Ford to Tear Down EcoBoost V-6 "Torture Test" Engine at Detroit Auto Show

[Swordsman88]

Originally Posted by Bossxr8

Age and thousands of cold starts can't be simulated in a few short months of durability testing. That is where most of the wear occurs in an engine and probably causes most of the power loss that occurs over time and k's.

These durability test engines run for long periods at a time and probably don't have a lot of cold starts during their test lives.

This sound right to me. I did read somewhere once (i think it was ford of europe) that ford engineers had built a rig that basically sat in an assembled car (as in almost production spec) and just pushed buttons and turned the wheel (basically everything you'd do as you drove it around) to test out durability of the interior. Aparently this got some engine guys quite interested in getting it to turn the key (which was part of the rig) but with an actual drivetrain installed to test out this cold start issue. Would be cool to see if they actually do that.

Does anyone have any sort of data RE the loss of power over kms with a stock engine etc.? Would be interesting to see. I heard that properly maintained most modern engines lose alot less than you might think in terms of low down performance but high end power takes a hit (which makes sense given increased friction etc.).

i've driven high mileage cars second hand (ef/au etc) and some of them seem to make great power even compared to much lower mileage examples. In fact some low mileage examples felt pretty gutless in comparison!