2009 BMW 750i: The Dyno Reveals The Beast Within

I'm really liking that flat torque curve through the midrange.

The M V10 probably is the mirror image of that!

Is the blue on your 7 Imperial Blue or Deep Sea Blue?

With that comment about how turbo engines usually dyno better, it would be interesting to see if y'alls M3 can put up similar power numbers.

Can somebody tell me how to read one of these charts?

BMW continues to be an engine company with cars built around them.

You guys are really whoring that dyno out.

2008? or 2009?

I'm no fan of Bavaria's pricing schemes for their cars. I'm a ha8er of most of BMW yuppie jerks who seem to drive bimmers here in Houston.

But DANG! Those Germans know how to make a motor, don't they??

The picture of the engine bay on the earlier post was beautiful. Symmetrically & logically laid out engine bay, the nice growelling sound....

As the ShamWow guy says' 'Ya know Germans make good stuff...'. For once, I agree with him!

Hey, I have a random request for whoever gets the 750 next.

Could someone do an exhaust note video somehow? Maybe team up with another driver? I heard this engine in the X6 (specifically in Edmund's first drive of that car) and it sound fan-freaking-tabulous. I've been trying to find a similar video of the 750i, but to no avail. The only ones I can find seem to have it sounding like an anemic four-cylinder engine. I don't know if my ears are deceiving me, if it has a different exhaust setup, or what, but any sort of video you could do to alay my fears that this amazing automobile sounds like a cheap econobox would be greatly appreciated.

BMW lies? I think 391whp is good enough. It's 97.75% efficiency after all. BMW does make good motors.

I don't know, I had a new BMW 320i in 83. Nothing but problems from day one. Terrible, over priced dealer service, and arrogant sales network. I heard that BMW is the most bought back nameplate in Florida due to the Lemon Law . Another reason I'll take a pass.

@ronvpr, 1983 called. They want their 'what the hell are you talking about' back.

"My computer in 1983 was horrible, I'll take a pass on personal computers thanksyouverymuches."

Whatever 1486. Thats all I hear people complain about the domestics like "I had a 82 Citation and the radio didn't play my favorite song enough, so I only buy imports now". I want to let everyone know that I was soured by BMW and would not consider buying one ever again. Like I said, it wasn't just the car that was bad. The dealers idiot service techs and arrogant sales staff were also part of the problem I'm sure you overlooked my point about the Lemon Law item. Or are you that much snowballed by BMW to find any fault with them what-so-ever?

Good one 1486.

148 SIX? Uh oh :)

Adavis - You read the chart thusly: the bottom (or X axis) represents engine speed, or RPMs. So you are looking at the "curve" of engine output over the engine speed.

The solid blue line represents Horsepower. Notice how it rises with torque and RPM? That's because horsepower = torque x RPM / 5252

Torque is the thinner blue line. As you can see, this engine produces a fairly "flat" torque curve meaning you get plenty of torque at all RPMs.

Peak torque is whenever the torque hits it's highest point, wherever that may be.

Peak HP is more complicated, as it's the point at which torque begins to drop faster than the RPMs can rise to make up for it. Make sense?

When torque is dropping faster than rpms can make up for it, it's usually called a "drop-off"....i.e. that's the point in which revving the engine further doesn't get you anymore acceleration, and it's time to upshift. There's more to it than that, but that's just a basic guide.

Does that help?

so BMW is underrating the car again, just like they did with the twin turbo I6. Based on these dyno results and assuming 10-15% drivetrain losses this V8 TT is actually producing 434-460hp and 482-510lb-ft. The M version really is going to be something then -- if BMW is consistent with their ratings the M V8 TT could be making 600-640hp and 542-575lb-ft at the crank.

I'd agree with ronvpr: the cars draw me into the BMW dealer and I do enjoy the test drives enough to purchase a vehicle (nearly). And yet the arrogance of the sales people turns me off so quickly that I rescind my offer and look elsewhere for the ultimate driving machine.

I double agree with ronvp and the arrogance is present in their Mini dealers as well. My "salesman" did practically nothing when I ordered my car other then enter it into the system. Not that I needed help picking my options, which were more mechanical than luxury (read: bullshit crap like the hi-fi stereo which equates to four extra speakers for $500), but basically did that at home and then came into the dealer and handed it to him with a check. I swear it was more involved when I bought a window air-conditioner from Sears once.

BMW options pricing is arrogant too. Everything is either $500, $1000 or $1500 for simple things that are standard in A LOT of other companies.

But I'd still buy one.......

Forgot to mention the fact that the Mini dealer that I bought from was heavily monitored by the BMW North American operations which was in the same county didn't make a difference. So I wonder if it's just a company standard to be arrogant.

And still I'd buy one......

The output drop-off before redline is the characteristic of turbocharged direct injection engines. The MazdaSpeed3 and Cobalt SS have the same shape to their power and torque curves.

Since you guys seem to be making a lot of dyno pulls these days is there any way that you could strap the G8 to the dyno before it departs? I would be really interested to see what the curves look like.

By camaro2010 on April 29, 2009 11:23 PM -

Yeah, BMW lies because given typical driveline loss this thing is pumping more like 460+ horsepower and over 500 lb/ft torque! WOW!!!

Two things:

1. Wait until Dinan and others make a chip for this thing. Good grief.

2. BMW salespeople - like all salespeople - are unneeded. Find the car you want (or spec it) and deal with internet/fleet folks via the internet and phone. No sense wasting time in person at a dealership. I haven't purchased a car face to face from a dealer in forever...

According to my research that is over 480 bhp.

SWEET!

7 series looks like a Corolla in the above picture.

I was curious about the Florida lemon law comment and found the newest (2007) report...BMW isnt even close to a leader in cases filed or cars being repurchased by the manufacturer.

http://myfloridalegal.com/webfiles.nsf/WF/MRAY-6VJQNF/$file/2007LLAnnualReport.pdf

If the engine was tested with a greater amount of heat soak, given the layout it makes sense that there would be such an output discrepancy, but still...wow.

The 750i (and Challenger R/T) dyno figures seem
to be on the high side..esp when looking at the
1/4 mi trap speed.Does this dyno have the latest
software and calsets? Suggestion=Try another shop who doesn'tknow you...

Folks, you really need to relax about this "it really has 480hp at the crank" stuff. As Jason pointed out, the manufacturers have a different set of standards so this is essentially an apples to oranges comparison of results. Unless someone knows the exact percentage of parasitic loss for each individual car, these estimates and assumptions are fruitless. Dynos are great for tuning as you need a baseline but trying to extrapolate flywheel horsepower from such data is a crap shoot. If you ask me, every engine should have SAE J1349 certification and that would take a lot of the spurious horsepower claims. So far, General Motors is the only company requiring all engines new engines to be certified.

RONVPR and 1486: I see both of you guys' point and partially agree with both. I don't have stats in hand but I can tell you that BMW's are great cars, with marvelous engineering. It is also my own personal experience and that of people close to me, that BMW's often have MINOR reliability issues that usually don't leave you stranded but still need to be fixed. A scheduled maintenance visit to the dealer is hardly ever excempt of some type of warranty repair.
But people don't care, they still want to drive BMW's regardless. Why? Because BMW's are an aspirational purchase. People will overlook ugly designs, expensive option packages, and even mediocre reliability in sake of driving a Bimmer.
That is changing though, more people are going to Lexus, for example, in an effort to purchase Premium and reliable cars.
I love BMW's, but I leave far from their dealers, therefore I drive Lexus.

This is will be a great used car deal in a couple years.

They should put a form of this engine in the next M5. Im sure this engine is capable of over 500hp with a few boost and ECU mods. And you have to assume it will be waaaay cheaper to build this engine than the V10 is.

@ttummy "This will be a great used car deal in a couple years."

Not only will it make a fantastic used car buy, but if these dyno numbers are any indication, it pretty much blows the doors off the S550 at it's price-point.

Just think of this engine kind of like one and a half 335i engines. And that engine has no trouble pumping out 350+ whp and 400+ lbs-ft with simple mods (ecu, boost and intake/exhaust). I'd love to see a 750 pumping out 500+ whp and 600+ lbs-ft for a few grand in upgrades. Cmon Jason, do to this what you guys did to the EvoX ;)

Good to see that for all the negative comments about you guys getting "yet another BMW," the Bimmers seem to be leading the pack in numbers of comments generated per post. And that is purely unscientific -- just a guess.
Guys, this is why IL keeps getting Bimmers. And I don't mind that at all. No boring cars, to rip a phrase from Automobile mag.

sgude,

Lots of venom directed at them too. Wow. I've had my share of problems with BMW products but I keep coming back as i can't find anything I like driving as much on a daily basis.

It's strange how one bad experience ruins a brand for people, and it seems time does not heal old wounds for many people.
My BMW has given me a nice handful of problems, but like blueguydotcom said, I'll keep going back since I can't find anything I like driving as much.
Next time, I'll just get an extended warranty...

I've had bad BMW experiences... *cough* E65 *cough*, but I've had ALOT more GREAT ones over the years... 4 E46s, 2 E38s, an X5 4.6iS, and even my '03 Range Rover (BMW in sheep's clothing) were wonderful cars with minimal, although occasional problems. They're just great cars despite all the vindictive sentiment toward the badge.

"They should put a form of this engine in the next M5."

Audisport, as good as this ENGINE (motors are electric people!) is, Id rather the ///M cars keep their high reving nature as its just one of the defining traits that make an M and M. The V10 in the current M5 is MAGNIFICO!

While it would be cool to mod this engine... who the hell buys a 7 series and mods it???

1speedbike, ever been to southern california? people here will mod anything with wheels. I've seen minivans rollin' with dubs.

And used cars...wow the cheaper a car gets the more often it's owned by people who modify cars in all manner of silly ways.

"We started our run after 2,000 rpm and found that peak torque arrived a bit later than BMW's claim."

Well - if you started above the torque peak, you're not going to get torque peak at the claimed 1800RPM. Even though the turbos on this engine are very small, they still need exhaust energy to spool up. To make enough exhaust energy to spool the two turbos, you need a lot of engine load. If the dyno run was started at a much lower RPM, I suspect you would see the torque peak much lower.