In article <
[email protected]>,
"Matt O'Toole" <
[email protected]> wrote:
> Ryan Cousineau wrote:
>
> > In Europe, where diesels sell (the economics having a
> > lot to do with the extra fuel taxes there), already
> > there are pseudo-hybrid diesels on the road. I call them
> > this because they are diesels that stop their engines
> > when the car comes to a stop. The dirty secret of hybrid
> > cars is that this trick alone accounts for a lot of the
> > fuel economy gains these cars show, especially in stop-and-
> > go traffic.
>
> This is absolutely not true. The main reason for these
> cars' shutting off while stopped is to meet noise and
> pollution requirements, especially in Switzerland. Diesels
> use *very* little fuel at idle anyway, so shutting off
> won't do much.
I was willing to go along with this one for a moment, and
will accept the assertion this has more to do with pollution
than economy, but noise requirements? What does the Swiss
noise test protocol look like that it can be fooled by
turning off a car at idle? As far as I know, these tests
usually involve a limit set by a drive-by reading at a given
speed, and maybe another test at idle. The Swiss noise
limits are notoriously low (motorcycles lose a ton of
horsepower in Swiss spec, mainly because of noise reduction
measures), but are they really fooled by turning the car
off? I did a search on the Swiss government's website; my
German is too rusty to decipher which, if any, link went to
the noise regulations.
> Besides hybrids' basic architecture storing kinetic energy
> in batteries, they employ other little efficiencies too.
> For example, the Civic/Insight combines the alternator,
> starter, and traction motor into one "pancake" motor
> inside the bellhousing, which is more efficient than a
> belt driven alternator. The Prius makes extensive use of
> electronic control, and everything in the car is optimized
> for efficiency.
>
> > The Volkswagen Lupo TDI 3L:
http://www.vwvortex.com/art-
> > man/publish/article_319.shtml
> >
> > I think gas-electric hybrids like the Prius and Insight
> > are a bit of a sham: they really do have very good
> > economy numbers, but most of that is achieved by virtue
> > of their being relatively light, sitting on high rolling
> > resistance tires, and running very small motors. The battery-
> > powered part of things amounts to a very small gain.
>
> Yeah, those dummies at Toyota and Honda with their stupid
> PhDs in engineering, what do they know...
> The Insight is light for a modern US-market car, but the
> regular Civic Hybrid and Prius are not particularly. Keep
> in mind these cars are designed for the lowest levels of
> emissions, which sacrifices fuel economy somewhat. They
> also meet American safety standards, which cars like the
> Lupo could never.
Hee hee. I don't mean to suggest there's no gain. But I am
curious about the fact that a car like the Prius is very
popular, but Toyota has not brought out an "intermediate"
car: think about a Toyota Echo running aluminum bodywork,
their smallest engine, low-rolling-resistance tires, and an
idle-shutoff. I suspect such a car would be very close in
fuel economy to the Prius, but without the expense and
weight of a substantial battery pack (it would need a
slightly larger battery for the fast-start setup). The only
really pricey feature would be converting from steel to
aluminum, and the savings on that would be marginal.
They probably know their business here: the Prius promises
pain-free efficiency (in both emissions and economy), and
the cost of the car is still affordable if you're shopping
in Corolla/Camry land.
> Diesels are indeed very efficient -- the newest ones have
> reached 50% thermodynamic efficiency. But the best ones
> can't be used in the US for passenger cars, because they
> don't meet our emissions laws. Most of this is due to our
> high-sulfur fuel, but that's changing. It's true that a
> Jetta TDI, for example, would probably match a Civic
> Hybrid for fuel economy, and beat it in performance. But
> since diesel hybrids are not available in the US, it's
> not a fair comparison. It's possible they could do 30%
> better still.
> Some of this anti-diesel emissions regulation may be a
> trade barrier against European manufacturers -- who happen
> to have good diesel product to offer, while American and
> Japanese companies do not.
The emissions regulations in the US, whatever else they may
be, are not anti-diesel. First, there are quite a few
diesels for sale in the US right now. I can't think of a
time from the OPEC crisis onwards during which at least one
maker didn't have a diesel option for sale in the US. Now,
these ranged from the slightly stinky early Mercedes-Benz
diesels and the astoundingly wretched Oldsmobile diesels,
through countless smelly Rabbits, and finally to a range of
TDI cars today, mostly offered by Volkswagen (two of my co-
workers own Jetta TDIs, and Canadian emissions standards
essentially parallel the US standard, at least for states
not following the California spec).
Second, there are market reasons why diesels aren't as
attractive in the US. Diesels are very efficient: they get
better mpg on an absolute basis than gas engines, and diesel
fuel is usually a bit cheaper. But in the US, gas taxes are
so low that the cost of fuel is a smaller portion of the
operating costs of a car than in any other "developed"
nation. This means that opting for the diesel takes longer
to pay itself off than it would in Europe. In some cases,
you would not make up the cost difference ever, if you
didn't drive very far and sold your car relatively early.
And more than Europe, diesels have had to fight a long
battle against their reputation as smelly hard-starting
vehicles. I realize that is no longer the reality of diesel
ownership, but it's a major reason (along with performance)
why diesels don't sell well in the US.
--
Ryan Cousineau,
[email protected]
http://www.sfu.ca/~rcousine/wiredcola/ President, Fabrizio
Mazzoleni Fan Club
