What is torque & How Much do I need?

Why does a car need torque?

I like to keep life simple, so instead of using scientific jargon, let’s explain torque with everyday examples.

Every engine produces two types of power: horsepower (measured in bhp or PS) and torque. Horsepower usually peaks at higher revs, while torque is strongest at lower revs. Of the two, torque is the one most of us use every day.

Torque is the force that gets your car rolling from a standstill. If you’ve ever noticed a driver gently blipping the throttle as the lights turn from red to orange, that’s torque in action. Even moving the engine from idle to around 1,200 rpm provides enough torque to overcome the car’s weight and start moving smoothly.

In simple terms, torque helps your car start, pull loads, and handle hills without struggling. It’s what makes everyday driving feel effortless, and why cars with higher torque can tow a caravan or carry heavy loads with ease.

Can I feel the torque working?

Going up a hill, perhaps fourth gear, instead of having to drop down to third and rev it (which drinks fuel), accelerating for an overtaking manoeuvre without needing to change down a gear or two and loping along at motorway speeds with the engine nice and relaxed. You’ll notice it too at the filling station, because a diesel needs far fewer revs to give you the power you want and that in itself, regardless of any other factor, will save you fuel.

A couple of things though are changing in the market thanks to technology. One is that a lot of the latest petrol engines have very small cubic capacity with a 1.0 litre engine becoming quite common these days, but often they're turbocharged. Turbocharging is a way of using the gases in the exhaust system to force the petrol/air mix into the engine at high pressure which liberates more power and most especially, more torque, and the best of them are little marvels.

One of the most outstanding of these little marvels is the 1.4 TSi used throughout the Volkswagen Group which goes a stage further because it’s both turbocharged and supercharged.

The turbo needs the exhaust gases, so the more volume flowing through, the more basic energy it can use, but that needs revs; because the TSi is also supercharged this also forces the petrol/air mix in under pressure, but works in a different way and at much lower revs. The result is that the TSi gives you lots of torque and bhp across a much wider range, from the moment you start accelerating all the way through the mid speeds. It is very impressive.

So much so that in the International Engine of the Year awards the 1.4 TSi won the 1.0 to 1.4 litre category for every single year from when it was launched in 2006 – when it was also voted the overall winner, the best in the world - to 2014.

Since then class honours have gone to a similar design from Peugeot-Citroën whose little 1.2 is used from small hatchbacks up to big MPV like the Peugeot 5008 or Citroën C4 Grand SpaceTourer. So exceptionally good is this little unit, so capable at doing the job of powering cars from little hatchbacks to seven seaters that it’s been voted the class winner from 2015 to 2018 and there’s nothing to say it won’t win again next year.