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... turbo Saabs ran 7.2:1 static compression. Sure don't want to go back to -those- days... ;-)
Another aspect of the APC system that you may dislike, but I think is extremely useful for street driving is its potention to provide lots of intial overtaking surge, then back off a little as cylinder temps rise. That aspect plays a paramount role in Saabs engineering philosphy and the reason why a 2.0 liter, 4/5 seater saloon car used to demolish nearly everything -including Ferrari's and 911 Turbo's- in the all-important in-gear incremental acceleration tests at highway speeds whilst at the same time posting relatively modest times in the 0-60 and 1/4 mile standing start accels. As the book "Made in Trollhättan" states: "Horsepower is very important. To cowboys" ;-)
Personally, this is what got me hooked on Saab turbo's. I can't drive at crazy speeds at the risk of losing my license, and I think traffic light battles are lame. But boy, what a nice feeling to be pressed ito your seat as you set out to overtake, merge on the freeway or power your way out of a corner :-)
It's only now, where the state of tune Saabine is in allows like 21+ psi of APC-controlled boost (on an upgraded turbo and with sufficient fueling, charge air and in-cylinder cooling, no "boost that odes nothing but heat things up" here :-) right after putting your right foot into it and overpowering the AP Racing relined clutch when doing so in fifth _without_ any shifting action during the quarter of an hour prior to that, the -very firmly planted- front tires in the lower three gears and in the long term potentially grenading the brand new gearbox, that I am rethinking my strategy and consider manually setting boost at a somewhat lower level as well as searching for more linearity in the engines power delivery, i.e. opnening things up from ~4K upwards by means of more agressive valve timing/lift (and of course subsequent re-tuning of fueling). But then again Saabine is at a level where I feel I am really pushing the envelope within the C900T concept as a high performance sports tourer. (Yes, I know there are guys out there running well over 300 hp c900's but those are more street dragsters, I certainly wouldn't want to grab a car like that by the scruff of the neck on a demanding road or track course. And of course there are and have been developments of the c900 as a pure, out-and-out racer which is a very different game also.) As a Dutch Saab master techician and performance tuner said to my friend Felix after putting the performance of his ~220 hp 900T16S back to its former glory: "If I were you, I wouldn't change anything on this car anymore. It works as a whole at this level. Beyond that, it's getting to be motorsport and you don't want to race this thing - you just want a nice driving experience." I think this goes for like 99% of performance minded Saab owners over here and up to and including that level, I reckon APC will be very hard to beat.
Anyways- Happy New Year!
Eric
http://web.inter.nl.net/users/turbo-teeam-europe
posted by 213.116.120.1...
, Sun, 30 Dec 2001 00:35:20, Sat, 29 Dec 2001 21:43:17, Sun, 30 Dec 2001 00:54:46
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