat another car to 30mph or even to 60mph. It all depends on the reaction times. But all conditions being equal where both cars travel to a certain distance where there is enough distance and time for the cars to run their numbers, and considering they both take off at the same time, prelude will pass the ml or any car comparable to it in hp but heavier.


BTW they say HP sells cars, torque wins races blah blah blah.

But they never ever mention the F1 cars, and even better the 2000HP monsters that win races.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drag_racing

 

Yea lets see how much an F1 car weighs. About 1,322 lbs. Its all about p/w and torque to weight ratios. Drag racers weight about 2,400lbs and and they have plenty of torque. Again an F1 cars engine revs up to 18,000rpm the fastest street car engines redline at about 8,000.

Lets look at some stats

Honda weight 3,050lbs power 195hp 156lb torque
Mercedes C230K weight 3,330lbs power 192hp 200lb torque

Honda P/w ratio .0639
Honda TQ/W ratio .051

C230K P/W ratio .057
C230K TQ/w ratio .06

F1 car (800hp) p/w ratio .6


The Honda wins in p/w ratio but loses in tq/w ratio. Off the line torque is what is going to help you. If you plot both cars engines and plot both torque and hp you will notice the mercedes has a nice flat high amount of torque for a long time vs the honda which will have a linear torque line. Both will have linear HP plot. Again the C230k since it is an auto is going to get the most use out of the power and has almost no error vs the manual front wheel drive honda which has a human factor of shifting.

But I dont know if this has been mentioned fun fact of the day HP is a derived from torque. A dyno only measure torque and uses an equation to calculate HP. The equation is HP= (tq x RPM)/ 5252

 

It is so funny that you made the hp/lb and tq/lb calculations, but you missed the ML out of the equation.

I thought you said you would beat the prelude with your v6 ML. But ML is not in the equation.

Torque may win the 0-30 races, but torque has not much of an effect as the speeds build higher and higher, if that was the case the F1 cars would not be that quick with their low torque levels. Have you seen the low torqued F1 cars accelerate out of the turns, and how long it takes them to reach 80-150 mph?

HP= (tq x RPM)/ 5252 and this is so funny stating HP is derived from torque. Here is the primary school algebra where torque is derived from HP

TQ=(5252XHP)/RPM

See Torque is actually derived from HorsePower!

It is primary school algebra to derive any variable in an equation with respect to each other, so your argument is completely flawed. We can even derive the RPM with respect to tq and hp in the same equation as well.

Torque can have only one advantage off the line which is maybe 0-30mph or 0-60 if the car hits 60 in 2nd gear, but as the speeds increase HP always and always takes over as well as the gearing. You know most Ferrari's have low torque level engines compared to their HP, as well as the new m5, which is capable of 200mph.

If torque was that important F1 cars would have had more torque than what they have now, as those engines are capable of producing higher tq levels if needed, same as the top fuel drag cars. Any of those manufacturers could make their engines in a way that they produce more tq than hp, but in accelaration level it is HP that is important.

TQ does not win races, it is the engine and the driver that wins the races, and engine outputs are always measured by HP.

In any circumstances even according to your measurements and calculations ML has no chance against a Prelude in theory due to hp/lb and tq/lb measurements.

For example:

Imagine two identical cars with the same weight and everything same gearing etc, only difference is output of engines.

Car A has 200 hp 300tq

Car B has 300 hp 200 tq

Car B will always outrun car A everything being equal no variable except the engine output.

 

I thought HP came from TQ.

 

Prelude SH will slightly outrun the C230K.

Preulde SH will completely murder a ML320

 

As much as I love the C230K, I'm having trouble with this one. The Magna Flow won't yield any increase. So, I can't see how this would have happened. Besides that, the story is so devoid of details regarding the kill.

 

You can derive anything from anything in an equation. Any variable in an equation can be derived from each other. Tq can be derived from HP, HP can be derived from RPM, RPM can be derived from TQ, it doesn't matter, all you need is a single unknown variable to derive it from other known variables.

If you don't know what HP the car has you can not know what TQ level the car has and vice versa at the certain RPM.

 

Even a chrysler mini van can murder ML 320.

 

You know what I have raced a kind in a chrysler mini van he thought he could take me. I beat him so bad...


Anyways back to my point a dyno can not measure HP a dyno can only measure TQ then uses the equation I listed above to calculate HP.

Back to my point the C230k loses in HP by a small amount but leads in torque by a large amount. So off the line the C230K is no slow poke. Second off I didnt include the ML or all of the mercedes line because it takes work to look up stats. Not only does HP and TQ have a lot to do with acceleration but you have to factor in gearing and traction. I have played with a few C230 4 doors in my ML on the freeway and neither of us pull on each other. Just for a comparison I raced my friends bmw 325ci convertible we where dead even neck on neck until we shut down at 70 mph. The C230 or ML320 might not be the fastest in the mercedes lineup but neither is slow compared to the vast majority of cars. Again street racing anything goes, go find the video of the poor z06 owner losing to a stock M3 at a drag race.

Just one thing to note when I raced the BMW and played with the C230 I had a 2000 ML 320 which weighs about 600 lbs+ less than my current 2002 ML.

 

LOL you need to stop racing your ML!
Sorry to break it to you but your ML is no performance car. Maybe a good grocery getter but thats about it.

 

Andrew, I appreciate your stats, but the C230k off the line is a bogger, worse with the auto. Human Error? The shifting points on the C230k are a nightmare.

Ed

 

i have owned both cars: 1998 prelude SH, 1999 MB c230k & 2005 MB c230k

stock for stock the prelude wins hands down (because it is an SH the only tranny available is manual). The c230 will win unless the driver of the prelude cannot shift or has the notorius grinding 3rd gear like mine did.

The 1999 c230 wins agains the 2005 c230.

i have no proof/numbers to back this up, this is my personal experiance driving all three of these cars daily on the same roads.

 

Weird, I had a hard time to catch up w/ the mini van in my ML, by 100 I was 1/2 car length behind him. Oh well....

 

it was a race for sure .. i beat him both times.
the first one i beat by alot . cause he said he misshift.
but . its all about the driver not the car. he mishift, his fault he lost
then the next light came . he told me what happen so we when again .
prelude are fast . but no torque.
i have 200 and more torque and about 200 hp . from the aftermarket parts .
the 2nd race we went, he was close . side by side, till he shifts and my supercharger kicks in . it beat him by one car length .

u cant say the driver sucks or watever , but its al about if u win or not,
excuses from dont mean **** . cause he challenged me .

 

his car had an exaust i think not sure , but he had a system in there cause i can hear it .. but
i have a coupe after market parts too .

i also race my buddies new 06 c230 sedan sport pakage. V6
DAMN THAT THING IS FKING SLOW .
it only has 182 hp and 192 tq
i killed it anyway he wanted me to . 0-w.e rolling 60k gave him 2 car length rolling . and him speeding up behind me .

 

Does C230k&Prelude Type SH beat Grand Cherokee HEMI?

 

the 2006 C230's have 201hp and 181 lb-ft of tq.

the normal Hemi should slot in slower than the Prelude but quicker than the C230