Maserati Quattroporte tagged posts

We got latest news regarding the facelifted Ferrari 458 will be using a 3.8L turbocharged V8 engine, which will be introduced sometime next year. Ferrari is also changing its name to be 458M or 458T.

The 3.8L turbo V8 is based on the same engine that is used on the latest Maserati Quattroporte (M156, 2013 – present) GTS. But its output will be tuned to be around 670bhp (679 hp), up from current 458’s 570hp generated from a 4.5L displacement naturally aspirated V8 engine. That is a 109 hp jump for the new model.

The current output of the 3...

Maybe there is no such issue in US market at this moment, but at least 6 incidents were reported and verified in China region.

The most serious issue happened on a Chinese customer who bought the brand new Maserati Quattroporte (with the 3.0T engine) back in November, 2013. As of the incident, the car only has around 3,900 miles on it.

On 04/27/2014, that unfortunate Chinese owner drove the Quattroporte in rain for around 3 hours. Then next day the car completely died: it cannot be started and even the door cannot be opened too.

After inspection, Maserati mechanic found tons of water inside of the spare wheel area in the trunk...

We all know race engines means high tech and expensive. Because these engines are only produced in small volume and usually working in high load/high stress circumstances, they usually uses some technologies that are not available in massively produced passenger cars.

One interesting fact is, because the race engine has higher assembly precision standards, there is less energy loss due to frictions between internal moving parts. Therefore, some race engines do have better fuel efficiency when comparing to a similar massively produced passenger car engine.

But some good stuff in race engines may act reversely in cars that are designed for daily driving...

Nowadays, cars usually have their engine bolted to transmission together directly, because it is easy to implement and saves costs. For some sports cars which seek to have a better weight distribution, the engine and transmission are located in different section of the car body, therefore requires an extra solid torque tube to connect them. This is an exotic design, for example, the below image shows the LFA’s torque tube.

But please do not misunderstand that this is a requirement for a good sports car...