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Thrashometer

Get a better idea of what the condition the engine is in.

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Buying a used car can be a risky business. That is why I am proposing that from now on all new cars are fitted with a Thrashometer. It works exactly like an odometer but instead measuring the distance travelled the Thrashometer will measure how many rpms the engine has done in its life. eg; Two cars both with 50000km. One of them the thrashometer shows 10000 and the other shows 20000. Seems perfectly clear to me that one car has done twice as many rpms to cover the same distance and therefore should be in worse condition.

—	phorysn, May 15 2008

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Bakeable .... the EMS could integrate RPM, idling (taxis do lots of that), hot running etc. and hash together a "thrash value" for the powerplant.

But what vendor would want to present a potential purchaser with such information ?

—	8th of 7, May 15 2008

Somewhat baked in newer BMWs, which need servicing more often if driven hard. Just check the service history to deduce whether the car has been thrashed.

—	FishFinger, May 15 2008

I thought most cars these days with ECUs had a "time to next service indicator", not just BMWs.

—	coprocephalous, May 15 2008

(separate note: at 3000rpm, in normal driving, a engine will amass nearly eleven million revolutions per hour. If it does 50,000km at an average 50km/hr, that would be eleven billion revolutions recorded on the thrashometer)

—	david_scothern, May 15 2008

Easily bakable but not always accurate unless you also include a timer, because I've driven in a lot of traffic which isn't that hard on the car, but would show up big on this meter.

—	MisterQED, May 15 2008

Yes, and it needs to factor in temperatures operated under and oil change frequency in order to present a full picture.

—	normzone, May 15 2008

Timers.. i love it! now we are getting somewhere. Doesnt seem so hard to put together a small computer that could coordinate all these thing in to an easy to read format. Does it?

—	phorysn, Jul 12 2008

//because I've driven in a lot of traffic which isn't that hard on the car, but would show up big on this meter.// A combination of an RPM-ometer and a hours-in-operation meter would cover all the bases. Hours-in-operation meters are already common on stationary equipment and aircraft, shouldn't be too much of a stretch to see them on autos.

—	CaptainCrunch, Jul 12 2008

It seems to me that revs per mile only indicates the gear used to travel said distance. If I drive down the motorway in fifth gear, I will use the same number of revs per mile whether I do 50 mph or 100 mph. If I do the same distance at 30mph, I will strain the engine a lot less but I will need third of forth gear and more revs.

Maybe a better measure would be fuel used:

Gear too low? - high fuel consumption

Gear too high? - high fuel consumption

Going very fast? - high fuel consumption

Taking the slow road rather than the fast road? - Slightly higher fuel consumption but nowhere near what the increase in revs would suggest.

Idling in traffic? - some fuel consumption but not much.

Trying to do 0-30 mph in under 2 seconds? - High fuel consumption if there is a lot of stopping/starting on your journey

It should also be pointed out that different engines can take different amounts of abuse. A sports car will happily do 5,000+ revs, treatment that would kill an economy car. So comparing two different cars would not be fair.

—	Bad Jim, Jul 12 2008

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