Fake Engine Noise Is the Auto Industry's Dirty Little Secret

methinks this article is fake.

 

No, it is NOT fake.

There was a report on ABC News, tonight.

The sounds are fed through the speakers to fool the driver. They even feed sounds through the Nissan Leaf.

 

and you can't tell?

 

NO! It sounds like the real thing. It's four speaker stereo played through the car's system synchronized with the car's ECU.

 

what does the leaf sound like? i'm starting to like toyota even more than i already do.

 

You'd have to drive a Leaf to find out.

The Ford Eco-Boost Mustang uses the V8 Mach one sound from the 1970's Mustang, according to the ABC News report.

 

probably a cobra or something. i think i'll stay with 'whoosh'. i wonder what the volt sounds like, bob klutz's hellcat?

 

The pipe version (and even the part number) in at least one car model was mentioned here in PC some years ago.

 

All I can think of:

 

I think Toyota was one of the first with a Lexus.

 

It's not fake, automakers employ audio engineers to make a car sound a certain way.

Now it's come to installing loudspeakers to simulate engine sounds:
The Rise of the Fake Engine Roar - Popular Mechanics

"in the future, you may be able to toggle a switch that makes your Prius howl like it's got a V-8..."

 

How do they get the sound to play outside the car?

I have to admit it.
I think that a muscle car like say......the Dodge Challenger is about the stupidest car on the planet, but if I won the lottery?
It would be one of the cars in my driveway the next day.

Call it a guilty pleasure.
Anyway....the point is that I happened to see/feel/hear one do a 3/4 throttle launch from an intersection yesterday, and I have to say that those audio engineers at Dodge are doing one helluva good job at making a Hemi 5.7l V8 sound so cool from 2-3 car lengths away.

No.
This wasn't the 700BHP 6.2l Hellcat, but just a regular old Challenger.
Ford and Chevy must use the same engineers because I've observed the same effects from the new C7, Camaros and Mustangs out there.

Call it what you will but based on current trends in the automotive industry there must be an itch out there that needs scratching because ABC's story (if true!!) points to a problem or a consumer demand that engineers are trying to solve.

YNMV

 

i want a white noisemaker that turns my pip into a stealth magnet.

 

So this morning, the little 'Walter Mitty' sports car with the glass-pack muffler was in an adjacent lane making his engine flatulence sounds and showing serious body roll as he tried to dart around traffic. There are some cars that need a muffler so everyone else won't have an accident laughing their asses off.

Bob Wilson

 

I've never understood this. I remember the Polo GTI was one of the first cars to do it. So you've got all this sound-deadening weight in the engine bulkhead, and then it plays engine noise through the speakers.

My speakers are for my music or documentaries or audiobooks, not for noise (although some of the comments on It's Triple J Hottest 100 time - best songs of 2014 | PriusChat would suggest that I am indeed choosing to pump just noise through my stereo). I got a car with a good stereo because I wanted to hear the stuff that I had actively chosen to listen to, not a computer pretending to be an engine. If I wanted that, I'd ask my three-year-old daughter to make car noises.

Like ETC(SS), I can appreciate a good engine noise. I think the AMG 63 engine noise (from the E63, C63, etc) is one of the finest mechanical noises there has ever been. But even then, I want to wind down the windows and hear the real thing, not listen to some crappy fake noise on my speakers.

It's stupid.

 

Ha, just turned an F150 with the eco boost which sounded exactly like a washing machine into a eco diesel which sounds like a 4 cylinder 6 volt 58 vw.
so what if you don't turn on the radio?

 

"...only trouble is it wants to take your nice respectable family car and thrash the guts out of it..." Love it!! SUPERB! words of truth, honor and glory and to live by. I want to get speakers on the outside of my car so when I pass on the 2-lane roads here, folks know it - the Prius is silent. Also at idle and just taking off from a stop sign down town, folks can't hear anything and it scares some of them,...but a super-modified Muscle car sound at idle and pushing on the pedal at the light with be fun.

 

This reminds me of the movie "The Dilemma" !!!!!