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Just by guessing as I have no tach, mines never been above 3k.....prolly not even that high....the more gas I give it the more gas I waste, since it just makes more noise and doesn't go any faster. So I'm a short-shift driver
Every engine makes it obvious to most drivers where the sweet spot is for torque and power and there is no reason to go above these sweet spots-unless you want wear and destruction.
But this thread brings up another point: No red lines on tachs of many/most Ford products. Why is that??
Especially on trucks that will have commercial lives and where some employee will try to "find" the redline and blow up the engine.
Every engine makes it obvious to most drivers where the sweet spot is for torque and power and there is no reason to go above these sweet spots-unless you want wear and destruction.
And noise.
Originally Posted by phoneman91
But this thread brings up another point: No red lines on tachs of many/most Ford products. Why is that??
Do you actually need a tach? Nothing wrong with it if you do, but I don't.
Originally Posted by phoneman91
Especially on trucks that will have commercial lives and where some employee will try to "find" the redline and blow up the engine.
That's called an employee termination device ;-) A friend of mine who has a fleet of vans for his carpet cleaning business had one van that kept breaking down in rather weird ways. It also had more flat tires than the rest of the fleet combined in any given year. When the regular driver of that van was on vacation, the van was spiffy fine and never was an issue.
Seemed that worker liked to get paid for sitting on the side of the road waiting for a tow truck instead of cleaning carpets. Good time to lose a job too, considering the economy.
I dont think they have any red lines on the tach because they all have rev limiters built into the computers . Lew
Yeah-I understand about the rev limiters in the ECU-but that doesnt prevent the driver from downshifting at too high of road speed at too low of a gear and overreving the engine that way. And without a redline-the driver wouldnt be aware that he is overreving the engine before hearing the big BANG .
I dont think it makes any difference what gear your in the limiter will cut in ..But i guess if your going like 70 & manueling down shifting that will make the computer shut the motor down . If you do this you will see what it does . If you put a high performance motor in a truck with the stock computer when the limiter kicks in you will know it . Its not nice . With the stock motor you dont notice it as much because the rpms come up slow . Lew
if the truck came from the factory with a tachometer then it would have a redline on it. although not many trucks came with them, as far as i know none were available in the f150 and most trucks with the tach were a diesel. some came on the 351 and 460 equipped trucks as well, as far as i knew no straight six or 302 trucks came with a tach but i could be wrong
and if you downshift too quick, even in a straight six truck it revved high, but hit the limiter and kicked the rear end sideways. the 300 6 has never hesitated to go sideways if i floored it in first or second gear
if the truck came from the factory with a tachometer then it would have a redline on it. although not many trucks came with them, as far as i know none were available in the f150 and most trucks with the tach were a diesel. some came on the 351 and 460 equipped trucks as well, as far as i knew no straight six or 302 trucks came with a tach but i could be wrong
and if you downshift too quick, even in a straight six truck it revved high, but hit the limiter and kicked the rear end sideways. the 300 6 has never hesitated to go sideways if i floored it in first or second gear
These F150 did have factory tachs options with all engines and most of these Ford factory tachs do not have redlines. I havent seen many other manufacturers that offered factory tachs without redlines. Something about Fords,factory tachs and redlines . Some of the earlier Mustangs have redlines on the factory tachs
But then-what other manufacturer-other than Ford- will give you an oil pressure gauge that doesnt show actual oil pressure??
Kind of like my FJR1300 that has an oil Level warning light and not an oil pressure light. Oil pressure is sure much more important to know than oil level!!
I dont think it makes any difference what gear your in the limiter will cut in ..But i guess if your going like 70 & manueling down shifting that will make the computer shut the motor down . If you do this you will see what it does . If you put a high performance motor in a truck with the stock computer when the limiter kicks in you will know it . Its not nice . With the stock motor you dont notice it as much because the rpms come up slow . Lew
The computer cant shut the engine RPM down when the driver downshifts. The computer can shut the engine down when upshifting-and it does it by cutting out the ignition. This way of shutting down the engine doesn't work when the driver downshifts-the engine can become a bomb all by itself-ignition or no ignition.
A bad excessively high speed downshift could killl an engine-or the driver may get away with it for several times and not know that he is overrevving the engine-because Ford didnt include a redline on the factory tach.
This is more likely to occur in mountainous terrain-where the driver is trying to use engine compression and no throttle to control the vehicle speed doing down the mountain.
Anyone that have operated a high performance motorcyle knows what a rev limiter does. Or low performance motorcycle for that matter. My old ST1100 limiter operated all of the time---very smooth engine and flat horsepower curve and low output (100 HP) meant that I was hitting it all of the time on Interstate onramps.
my 96 cadillac had no gauge pertaining to oil. one day when i had an oil leak i didnt know until the dash started making a particular dinging noise (apparently you need to be a musician and know what the noises mean to know whats wrong with your car). all the tachs have redlines weather they are easily visible or not is another story, even an old 88 mercury sable wagon i had, had one. trust me they are there if you look.
all the tachs have redlines weather they are easily visible or not is another story, even an old 88 mercury sable wagon i had, had one. trust me they are there if you look.
I wish that you were correct. All factory tachs should have redlines. But not true. See this :
hmm wierd, ive only seen the diesel ones in person and they have one. my bad though. i was almost certain the pre-92 ones all had redlines so maybe it was something they didnt do for 92-96 but again im only assuming since ive only really seen the diesel ones. id rather have an aftermarket tach anyways. alot of dash gauge clusters were setup crappy in many cars, which is rather annoying when your curious about important things such as oil pressure!!
hmm wierd, ive only seen the diesel ones in person and they have one. my bad though. i was almost certain the pre-92 ones all had redlines so maybe it was something they didnt do for 92-96 but again im only assuming since ive only really seen the diesel ones. id rather have an aftermarket tach anyways. alot of dash gauge clusters were setup crappy in many cars, which is rather annoying when your curious about important things such as oil pressure!!
Yeah-I am with you. Have you noticed that your factory "oil Pressure" gauge doesnt change readings with oil temperature nor RPM on your Ford truck??
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