So every schoolboy knows what the most powerful production car is. I however want to know what car has the highest specific horsepower. That is, hp per litre.
I started wondering about this when I saw the new 1.4 turbo engine from VW/Audi in an A3 going by the other day. It apparently has 125 bhp which is fairly handy for a 1.4. I'm sure there must be better examples. Maybe motorbikes too?
Aprilia RS250: 60bhp, so 240bhp/litre.
Bimota V-Due (500cc): 111bhp, so 222bhp/litre.
Two-stroke motorcycles fare well!
Can't remember what the capacity is but a Mitsi Evo FQ-400 kicks out 415 bhp
125hp for a 1.4, rubbish
Well i think you'd have to take turbo's out of the equation, since well F1 used to run 900bhp from a 1.5ltr turbo.
Mitsubishi evo ran a production FQ400 from a 2.0ltr turbo
Honda got 250bhp from its 2.2ltr for its s2000 or even 187bhp from its 1.8ltr integra typeR. Anything over 100hp/per litre is good going. Ferrari F430 scuderia 503bhp from its 4.3ltr
Prob best production engine though is, albeit very very limited production, the 3.5ltr V8 in the Caparo T1 which produces 610bhp. Now thats amazing
This 1.4 turbo petrol isnt very good, the newer pug diesels are 110hp 1.6 - would expect more from a petrol.
However wikipedia gives:
Petrol/Gasoline (naturally-aspirated) piston engine - 106.2 kW (125.2 PS/142.3 hp)/litre[citation needed] - 1994 JDM Suzuki Cultus Suzuka edition R13B (138 kW (188 PS/185 hp) 1.3 L I4)
Petrol/Gasoline (forced-induction) piston engine - 149 kW (203 PS/200 hp)/litre 400 hp - 2005 Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution VIII FQ400 (298 kW (405 PS/400 hp) 2.0 L I4
Diesel (naturally-aspirated) - 33.4 kW (45.4 PS/44.7 hp)/litre (100 kW (136 PS/134 hp) DIN 3.0 L I6) - 1995 Mercedes E 300 D
Diesel (forced-induction) - 75.2 kW (102,2 PS)/litre (150 kW (204 PS) 2.0 L I4 twin-turbo) - 2007 BMW new 2L engines
Naturally-aspirated pistonless rotary engine - 140.5 kW (191.1 PS/188.8 hp) /litre - Mazda RX-8 Renesis (184 kW (250 PS/247 hp) JIS 1.3 L)
Sure I read recently that a Honda S2000 has about the most BHP/l for a current N/A car.
The Honda S2000 has/had a 2.0 litre engine.
s2000 is 120 hp/l
My celica is 150hp/l but it is slightly tweaked. From 100/l
Jimbo, your right, it runs a 2.0ltr, thinking of the Accord type R
Not strictly a production car but these guys take some beating at 975bhp/l
It's amazing what you can do when you can strip down your engine 4 times per mile. Running costs get a bit much though.
Indeed and find somewhere to fill up with nitro-methane might be a challenge too 
Depends if its street legal or not - these 2 take a bit of beating Ghostriders 499bhp from 1298cc bike & Andy Gabats 860bhp from 2 litre cosworth.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ud_gXPCMUDw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8pyb2tcK5ZQ
This is impresive for normally aspirated 1000bhp from 3litres
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PFMuXe80-a4
Ultimately its power to weight that makes a car fun, not power to displacement or ultimate power. Which would definitely go to the caparo T1 with 610hp to 550kg!:
It all depends on if the engine is Normally aspirated or forced induction.
The bench mark for production NA cars is 100BHP per litre, there's not alot out there in gneral car world than can achieve this and still have enough tourque at low enough revs to make the car truly driveable, one example as stated above is the Honda S2000.
It's nigh on impossible to achieve this kind of output without some very clever variable cam timing. the previos incarnation of the BMW M3 was also pretty damm good at this, also with clever variable cam timing and AFAIK variable inlet manifold lenght allowing both low down torue and top end power.
Turbo cars, with the right tuning are very easy to generate high specific outputs of both torque and horsepower. However they can become very very laggy and no fun to drive unless flat out.
coffeeking I'd be very interested to hear of the modifications to your engine/breathing/ecu that have allowed to to achieve 150BHP/litre from a NA (presumably VVTi) Toyota engine, whats the power & torque curve like?
Just to blow my own trumpet my last project NA car was a 1993 Honda Civic running a very heavily modified 1796cc DOHC VTEC engine, in it's upper most state of tune this was giving 234BHP & 165lbs/ft of torque. That was an expensive engine completly built from the sump up - stood me at over 3k inc inlet/outlet manifolds & transmission.
steve_b77
oooow the civic sounds nice, im just starting on my DC2 but not going to go that far with it.
has a lovely honda engin in it
missed me slash
BRM V16 produced 600BHP from a 1.5l, naturally aspirated too.
You aint gonna top that = 400bhp per litre
It sounds AWESOME too.
I think you can - http://www.gurneyflap.com/renaultef15.html
Nah snaps, it's got blowers, that's just cheating.
If we're going to that, I may have to invoke the mighty GE90...
Those BRM's were supercharged http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BRM_British_Racing_Motors_V16
This is normal aspirated http://www.mefeedia.com/entry/graeme-wight-junior-predator-v10-doune-hill-climb/17004201
coffeeking I'd be very interested to hear of the modifications to your engine/breathing/ecu that have allowed to to achieve 150BHP/litre from a NA (presumably VVTi) Toyota engine, whats the power & torque curve like?
Yeeeeuch, wouldn't touch a gen7 with someone elses stick Horrible feeling gutless engine in a minging body (IMO, personal taste - not keen on the high-revving VVTi engines!). I'm afraid I'm a turbo convert! Mine's a fully rebuilt '91 GT4 (3S-GTE, hybrid turbo, forged internals, metal HG, ceramic paddle clutch, straight 4" intake and cold air box, full 3" exhaust from the turbo back (manifolds known to be pretty unrestrictive to ~400hp), beefed up fuel rail and injectors all controlled by a self-mapped megasquirt). Currently waiting on new intercooling and a healthier bank account so I can actually drive it again Not everyone's taste in cars but it's my labour of love
234 hp for 3K sounds like a tall story to me ,and a 3SGTE self mapped on megasquirt good luck with that !
150 hp per litre is possible the last engine i built that gave that was a non turbocharged cosworth engine wich cost nearly 30k and the little Vaxhall corsa engines 1400cc give 160hp approximate cost 10k
And as for turbo engines being laggy turbos have moved on a long way.
The last 500hp subaru i built had 28psi of bost at 1600 rpm with over 350 ftlb of torque at 1600rpm with over 500ftlb at 5200rpm approx cost 30k
Anything is just about possible but there are three variables when it comes to engines
CHEAP
RELIABLE
POWERFUL
Pick two options from above
Now get your foot down
on and on It was very nice, 4 years ago when I had it.
kingofsweden when you build the whole thing yourself, have machining done in return for labour, dyno time and mapping in return for labour and get everything at cost or in return for labour it's easy 
Suppose I should've mentioned that 
bit of a different layout, but the wankel [snigger] rotary engine in the RX-8 comes with 230+bhp from a 1.3 litre engine, which is pretty impressive.
HP
Technically it's only a 1.3, in reality it's more like a 2.7
and a 3SGTE self mapped on megasquirt good luck with that !
It's done, up and running happily at 1.1 bar and had been for 18 months as a daily driver (with the odd minor niggle which I adapted the firmware to fix and have had no probs since) before I took her off the road for a clutch/fly/gearbox and cam-belt change? It's got full boost curve, TVIS and closed loop idle control just fine, switchable tables with finer mapping for low-boost driving such as motorway trawls and getting to work. But thanks for your concern 
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