What the iPhone can teach us about electric cars January 23, 2010
Posted by richard in : Green cars, Technology , 4commentsELECTRIC car owners suffer from range anxiety – that of worrying that the batteries will run out before your journey does.
As I run diesel long-termers which, with a full tank, will take me 800 miles or more, this isn’t something I’m familiar with. Well, it wasn’t, until I got an iPhone.
Apple’s iconic mobile is famed for many things, including its, err, famously minimalistic battery capacity. So it proved, right away, with mine.
It was either risking running flat. Forcing emergency recharges from me. Or, when it wasn’t doing that, had me fretting about it going flat instead. I became obsessed with finding USB sockets, topping it up, keeping it swimming.
I even delayed journeys, just to squeeze some extra minutes in the battery. Because you never know.
Crazy. But a few weeks hence, I began to think differently.
I’ve now learned that it won’t just run out. That I’ve yet to go on a journey long enough to deplete it. And that, where I do, I ensure it’s both fully charged and there are known means of filling it further should it prove necessary. A bit more planning at first, but second nature now.
It’s really not the crippling hardship I initially feared. Yet the few weeks of range anxiety still strike me – not least because I spent those weeks telling folk how damn utter rubbish the battery was. Folks whose first iPhone-related feedback could well have been about battery life.
There are lessons here, if you’re still with me, for electric car marketers. My experience was painful enough, and that’s on a £200 phone, which doesn’t carry the ‘risk of leaving me stranded’.
How do you get round it with cars? How do you make that initial word-of-mouth spread one of positivity, not gripes? Hmm. They’ve got 5 years to work it out…
UPDATE: If all else fails, there are also portable chargers: this Mashable guide shows 5 options.
How motoring writers used to do it
Astra suspension by Automotive Engineer January 22, 2010
Posted by richard in : Technology , add a commentVAUXHALL Astra rear suspension was the subject of a recent analysis by tech-fest industry title Automotive Engineer.
Michael Harder is chassis development engineer of the Astra line – and said that pleasing all of the people all of the time led to him eschewing multilink setups.
Multilinks reduce the compromise between ride and handling, writer James Scoltock was told – but at a price. Indeed, quite a cost: some experts say they add €100 or more to the base price of a car.
Vauxhall thus stuck to a cheaper twist beam. But how to make it class competitive? Spend €20 on a Watts linkage. Which Harder duly did, despite nobody doing it on a production car before.
He prefers to call the twist beam a ‘compound crank’: they’re lovely, he says, because they’re simple, don’t take up much space, and are easy to work with. There is a fault, mind, admits Harder: put side forces in, and the axle ‘tends to rotate underneath the car, which creates lateral oversteer and deflection’.
In practice, this means the front of the car turns in first, with the rear responding after an elastic-like delay. Giving the impression of laggy oversteer.
You can fix it, says Harder, with stiffer bushes. Ah, but these are bad for both noise and road isolation. So, enter the Watts linkage. This means the bushes can be softer, as it absorbs an impressive 80 percent of all lateral loadings on the rear suspension. It also improves camber stiffness – making it ‘twice as good as any other car on the market’.
Throw in canny tricks elsewhere, such as rebound springs in the front struts, which helped him tune roll stiffness without affecting understeer or oversteer, and you’ve something more than class competitive. Still, though, at way less cost than the expense of multilink.
You know, this ‘ere twist beam could just twist my arm…
How can good ride be stiff ride?
Vauxhall gives new Astra suspension a twist
Why RenaultSports don’t have rear spoilers
5 facts on the MGF January 17, 2010
Posted by richard in : History , 3commentsAUTOCAR man Steve Cropley interviewed the team behind the MGF back in 1995.
His piece is full of fascinating findings: 5 of them caught my eye, which helped show that the MGF was much more than just a rebodied Metro.
Such as:
1 Europe-first EPAS system
MGFs weren’t initially to have PAS. Late implementation meant a simple solution was required. Enter electric power steering – which Rover initially only was to fit on Japanese-market cars, to help with parking. Speed-sensitive, it had then never before been seen in Europe.
2 Trick adjustments to Metro rear suspension
Metro rear suspension anti-dive caused the MGF’s tail to rise and toe-out under braking, and squat under power. Bad. So, to the existing subframe, engineers junked the bottom A-arm, in favour of 3 new lower bits:
• Bottom link
• Track control arm
• Brake reaction rod
These were anchored in different places on the subframe, for optimal geometry. The result was one ‘as pure in practice as that of a uniquely designed system’.
3 Subtle changes to Metro front suspension
Well, just one – the steering arm was shortened, to speed up the steering ratio and improve the Ackermann effect
4 Posh Hydragas units
These were more expensive, with less inbuilt ‘stiction’. They moved at lower loads than in, say, the Metro. Richard Parry-Jones would be proud. That’s why Dr Alex Moulton wanted to see them on the Rover 100 – but Rover couldn’t justify the expense on a low-end car.
5 BMW-spec windscreen frame strength
BMW gave the MGF the final green light. German input was minimal, though: the only contribution was the adoption of the BMW roadster’s specification for windscreen frame strength. Does this mean the MGF has the same windscreen surround as the Z3?
Any more insider facts on the MGF, please share them here!
Land Rover’s ride quality secret
How Ford would have made a Rover
How Renault makes a 50mpg 7 seater January 11, 2010
Posted by richard in : Technology , add a commentRENAULT and I won our class in last year’s MPG Marathon – a right ol’ result, it was, after 400 miles’ somewhat steady driving.
But how? All down to the Grand Scenic I drove – fitted with the 1.4-litre TCe ‘downsized’ engine.
In Renault parlance, this is a 2.0-litre power-puncher with 1.6-litre fuel-sipping ability. Tiny turbo, no direct injection, Nissan all-alloy block and plain efficiency. It’s a canny wee thing, alright.
Particularly if you want to drive economically. See, its key characteristic is delivering loads of torque at really low revs – diesel-like revs, in fact. Throughout the entire Marathon, I honestly didn’t exceed 2000rpm. And still managed to summit the 1-in-2 climbs dotted through the route.
That tiny turbo allows this; it spools up fast, which is just what you need for eco driving. Here’s traits I exploited:
• Responsive to light throttles
• Ability to select 6th at ridiculously low speeds
• Linearity when modulating the throttle
• Turbo doesn’t ‘run away’ from you
• If you’re genteel, then so will it be
Being eco is about fluid motion. You need to swim along, with not a misplaced stroke, slipping along like an eel. Only with infintesimal control over the fuel being pumped into the engine can you do this.
Tiny turbo engines often produce great figures on the test rig, but plunge in real life, due to the turbo sucking in air like an iron fist, and forcing fuel injection to throw petrol in accordingly. Many people who drive at low revs and in a seemingly eco manner actually get mediocre economy – because of the lack of control the engine seems to have over itself.
None of that with the TCe. If you want to accurately throttle back as far as necessary to maintain pace, you can do. No torque-free gullies to fall into, no risk of being left floundering. It’s almost electric-like in its reponsiveness when you’re taking it steady.
The result of this is 50.3mpg in a 7-seat Grand Scenic. Official.
RenaultSport past to inspire turbo future
How Ford would have made a Rover January 8, 2010
Posted by richard in : History , 4commentsFORD finally won ownership to the Rover brand name in 2006. But it was providing aid for the brand even before then.
Secret talks in the late 90s were conducted, to sidestep then-chief Bernd Pischetreider’s plans to invest £1.7bn in Rover. Instead of spending so much to develop two new platforms, a future mid-range Rover would have been developed with Ford.
The plan was to take the Focus and develop it into a Rover. BMW engineers, said Car magazine’s Hilton Holloway back in 1999, went so far as to evaluate the Ford Focus.
Their verdict? The VW Golf, which was initially to have formed the base of the Rover, is a fine car… ‘but the Focus is better – almost as good as we envisage the next Golf being.’
And how would they have turned it into a Rover? Easy: ‘new rubber mountings, springs and dampers.’
This has to rank up among the biggest opportunities missed in the entire history of Rover. Despite an insider telling Holloway ‘on a 1-to-10 provability scale, we’ve reached 8 with Ford’. The Mk1 Focus is brilliant. It could have made a superb Rover 200 replacement.
Volvo proved as much by taking the Mk2 Focus platform and creating the Volvo C30. Which is brilliant. Looks nothing like a Focus, neither outside nor in. Indeed, the more I think about it, the more it pains me: seems the ‘unforeseen’, which would have scuppered the deal our insider expected by March 2000, did indeed happen.
Groan…
Land Rover’s ride quality secret
Green car countdown January 4, 2010
Posted by richard in : Technology , 1 comment so farIs this the single most important feature a car can have to encourage economical green driving?
It is, no less, an ETA for sat nav journeys. No more than that, either. Eh? The big deal is..?
This: In real time, it tells you what time you’ll arrive where you’ve said you want to be. In this instance, it’s seen on a BMW M3 Edition Coupe, but y’£100 TomToms have the very same function. With a bit of thought, it’s potentially massive.
It’s why I set sat nav to take me home. Now, Lord, even I’m not forgetful enough to forget the route. No, I instead like to know how long it will take.
Surely you know, you may ask? And yes, I do, roughly. But I like exacts, not guestimates. Particularly as, and here’s the key, my eco head sees my speed vary from day to day. Seriously. And it’s sat nav that allows me to do this in confidence.
Say I have 5mins ‘spare’. I’ll slow down a bit. Tweak the ETA. By driving more slowly, I’ll have returned more miles to the gallon. See it as a bit of real-time money-saving. In practice, it means I can be as green as possible and STILL not miss the start to Corrie.
It’s pilot mode. Whenever they’re late, what does a scheduled aircraft’s pilot say? That they’ll put their foot down and make the time up. That’s because planes are usually operating at way less than vmax – they’re flying at the EXACT speed required to reach their destination on time. No faster. No slower. This is, err, plain efficiency – both of time and of resources.
We could be doing this in our cars in the future: plugging in what time we need to be home, and letting the car cap, say, our motorway speed to only that required to achieve this. Perhaps, with layered financial penalties for those who want to go faster, within the realms of legality? Companies in particular would love this, and with vehicle tracking now all the rage, it would be particularly easy to implement.
Folk don’t like being told to do stuff slowly. But, they could be convinced to do it a bit slower, if they knew by how much they’d be penalised if they didn’t. What’s a few minutes here and there, for the prize of 5mpg and a fiver?
The Maestro of the instruments
Audi Q5 economy enough to tyre you out
Fuel economy economical with the truth?
iDo iPhone at last January 3, 2010
Posted by richard in : Technology , 5commentsiPhone users have another amongst their ranks: yes, late last year, it was done.
No sooner did Orange officially announce it had signed up with Apple, then the shipping route card to my front door was printed.
It’s been even better than I expected, for so many reasons I won’t bore you with. It has also, though, reinforced just why WordPress is so good.
My blog is designed in WordPress, using a custom (free) theme designed by Binary Moon. Great for desktops, but you need something a bit more straightforward for smaller mobile devices.
Enter the WPtouch iPhone Theme plugin from Bravenewcode. Again free, it converts posts and design into an easily navigated log on a mobile device. Making it even easier to waste 15 seconds on the move with my sometimes coherent ramblings.
It was a breeze to install. WordPress Plugin search, install, and bingo. Other WordPress users, I can thoroughly recommend it.
Means I’ll have to be even more committed to the updates in 2010, mind. Good job Schumacher is going up against Hamilton in F1, then…
How motoring writers used to do it
Apple Tablet changes the game, again
Nissan Qashqai photostream on Flickr January 1, 2010
Posted by richard in : flickr , 1 comment so farNISSAN was selling more Qashqai models last year than ever before.
Why? That’s what we were keen to find out at Motoring Research – so we got one out for a week’s test, courtesy of the kindly press office.
It really did impress, in many ways that surprised. That’s why it has its own Nissan Qashqai photostream on Flickr, honing on some of the details that stood out.
Head on over there, take a look-see, and leave any comments you see fit!
