I must say. My Lexus IS250 is a different beast now at sea level.

I live in Denver at 5200 feet and routinely drive to the mountains at 7000-10000 feet. Car is pretty sluggish.

Driving cross country and I started really feeling the difference around Missouri. Car was very responsive. Had a lot more pep.

I know elevation has a negative effect on HP but it is pretty dramatic for my Lexus at least. Too bad going back to elevation in a week

 

It is the same effect for any naturally aspirated car.

 

Same effect even with forced induction. Maximum boost that the wastegate will allow is relative to atmospheric pressure. If you have a car with 6 psi of boost, it will push 14.7 + 6 = 20.7 psi absolute pressure at sea level, but only 12 + 6 = 18 psi in Denver.

Only electric vehicles escape unscathed by altitude.

 

Yeah you truly never understand it until you witness it first hand. It is pretty dramatic.

A car loaded with the full suitcases and other stuff in trunk with 3 people and drives with more pep/horsepower at sea level vs mile high

 

My understanding is the effect on forced induction is the same, but it is proportionally affected less for a car with equal sea level HP.

 

That's correct. Using the numbers from my example earlier in the thread, even though both the normally aspirated and boosted cars drop by 2.7 psi, the NA car drops from 14.7 to 12 psi, an 18.4% decrease, but the car with 6 PSI boost drops from 20.7 to 18 psi, which is only a 13% decrease.

That said, I remember when I took my Eagle Talon turbo to Mount Mitchell in North Carolina, the drop-off in performance was definitely noticeable on the butt dyno.

 

Well I just got back to Denver and car feels sluggish again. It was nice driving around the east coast at or near sea level. Car was way more responsive. A simple tap of my gas pedal and it went and didn't need to down shift. Now at elevation it takes more effort to move and car is constantly downshifting.

Oh well, just how it is.

 

Even the electric/hybrid cars can be effected by mountain driving. When the battery gets drained going up a long grade, you only have the small NA gas engine power to reach the top. One of the ES300H owners wrote up his experiences over on the ES forum. He did note the battery recharges real fast going down the other side of the mountain

 

Maybe it's an issue with remapping my ECU?

I have the Carfax history of my vehicle and it was sold in CA and driven in TX before coming here to CO a few years ago.

Does it need to be remapped for thin air here in CO to adjust for the elevation?

Is this common among certain cars? Thanks

 

It wouldn't make much of a difference, but it wouldn't hurt to try; this is because you can't control how much air goes into the car when you drive at that elevation (the higher up, the less air is available for an engine to intake).