Car Terms Every Car Nerd NEEDS to Know

- Blower, LSD, Muffler Removal, Heel-Toe, Turn Signal Fluid. You've heard these

terms

a million times before, but what do they all mean? Today we will look at some car

terms

that

every

car

nerd

should

know

. Easy newbie things to talk about shopping at an expert level. how much do you

know

? Let's find out. Hello, thank you so much to our friends at Keeps for sponsoring yet another episode of Wheelhouse. Look, I may still mess up the pronunciation of some car terms in this episode, but one thing I don't have to worry about is messing up my hair.

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That's K-E-E-P-S.com/wheelhouse50. Thank you so much, Keeps, for sponsoring this episode. Now, let's continue with this episode. Being a reducer is a lifelong pursuit. No matter how many keys you turn, how much gas you breathe, how many engine blocks you accidentally break, there is always something to learn. It's sometimes intimidating to talk to people in the automotive industry because you literally don't know what they're talking about. So we make it easy for you and compile a list. Let's start with an easy one. A muffler is like a big box in your exhaust system that muffles noise and prevents every car on the road from sounding like a Harley Davidson.

Like I said, let's start easy. This list is going to grow. A resonator is a device that comes just before the muffler. It acts as a sort of echo chamber to focus the sound so that the muffler can silence it. It's usually the thick section of an exhaust pipe that looks like that big, weird section of a worm. You know what I'm talking about, right? What about that part of the worm, what is that? The downpipe on older cars refers to a tube that carries exhaust from the exhaust manifold to the rest of the exhaust system.

However, in a turbo engine, it carries the exhaust from the turbine to the rest of the exhaust. Moving on to the chassis. A unibody is when the chassis of the car is a single piece of metal that also joins the body, creating it perfect and beautiful. This is in contrast to the ladder frame, which is used by most trucks and off-road vehicles. The frame of a ladder uses rails while the body sits on top. And then you have some rungs that make the entire stair frame look like a ladder. When it comes to fuel delivery, cars have carburetors or, more commonly today, fuel injection.

I don't think a car has had a carburetor since the mid 80's. In a carbureted engine, the gas and air mixture is brought together before passing through the intake manifold into the cylinders. And direct fuel injection shoots fuel directly into the cylinder. CEL is the check engine light on your dashboard. Just the side of this light can strike fear into the hearts of the bravest tuners. It sometimes looks like this, which can be confusing even for big car fans. We prefer this one. It's much clearer. FWD, or front-wheel drive, the front wheels drive the car, obviously, RWD is rear-wheel drive, and 4WD, is four-wheel drive, which means your car is capable of providing power to all four wheels when they need it, either. either automatically or manually controlled.

Basically, 4WD can function as two-wheel drive or four-wheel drive. AWD or all-wheel drive means that the engine supplies power to all wheels at the same time. Torque is the measure of twisting force measured in foot-pounds. If you hold a 12-inch ruler in one hand and place a one-pound weight on its end, you are rotating with a torque of one foot-pound. A lot of hype is given to horsepower, which is how fast they can work. But torque is also extremely important and it really tells you how fast you can get out of the hole or out of a corner or accelerate, you know?

Alright, now let's get into some more general engine terms that have to do with engine design. You've heard of I4, I6, V6, straight six, inclined six. When someone refers to a car as a V8 or inline six, what does that mean? Well, they refer to the number and arrangement of cylinders in the engine. This is an inline six, because all the cylinders are lined up in a row, up and down. This is a V6 because the cylinders are arranged in a V shape. This is a Chrysler Slant Six, where all the cylinders are inclined 30 degrees. I'm a six because only 40% of guys are hotter than me, F-F and F-R describe front or rear engine position and front or rear wheel drive.

For example, F-R is front engine and rear wheel drive. R-R is rear engine rear wheel drive and in addition to the sound is produced by a seal. (seal honks) And FFA is front engine, all wheel drive. Bondo is a body putty. You can use it to fill small holes and cracks. You can sand it. You can paint over it. You can do a bad job on it and make your car look (bleep), and then just say, screw it on and buy a new body panel. However, whatever you do, don't use it for structural integrity. W-O-T, WOT or full throttle.

It is when you have the pedal to the floor, the accelerator opens completely. You don't have time to say the whole quarter. So you just have to shorten it. WOT. WOT. When you hear someone say N/A, he is saying naturally aspirated. This refers to any engine that does not force air into the cylinders with a turbo or supercharger. Speaking of naturally aspirated, one of my favorite engine terms is HEMI, and it's not just a name for a Chrysler V8. Hemi refers to the shape of the engine's hemispherical combustion chamber. Before the debut of the Chrysler Hemi in the early 1950s, most automakers used flathead designs, which got the job done, but weren't very efficient.

Hemispherical heads, on the other hand, allowed the use of much larger valves, which increased airflow through the engine, always increasing power. There's a lot more to the Hemi than I can get into right now, so for more on that, check out We're Up to Date on the Hemi. It's one of my favorite episodes. I just love them Hemis. Turbochargers and superchargers do pretty much the same thing. Both are essentially pumps that compress an additional air-fuel mixture into the cylinder before combustion. Turbochargers are powered by exhaust gas energy, while superchargers are powered by a belt connected to the crankshaft.

Spinney boi is slang for a turbocharger. There are also a million other slang terms for these things, we have whooshie guys, snails, turbine. Honestly, you can probably make up your own. And if you say it with enough confidence, people will believe you. Here at Donut we call them spin guys. Discharge valve. Even if you don't know this term, you've definitely heard what things sound like. They are sometimes called BOV or BPVS for bypass valve. These take the load off the turbo when the throttle is suddenly closed. Without a wastegate, there will simply be too much pressure between the turbo and the closed throttle.

Then the relief valve releases that pressure. (car rumbles) Now when it comes to superchargers, there are three different types. I like to refer to them as blowers. Roots is the largest and heaviest style of supercharger. It seems the best, but it is the least efficient. It has nothing to do with the Sepultura album, it's just named after the guy who invented it. Twin screw superchargers use two screws to squeeze air into the engine. They are usually located on top of the engine and make a lot of noise. Don't Google "twins" in front of your twin. Central turbochargers are the most efficient of the blowers.

They use a rotating compressor to squeeze the air and as a result, they look like turbos. They can be mounted on the front of the engine, which is kind of a pain, because then you won't be able to cut a hole in the hood. You may have heard of X-pipe and H-pipe exhaust setups. While these two will make your V-engine car sound different, the main benefit these pipes bring is a balancing effect between the two banks of cylinders. Exhaust pressure can build up on one side of the engine and an X-pipe or H-pipe can allow the pressure to equalize and flow better through the exhaust system.

They sound really cool too, especially the X-pipes. (Car rumbles) A ​​cat is your catalytic converter. It is another exhaust device that reduces the amount of toxins in the exhaust gases. This is something you don't want to eliminate. They get robbed all the time. And if you steal catalytic converters, get a job. In fact, many people eliminate them from their system because they believe they reduce energy. That used to be true when cats first appeared, but nowadays they are very efficient and don't offer much benefit if you remove them. So don't do that. Plus, you can't let them pass.

A delete is when you simply remove a feature from your car. You hear people say they have a muffler delete or a cat delete. And all that means is that they probably won't pass (unintelligible) next year. A sleeper is a car that looks modest on the outside, but is built like a racing car on the inside. The trick is to lull rival racers into a false sense of security, without realizing what's under the hood. Our guys Tony Angelo and Lucky at Hot Rod Garage probably built the coolest sleeper car ever, the Maliby. I had to drive it around the block once.

And it was the sickest thing ever. I love sleepers. I love sleeping well. Let's talk about some suspension stuff. A solid axle or live axle is when an axle is a rigid part and moves together. It is durable, but if one wheel crashes, the entire axle will be effective. They are extremely strong, which is why trucks use them. They are also great for endurance racing. A torsion beam rear suspension is a little better. The wheels are offset from the axle, so the weight of the car creates torque, which compresses these springs allowing for a smoother ride.

A MacPherson strut assembly looks like this. It is basically a spring to cushion an individual wheel. Double wishbone suspensions are a little more sophisticated than straight strut designs and result in better handling, thanks to these two lateral control arms that look like the cape you wear when you're dressed as Sherlock Holmes, hence double fork. Multilingual suspensions look like this: a complicated mess of links to push and pull the wheel in every direction. This design is super customizable as these links can be replaced with adjustable parts to tune your suspension exactly how you want it. Camber is the angle formed by the wheels, resting on the ground, measured in degrees of swag.

Straight up and down wheels have no camber and therefore no camber. These wheels have like 20 degrees of negative swag and these wheels have 90 degrees of positive swag, which mathematically is maximum swag. The camber angle has a direct effect on the grip the tires have. So if you want a really grippy setup, you don't want a (bleep) bunch of camber in your tires. Whereas, if you want to look cool, you'll definitely want all that curvature. I personally am a grip guy. I like the grip. So I don't want to have a lot of curvature, but I can appreciate a good curvature setting when I see one. (laughs) Yes!

Double clutching is when you match the engine speed to the speed of the gear you want to shift. You put the clutch in neutral, release the clutch, give the engine some gas to increase the RPM, put the clutch back in, shift into the next gear, and release the clutch. AFR is the air-fuel ratio. Basically, the mixture of air and gasoline that your car uses to run. If you use more gas and there is not enough air, you are running rich, resulting in poor gas mileage. And if you're not using enough gas, you're running poorly and may notice poor or choppy acceleration.

And it's usually pretty bad for the engine. When you get the air-to-fuel ratio just right, it's like Goldilocks using a teddy bear's bathroom. It feels so good. Hey man, she woke up one day, I can't blame her. Let's talk about the different types of horsepower ratings you may have seen. Horsepower to the brake, horsepower to the wheels, horsepower to the crank,what does all that mean? Brake power, or BHP, is the amount of power actually delivered to the crankshaft, which is why some people say to the crank. Brake power is different from wheel power, or the amount of power that actually reaches the ground.

A noticeable amount of power is lost when it passes from the engine through the drivetrain to the wheels. You've probably heard of limp mode, which is a safe mode for your car. If any number of sensors are activated, limp mode is activated, which typically limits the engine to around 2000 RPM and prevents the vehicle from being injured. If your car goes into limp mode, you will have no choice but to go, embarrassed, to a mechanic, so they can identify which sensor was activated and why. Here are some manual transmission terms. Heel-toe is a tricky and genius method of downshifting with a manual transmission.

In the middle of a downshift, you brake and step on the accelerator at the same time, using your heel and toe. Try this one on your friend's car before you break yours. Rev matching occurs when you step on the accelerator to equalize the RPM difference between the engine and transmission during a shift. You can actually do this without a clutch. If you do it fluently enough, I can't. Rev drop is when you press the clutch and the RPM stays high and gradually decreases. Car manufacturers program it into the engine control module to prevent your car from creating too many harmful missions from rapid gear changes.

I know it sounds crazy, but believe me, it's real. Car accelerator has a good article, I will leave a link in the description. A money change occurs when you drive too hard and accidentally shift into the wrong gear. More specifically, in the change of money to shift one, two and then back to one, pressing first gear again after second instead of pressing third, shooting your RPM into the stratosphere and probably causing a lot of money worth of damage . Final drive is the relationship between the pinion and the ring gear of the differential and exists in all cars.

A lower final drive ratio will result in less torque but a higher top speed, while a higher ratio will do the opposite. LSD stands for limited slip differential. This is a type of rear differential that drives both wheels, even if one of them loses traction. This results in a smoother transfer of power to the wheels and allows for great drifts and burns. CVT stands for continuously variable transmission, which is driven by belt or chain instead of gears. The belt connects polys at an angle in a way that allows you to change gear ratios seamlessly. The car does not need to change gears in the traditional sense.

Cars with a CVT accelerate much more smoothly, since there are no steps between gears. Does it seem strange to you to accelerate perfectly and without problems? Yes, and it does. And people don't really like it, but it's cool. Turn signal fluid is a lubricating agent that helps silence that annoying clicking sound in your turn signals. If you hear that ticking sound, you're probably not taking enough care of your car, take it to the shop right away. Or if you're feeling really greasy, you can change the turn signal fluid yourself. I recommend Dirty Dirk's intermittent drink. It is made from real snake oil and we are proud to have them as a sponsor.

A transaxle is a large box that combines the driveshaft and differential into a single unit. They were invented to save a lot of space for FF and RR vehicles. They are also used on some FR vehicles to distribute weight. Running from a dig means starting a race from a dead stop, also known as a sprint. Racing from a roll means starting a race while the cars are already moving. Shout out to video 1320. I love you guys so much. Check out his channel for some roleplaying career examples. Ground effect is an aerodynamic principle of racing car design.

You shape the car so that when you drive, differences in air pressure create a downward force on your car, giving it better traction. Firing order is the order in which the spark plugs fire. For example, in this six-cylinder engine, the firing order is one five, three six two four. Firing orders are generally optimized to achieve balance between the left and right cylinder banks, as well as between the front and rear of the engine. Rod blow. If you hear a repetitive knocking sound coming from the engine that sounds like this, it could be a rod knock. Your piston is connected to a rod, which is then connected to the crankshaft.

There are bearings at each end, and if you run out of oil or simply blow the engine, you can damage the connecting rod bearing, which means metal-to-metal contact. Your engine may be toast. So rest in peace. There are a lot of car terms in there that you should know. How many did you already know? Let me know in the comments. Now you know them all. So don't hesitate to ask your mechanic for Dirty Dirk's intermittent drink with competence. Obviously, I missed a lot of them. We'll probably do more of these episodes in the future, so if there's anything you'd like to know more about, let me know in the comments below.

If you haven't subscribed to Donut yet, consider subscribing. We publish a lot of videos a week, a lot of content, we work very hard for you. We want to be inclusive. We want to help you get to know the cars we love so much. Follow Donut also in some media @donutmedia. Follow me on nolanjsykes. Sometimes I post photos. Be nice, see you next time.