I was wondering how i could tell if my 96 3.8 has lost any of its horsepower.... im certain it has seeing how it has 158000 miles on it, but how could i tell just how much power its lost?????

 

I guess you would have to know how much it had to begin with and then even after that put it on a dyno? I dunno I'm not a car smarty pants but that's my guess

 

if your at sea level the 3.8 should dyno at about 160hp/180 torque thats a really conservitive figgure if you dyno less that that then youve lost quite a bit of power and will need a tuneup

 

Those numbers for HP & TQ are at the flywheel. The HP & TQ(RWHP) at the wheels will be less due to about 20% drive train loss.

 

wrong there buddy the 3.8 makes 200hp/225 tq at the fly wheel thusly account for about 40 loss to each catagory he should dyno at the wheels at about that tyvm scotty....

 

40% is about twice what a AWD car gets. 170 is roughly 85% of 200hp. those figures seem about right to me

 

i wouldnt be worried about having or losing any hp in a v6 unless you have the money to do it right and get some real numbers out of it

 

Why would you not be worried?

 

unless it affected drivability, then i wouldnt be worried

 

well i was just curious, because I knew that the 3.8 makes 200 hp but i figured it had probably lost some hp..... the previous owner didnt take care of the car, and im trying to fix it back up.... But I also heard the 98 3.8 Cam was faster than the 96, that didnt make much sense to me....