How torque curves will change in the future February 14, 2010
Posted by richard in : Minutiae of cars , 2commentsTORQUE Talking is not only the name of fine industry man Duncan Forrester’s blog, it’s also what I like talking, when I’m not discussing ride.
Oh, believe me, it’s a night to remember, if you get me in the pub.
I’ve munched on the shape of torque curves before, and how they’re slowly changing from Peak Practice to Table Mountain. And, in the future, they will continue to do so.
Indeed, they’ll do it completely. Become big, flat boxes. Why? Because the car of the future WILL be driven by an electric motor. Whose key characteristic is maximum torque delivery from 0 rpm.
As soon as you press the accelerator of an electric car, all your Nms are there at your disposal. No delay, no build-up and no waiting for your little torque mountain-climbing men to summit the side of the low-rev cliff-face until the stick the conquering flag of their home nation atop the 3500rpm sweet spot. Or similar.
This means torque will become an absolute. You’ll see a number and instantly be able to judge the strength of an engine. Just as we look at 0-60mph to rate speediness, so we’ll view torque to rate strength. All the mystique will be removed.
Indeed, this is why all the fledgling electric cars right now are not even bothering to discuss hp. Because it’s even less important than it already arguably isn’t. Torque is what will talk. (Quite right, too. After all, hp is but a function of torque in the first place…)
Incidentally, note I earlier said accelerator. It is, of course, not a throttle. That’s why Vauxhall Ampera chief mused to me recently, that perhaps it should be renamed ‘speed variation device’…
Why Ford Econetics break the rules
RenaultSport past to inspire turbo future
Land Rover App out snow February 5, 2010
Posted by richard in : Green cars , 2commentsLAND Rover has launched a great example of why marketing is brilliant.
First, the background. 4×4s have been vilified in recent years. Land Rover makes, well, 4×4s. Its engineers have been making them ever-more green.
And then, the winter came. And the snow came. And came, and came. 6 million people were stuck at home, and BMWs were abandoned. Cue Breaking News panic, and children stuck at school, and brides unable to get married.
To the rescue? None other than the 4×4. The hero of the hour. And what more famous 4×4 in the UK is there, than the Land Rover? Suddenly, the idea of an all-year machine that has a premium badge, gets you out of a fix and still does 42mpg became the thing of the moment.
Lo, 4×4s, we love you again. Snow joke.
But the brilliance? A new App developed by Land Rover. Which… gives live ski snow reports from the slopes of Britain. Complete with image of Range Rover spanking said slope like a bitch.
You’ve gotta hand it to them. Marketing, when done well, is utter genius…
What the iPhone can teach us about electric cars
What the iPhone can teach us about electric cars January 23, 2010
Posted by richard in : Green cars, Technology , 3commentsELECTRIC 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
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
Green car countdown January 4, 2010
Posted by richard in : Technology , add a commentIs 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?
The 58mpg MINI and my turbo engine theory June 28, 2009
Posted by richard in : Green cars , add a commentMINI John Cooper S Works returns 58mpg shock.
Yes, indeed. And a real-life shock, as I proved over the weekend.
I wasn’t doing anything particularly special on this 100-mile journey, either. Simply driving steadily up the motorway.
Listening to Radio 5Live. Hearing Eamonn Holmes interview Steve Bruce. Enjoying the sun. Considering the tactile qualities of Alcantara steering wheels. Normal, everyday stuff.
Yes, my right foot was light, but I wasn’t crawling. Yet, at journey’s end, there the remarkable result was. Boldly blinking on the trip computer. 58.6mpg.
This, from a 211hp turbocharged 1.6-litre… petrol engine! Naughty exhausts and all! Pretty jazz, I reckoned. And yet another tick against my turbo engine theory.
That they’re super-economical when you drive them economically. But thirstier than Richard Burton when on it. Disproportionally so. Jekyll and Hyde. And so on.
Car makers know this. And this is why modern turbo petrol engines always do really well on the official test cycle.That’s something conducted in a genteel manner not dissimilar to how I drove last Saturday.
But what’s real in my world, and the world of Euro-MPG test drivers, isn’t in the vast majority of turbo petrol drivers. Hence, the disparity in economy many report.
It’s a theory I’m going to run with, and put to the next engine, err, engineer I meet…
MINI John Cooper S Works photostream on Flickr
MINI prices and the daily heart-flutter
More on Mini’s classic brochure
Why Ford Econetics break the rules May 31, 2009
Posted by richard in : Green cars , 3commentsTO be eco, you need a small, tiny engine. Yeah, right.
That’s Politician’s logic at work. Look for blacks and whites in things they don’t understand. Big is bad, small is good, always and forever more. Smile, smooch baby, job done.
If only they spoke to engineers, such as the engine chief at Ford’s Dagenham plant. He’d tell them, like he told me, that Ford eschewed the smaller, ‘more eco’ 1.4-litre TDCi for its Econetic models.
Fitted the 1.6-litre TDCi instead. Which, as it’s bigger, is clearly ‘not as eco’.
Wrong.
Yes, he said, in ideal conditions, the 1.4-litre might use a smidgen less fuel. But, real world, the characteristics of the 1.6-litre make it far more suited to the Eco treatment. Traits such as:
• Very low rev torque ramp-up: the turbo wakes up at 1200rpm, meaning much lower revs (and, conversely, taller gearing) can be carried
• Torque curve shape: the step between non-turbo lethargy and meaningful torque delivery is much better profiled to eco driving – it’s not ‘switch-like’
• Part-throttle characteristics: allow ECU software to be massaged so fuel delivery can be turned right down
• On-throttle immediacy: small throttle inputs elicit immediate, meaningful response, making it feel ‘bigger capacity’.
The demands and characteristics on the 1.4-litre mean it would be swamped. It would have to be worked too hard in practice, negating any eco benefits a lab bench revealed.
Light loads work best for eco driving. Hence, the development of the ‘bigger’ engine here.
Luckily, there are no tax disincentives to stop him following what he knows, rather than what politicians tell him should be true. Imagine if, say, the engine size-based company car tax rules of a decade ago were still in place…
If Ford played chess, don’t take it on
Ford gloom hides people carrier revolution
Why car scrappage is now inevitable
Citroen top (3) engine revelation May 29, 2009
Posted by richard in : Green cars , add a commentCITROEN wants to become Europe’s third-largest brand.
No, I’m not sure how, either. Right now, it’s seventh-largest.
Sixth? Its partner, Peugeot. So, a right old odd statement for new chief Jean-Marc Gales to make, then. I’m still puzzling over it. But what also caught my eye in the Automotive News interview he gave was another revelation.
That Citroen doesn’t need to produce 6 or 7 million cars to survive and thrive. Because, instead, it enjoys economies of scale from compnents alliances with other car makers. Meaning it can make big-number money on smaller-number car production.
Take engines. Citroen co-operates with Ford and BMW on them. Which, Gales tells Automotive News, are the most expensive parts to develop in a car. Pair up, share the costs with a partner or two, and that’s a whole heap of cash you don’t have to claw back in higher-volume efficiencies of scale.
But yet something else grabbed my attention in what he said. Engines remain the most expensive bit of all, aye? Well, I’ll be.
Explains a lot, mind. Why the VW TDI is omnipresent. Why car makers are so willing to sign up to co-opt deals. Why the Ford 1.25-litre Zetec is a decade and a half old.
And why electric or fuel cell cars can’t be that far away, surely.
Yes, they’re expensive. But if developing tomorrow’s combustion engines is also heinously dear, won’t car makers soon consider designing a new generation of IC engines to be economically unviable?
Car brands always look to the future. And, Lord knows, it ain’t in fossil-fuel-hungry ICs. Developing a new range to meet, say, 2012/2015 emissions legislation won’t be easy. Or cheap.
Whether Citroen will indeed be in the EU Top 3 by then is, of course, another matter entirely.
bmwblog and UK car dealer agree
Image of the week: 4 April 2009
Fuel economy economical with the truth?
bmwblog and UK car dealer agree April 11, 2009
Posted by richard in : Uncategorized , 4commentsBMWBLOG has been reporting from the New York Auto Show. Of course, with a focus on BMWs.
But the guys there also took time to sniff around the other exhibitors – and came up with a ‘cars to watch’ list.
What struck me right away? The first car on the list – the Fisker Karma. A green petrol-electric combo, and set to be the world’s first high-end eco-supercar.
Why my interest? Because I spoke with a dealer of high-end cars in the UK last week, who said something very similar. Of all the forthcoming ‘green’ supercars, he reckons the Fisker is the most viable.
It’s got the looks, the performance and the prestige to both justify a high price tag and to stir customer demand. He’s thus watching it – because he knows his customers will be.
Two insider heads-up for the new Fisker, then. Guess we’d thus better be watching it…
BMW tells me why its instruments are lit in orange
Image of the Week: 4 April 2009 April 4, 2009
Posted by richard in : Uncategorized , 1 comment so farBMW Shows Off Its Emissions
This is one of those images that I find oddly satisfying. Renault did a poster, years ago, with a tiny icon of every F1 car to win bearing its name.
Now, BMW’s done something similar – but, this time, showing off winning emissions, rather than race chargers.
I stumbled across the image on the company’s EU media site – hence, why fuel economy is listed in litres per 100km, rather than mpg.
Here, the logic is simple: lower is better. As it is for CO2.
The image is showing off just how many BMWs creep into the ‘low emission’ general category, and you have to admit it’s quite impressive.
I’m no BMW apologiser. It’s just impossible to deny how ‘green’ its current cars are.
Come on, Renault, Peugeot, Fiat and so forth. Your posters would be similarly impressive. Let’s be seeing ‘em!
