Do you ever run your car up to the redline? What’re your reasons for doing or not doing it?

Nope…

It’s a car… why would I ?

A motorbike 🙂 Yes… often.

Yep, used to only change up when the rev limiter kicked in on my V6 Golf as it was still pulling (and it had been remapped which upped the limit).

It’s pointless in most cars, so generally no. But if something has a nice note up there then yes.

Whenever I safely can 🙂

Was beautiful in my Alfa v6- mk7 golf gti is still fun but less sonerous

Would really miss the noise and experience in an electric

My wife learnt to drive in a diesel and barely ever takes our golf above 3500, feels a shame!

No – no need. It’s a diesel.
Had a petrol civic before and that only really got going above 4500rpm, so that went to the redline every now and then *

*to safely overtake a tractor for example 🙂

The Clio 182 I’m selling at the moment (80k miles, £2,200 for those interested 😉 ) was built to be redlined, the power only really comes in above 5,000rpm and gets to 7,250rpm* very quickly after that. Makes a good noise doing it too

*only once warmed up for 20mins minimum of course

If I’m making progress to an important business meeting in my panzerwagen I’ll take to the max, because that’s the way I lead my life, on the redline.

Sometimes. No on the road but yes on the track, but then only if it’s the difference between just avoiding the limiter and another gear change. A lot depends on what your cars dyno graph looks like though. The higher you rev an engine the more stress it’s under (unless you’re really labouring it down low).

So uncouth.

yes often, its the only way to get the maximum acceleration in my cars, and its fun.

presume by ‘redlining’ you mean change gear near the actual revlimiter, but not actually causing the rev limiter to cut in? if you mean actually bounce it off the rev limiter, then no, never – unless I miss time a gear shift.

MX-5 – Yes frequently.
Land Rover – Never.

Depends what you are driving really.

I drive a diesel SMax!

Other peoples cars

On roads in my shitty petrol car. Hell no, it’s lost all power by 5.5k 😆

On my track car, I try not to, its had a lot of mods done recently and has caught me out a couple of times on the track.

This might be a myth, but it keeps the engine a little less coked up if you run it through the rev range occasionally, I’m not on about bouncing it off the limiter. 😐

have you ever driven 68bhp in a vehicle that CAN weight just under 2 tonne.

if you short shift on a hill you risk stalling 😀

Mechanical sympathy is my middle name and I’ve never owned or driven a car that hasn’t sounded or felt as though it was going to explode on its way to the redline so no, never

But I’ve owned a few two-stroke motorbikes and IL4s where the redline was just a coloured section on the revcounter and there was no mechanical distress whatsoever so yes and often

its an auto, so sort of.

In my car no – its a diesel so it’s given all its got to give by 3000 rpm so no point in going any higher towards the 4500rpm red line. The wife’s car is an auto so if i’m pulling out of a busy juncion or accellarating down a motorway slip road aiming for a gap in the traffic, it will sometimes kick down and use all the revs. That’s what they’re there for.

Though I can completely understand that if you had a car with an interesting engine that sounded nice at a particular RPM then I might be a bit more inclined to delay the gearchange unneccassarily from time to time when the fancy took me. But to my ear at least most cars or bikes don’t sound good when maxed out at full revs. There is always a sweet spot beyond which the noise just gets harsh and screechy like fingernails scaping down a blackboard. A bit like if you were to turn up a HiFi too loud and you start getting clipping, distortion and all sorts of other effects.

In my ten year old turbo diesel Corsa, the party’s over by 3k, so no.

In my old 1275 mini with stage 1 kit, yes, every time I drove it purely for the racket it made through the pipe and air filter 😀 In our diesel Doblo that has to last us a while, not so much.

Nope, drive a diesel, there’s no point

i’m blessed/cursed with an over-developed sense of mechanical sympathy.

our current car (1.8 petrol vauxhall) is not at all happy approaching 4k, never mind the ‘redline’ of 6000rpm…

had an old VW jetta, bloody years ago, that thing just revved, and revved, and revved, that was a really ‘nice’ engine.

(60mph in 2nd was no bother)

8250rpm redline so why not.

And every other car as all cars need an italian tune up now and again.

Mechanical sympathy is my middle name and I’ve never owned or driven a car that hasn’t sounded or felt as though it was going to explode on its way to the redline so no, never

according to many …..my cars all sound like they are going to explode from idle all the way through to 4500…… im not sure you would be able to tell the difference between idle and full beans without a rev counter 😀

its now 10 years old and owned for 7…. never given me any issues with the engine despite it getting used through its range often.

I do in my parents suzuki alto as otherwise any breeze would blow me backwards.

In my old 84 MK2 Golf with 180+ bhp (16v ABT tuned engine) i used to occasionally when the road conditions allowed as it was very entertaining to hit 7800rpm but it’s been off the road for the past 2 years getting a very slow (and expensive) bare metal rebuild so all i can do now is sit on a plastic crate in the bare shell and make broom-broom noises.

In my current runaround of a 2003 ford connect van i rarely take it above 3000rpm as there is no point in revving the nuts off it

Sure, occasionally on the road; definitely on the track (and like the other peeps; if by redlining you mean “changing gear at the last possible moment” and not “bouncing off the limiter”)

*peak power is at ~7k rpm

I’m driving my wife’s C2 with the eco-strangled 1.0 engine (0-60 in 16 seconds). I hit the redline by accident just in normal driving because it is so slow.

It’s such a crappy undriveable little engine as well, I don’t think it has enough torque to pull my foreskin back. There’s absolutely nothing below about 3500 RPM. Then the bloody redline is 6000. You have to constantly drive round revving it up looking like a boy racer **** just to go at normal speeds.

Only in hire cars…

And my 1996 1.4 Megane the night before trading in. It made what can only be described as a ‘death rattle’. I quickly changed up and trundled home to preserve something to trade in…

V-tec yo.

Rarely, but when there is a pull away from lights or roundabout on an open road (National speed limit of course) then the v-tec does occasionally get woken up.

Occasionally – it’s a diesel automatic so generally shifts at about 4500rpm if you keep your foot flat to the floor but since it’s new I’ve held it in gear until the rev limiter begins to come in a couple of times.

I imagine that cooling issues aside a modern diesel engine would run at the red line for years before anything happened.

Drive/ride it like you stole it! 😀

I have blown up quite a few motors. Quite spectacularly! Punching a con rod through the crank case at >120mph on my VF500 F2, and the contents of the gearbox dumping itself onto the red hot exhaust collector box and engulfing me in a huge cloud of smoke, must have looked as spectacular as the newly released piston saying hello to the valves sounded! 😳

How fast can you pull a clutch in?

Yes. A flat six at 7000 rpm sounds completely awesome in the Brynglas tunnels…

of course, occasionally. RS Clio, so it kind of likes it anyhow.

GLWTS legend – why are you selling?!

I think redlining finished the day after I parked rubber side up in the Goyt Valley.No. I’m slow and old now and more interested in fuel consumption.

Surely the answer is yes when it’s a hire car
😉

simonbowns – Member
GLWTS legend – why are you selling?!

Doing more miles than ever planned for it, so the things that give it ‘character’ are starting to get a bit wearing. Haven’t exactly compromised massively though, got a Fiesta ST now too

No point if produces max torque/power below the red line

No point if produces max torque/power below the red line

actually, there is.

lets ignore torque (its irrelevant at this point) and focus on power. A typical power curve might go

4.0 150bhp
4.5 160bhp
5.0 170bhp
5.5 180bhp
6.0 170bhp
(redline)

lets say your shift from 2nd to 3rd drops from 6000 rpm to 4,500 rpm – this would be going from 170 bhp down to 160bhp. if however you shifted at peak power (5500 rpm to 4000 rpm), you’d drop from 180bhp down to 150bhp (ish, it would actually drop slightly fewer bhp as the revs would only drop to something like 4125 rpm). anyway, from the time it takes you to get back to 4,500 rpm you’d be getting ~150-160 bhp. if you’d let the car rev, you’d have been getting ~180-170 bhp at the same time (using the higher revs), which is a lot more.

On very few engines you do get less than maximum power out of the engine by shifting early (ie ones with a very peaky/early power curve), but on the vast majority of engines (yes, even including turbo diseasals), you get most power by hitting the redline every time. That’s why the autobox does exactly that.

The Clio 182 I’m selling at the moment (80k miles, £2,200 for those interested ) was built to be redlined,

I admire your sales patter. Much better than “has been driven hard all its life”.