If the nut doesn’t move, no power is being produced. The torque on the wheel nut is being applied regardless of whether the nut moves or not. That 980-Newton force on the end of a lever (the wheel brace) that’s a metre away from the nut, then produces a torque on the nut of 980 Newton-metres (Nm), calculated by multiplying 980 (Newtons) by one (metre). That 980-Newton force comes from multiplying your mate’s 100kg mass by 9.8 metre/second, the acceleration due to gravity. If your mate puts all of his 100kg weight on the end of the wheel brace when it’s in a horizontal position, that 100kg weight equates to a downward (linear) force of 980 Newton Newton being the standard measurement of force in the metric system. To get the nut turning you need to overcome the friction between the nut and the stud by applying sufficient force to the end of the wheel brace. Thankfully you have a huge wheel brace that’s a metre long and an even bigger mate, whose pizza and beer diet sees him topping out at 100kg, to help get the wheel nut off. So where torque is a rotation force, power is the rate at which that force can be applied.Ĭonsider this simple analogy: You have an old 4x4 with a wheel nut badly rusted onto its stud. Simple laws of physics actually tie power and torque inextricably together, because power is simply the mathematical product of torque multiplied by engine speed. And if that’s not enough, something like the 4.4-litre V8 turbodiesel in a Range Rover claims 740Nm!īut what does 450Nm, 600Nm or even 740Nm really mean? And is having a huge torque figure like that more important than having a decent amount of power? The 2.3-litre turbo-diesel in the Nissan NP300 Navara claims 450 Newton-metre (Nm), an unheard of figure for a relatively small four-cylinder diesel a few years back, while a good 3.0-litre diesel these days makes 600Nm or more. *This was first published in 4X4 Australia's September 2015 issue LOOK at the specifications of a modern turbo-diesel engine and one thing you can’t miss is the large amount of torque they produce.
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