Gentlemen's Agreement

[Rex]

Okay, after reading how AZ "spanked" that turbo'd 6 speed 350 with the AC on and one spark plug wire off.... HOPEFULLY people can satrt to see my horrible sense of humor.

Back to reality.... based on AZ's comments about being surprised that his 278HP, much heavier car was able to hang with the admittedly lighter and stronger 350, I made a comment about the 280hp "cap" aka folk lore. After exercising my search engine of choice (plug for google), I found no "proof", but lots of talk about it being mandated and/or an agreed upon limit for exports. Nonetheless, I found no goverment or automotive manufacturer's secret documents .

Can anyone find an example of a mid 90's or earlier production car exported from Japanwith a factory claimed hp over 280?

Or you can just glance at this post and go back to usefull messages .

[Jesda]

I tend to agree that 278hp for the Q is seriously underrated, and the 266hp for the 97-01 is about accurate.

[qship96]

the 1990-1996 300zx turbo was rated at 300HP from the factory for 5speed models headed for the USA,interesting that they were rated at 280HP for japan,maybe the 280HP cap was for the japanese market,not the exports for the rest of the world? I have heard that the older turbo skylines rated at 280 HP in Japan were seriously under rated,some say by over 100HP.

[WAMP]

In japan insurance and I think registration costs skyrocket above a certain hp level (300hp) and displacement. Hence the gentleman's agreement of offical underrated hp levels and 3.97L=4L displacement. Kind of a don't ask don't tell between manf and the gov. They might also measure hp in a different manner, i know euro manf use a different method than US.