A Dodge Viper and a Lexus LFA both use a V10 engine, but a Dodge Viper has a very “deep” sound, but a Lexus LFA has a very high pitched whining sound?
What makes a car like a muscle car like a Mustang or Viper have such a different sound than a car like a Lamborghini or Ferrari when they use the same kinds of engines?
In: Engineering
There are many reasons why, but one of the most important factors in an engine’s sound is how evenly the exhaust pulses reach the tailpipes. Evenly spaced exhaust pulses tend to result in higher-pitched, smoother sound. Unevenly spaced pulses in deeper, more complex, and angrier noise.
also very engine’s sound is the product of a whole orchestra of bushings, pipe diameters, and hundreds of sheetmetal pieces of varying thicknesses, as well as design factors, such as the exhaust layout, insulation, and the body shell, exactly how the noise a car makes is produced and then tuned of course starts inside the engine, and the type of noise created rests largely on three primary variables; the number of cylinders and their arrangement, the frequency with which those cylinders fire and the firing sequence of those cylinders.
They both have a v10 engine, but that doesn’t mean they’re the same. The displacement, firing order, cams, exhaust pipes, and aspiration are some things that make a difference in how it sounds.
The whine from the engine comes from a turbocharger or supercharger, which both work like compressors to pump more air into the engine to make more horsepower, which means the engine is not naturally aspirated.
A much deeper growling sound from an engine compared to a higher pitched, faster sounding idle at the same rpm would be a difference in engine displaced, firing order, camshafts and exhaust, but I’m not the best guy to explain how all that works.
I’m going to go out on a limb here and assume it also has to do with larger bore vs longer stroke, cams, presence of VVT, etc
Engine bore and stroke, firing order, crank shaft design, exhaust design are all contributing factors.
Flat plane cranks give you the Ferrari type sound. Compare a standard C8 Corvette to the ~~ZR1~~ Z06 which has the flat plane crankshaft.
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A proper ELI5 is that engine ‘sound’ is determined by a lot of different things, so even engines that have the same number of cylinders can sound quite different.
Some of the different things include the engine displacement, the firing order of the cylinders, the shape and composition of the exhaust system, ignition and valve timing, and the use of forced induction.
American muscle cars usually sound a certain way because American rednecks like loud-make-me-look-like-a-toughy toys…think Harleys and that loud pipe save life bs.. real super cars are highly engineered machines and sound like that, showcasing rev and fined tune efficient masterpieces. the LFA is an amazing piece of engineering, and good thing it doesn’t sounds like something that would appeal to Bubba on his way to his date with his cousin Crystal
Displacement has a huge effect on this. Big displacement engines roar. Small displacement engines scream.
Viper v10 is 8.4 L, F1 V10 is a 3.0L.
Well, to really grossly oversimplify it, you can think of it like people. Most people have two lungs, but very different voices. We all have different length windpipes, different shaped mouths, different vocal chords. It’s the same with a car. Lots of things are different besides number of cylinders. Lexus famously worked with Yamaha, an instrument maker (yes they do more than that), to tune their exhausts for a certain effect!
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