Recent Comments:
A gentler tap - IIHS suggests car bumper standards for light trucks {Autoblog}
Jul 2nd 2008 8:58AM Even if all vehicles had the same bumper height it would not matter. When a vehicle is stopping suddenly the nose tends to dive and the rear end lifts up. Some more than others.
So even if cars had higher bumpers in front and trucks had lower bumpers in the rear we'd still see a mismatch in bumper height.
Bumps when parallel parking, and expensive repairs.
A bumper is not going to fix the fact that people are poor drivers and make mistakes. Repairs are expensive, labor is expensive and the bumper on your car is a giant piece of flimsy plastic that can't be repaired easily.
You have NHTSA to thank for weaker bumpers, and more expensive repairs they lowered the standards from 5 mph to 2.5 mph.
Veteran journalist John McElroy calls for EV1 revival; too bad it's not that simple {Autoblog Green}
Jun 30th 2008 2:43PM Electric vehicles have been around for years and will continue to be around for many more.
I am in favor of electric vehicles, I also have no plans to buy one any time soon.
Why? Because I have yet to see an electric vehicle that can replace a gas vehicle. Electric vehicles can be classified as better in a number of applications than gas/diesel which is great, the problem is there is a whole set of applications that current tech / logistics electric vehicles can't do at all. Such as long distance driving and refueling time. My gas car may only have a 200 mi range but it does not take 8 hrs to refuel.
Could one set up a battery exchange like propane tanks are exchanged... yes, there are many things we "could do" but have not, things we could do have no benefit to me now.
I didn't lease an EV1 when they were available and wouldn't lease one now unless I was convinced that it would save me money and I am not convinced that it would, the cost of a vehicle lease/payment + electricity + the cost insurance, tires, etc for a 2nd vehicle is not likely to be less than the cost of gas.
The problem is this, if I live too far away from work then an electric vehicle won't have enough charge to get me home. If I live close enough to work to get there and back, I still might not have enough range to stop at the store on the way home.
If I live really close to work an electric vehicle might work fine as a commuter car but then I would be using so little gas anyway that the "savings" would be negated by the cost of owning a 2nd vehicle.
If you want to argue that an electric vehicle is better for the environment ... I'm not sure about that either.
say the power plant also runs off natural gas even the best fancy combined cycle power plant the best you can hope for is 50 - 60 % efficiency a stand steam only plant might be as low as 33 - 38%
Your home furnace could be as high as 80 - 96 % efficient.
Why throw away 40 to 66% of the energy available when you could set up a co-generator that would heat and cool your house and generate electricity?
People are barking up the wrong tree, more energy could be saved with cogeneration than switching your commuter car over to electric.
One ecopowerTM will reduce the emission of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the atmosphere by 24 tons/year.
http://www.marathonengine.com
Since we talked about the rav4 ev before lets compare it again.
The 2000 2wd rav4 vs the electic version "saves" 3.8 tons of co2 per yr according to fueleconomy.gov
The operation of the co-generator would be seamless to the user, you still get heat and electricity and it saves more, over 6 times more than the electric vehicle that can't do what a gas car can.
The option the requires the least sacrifice also does the most good. How about that! The downside is that the furnace is boring and show off how you are "saving the earth" everywhere you drive.
"The RAV4EV’s battery system is a wearable item, and current costs are approximately US$26,000 to replace the battery pack,..."
http://www.fuel-efficient-vehicles.org/energy-news/?m=200701
Veteran journalist John McElroy calls for EV1 revival; too bad it's not that simple {Autoblog Green}
Jun 30th 2008 9:00AM Electric cars have been around since the late 1800's
In 2008 they still have the same problems they did back then. Limited range, long charge times, expensive batteries.
Nobody killed the electric car, it has never been very practical.
Higher gas prices are making electric vehicles seem more attractive even if they still do not make sense economically.
The cost of electricity is less than the cost of gas or diesel to go the same distance, but this is not a good comparison. Until a battery pack lasts as long as the car, you can not neglect the cost of the battery in the operating costs.
What good is it to save $500 a yr in gas only to have to spend $26,000 on a new battery?
Even at $4 a gallon and 20 mpg $12,000 will get me 60,000 miles worth of gasoline.
I drive long distances, plane tickets home work out to 31 cents per mile per person, driving I can load my entire family, and all our luggage for one price and no fees for a 2nd bag. It is 20 hrs of driving, and another 6 hrs to my grandparents.
For less than the price of 1 plane ticket, we can drive, camp and visit friends along the way.
The electricity to cover the same distance would cost even less than gasoline, but it does not even make sense to talk about it because an electric vehicle couldn't get me there in under a week.
Trapped in a Ford Excursion! {Autoblog Green}
Jun 18th 2008 3:57PM If he has 7 kids and a wife and him that is 9
Unless he gets a 15 passenger van, a sprinter van or a short bus I do not know of many other vehicles that have seating for 9. I do not know of any others that have seating for 9 and 4wd.
Were all the kids single births? He could have 1, kid, 1 kid, then bam quints. Sometimes you get more than you barged for.
I don't have 7 kids so its not like I've looked.
So even if he sold the ford and bought 2 cars that got 20 mpg each what would that get him? That still works out to 10 mpg and depending on the age of the kids if the cars do not have an "off" switch for the air bag they still might not be able to move all those people.
People blame other for living in the suburbs as though they are greedy for doing so. In the Baltimore area it is not uncommon for our civil servants (teachers, firefighters, police) to live in PA not because they want to dive an hr+ to work each day but because that is the only way that they could find a home cheap enough that they could afford on their pay.
People seem very quick to attack and very slow to offer solutions.
I don't think people understand the lack of options.
It is easy to insult and offer dumb solutions when you do not understand the problem.
High speed trains are killing airplanes {Autoblog Green}
Jun 17th 2008 3:40PM Germany is smaller than some us states. There are entire states that have no passenger rail service at all. Because of how the railroads were built the tracks tend to go east west but not north to south, so even though there is an amtrak station in north dakota and one in texas you can't take a train from one place to the other.
The situation does not get much better when you talk about airports either. My grandparents live at least 4 hrs from the closest major airport.
My family lives over 2100 km away but it is cheaper to drive. Driving I only have to pay the cost of gas, flying would require purchasing a ticket for each passenger. Depending on the time of the year it is sometimes cheaper to fly to Germany than it would be for me to fly home, because the town my parents live in only has a regional airport. It is possible to get tickets for half as much if we are willing to fly out of a larger airport, 300 km away.
Even on the east coast trains are not very practical. There are several systems that do not interconnect, marc train, light rail, amtrak, dc metro, some have separate lines that do not connect or a branch that forks with no way to get from a station on one leg to the other without taking 2 trains. The train might be useful if you live outside of town and work downtown but not if you live north of town and work south of town because even though the train that goes from north of town to the center of town goes no farther and does not connect with or share a station with the train that goes from the center of town to south of town.
There are train stations near my home, and train stations near my work, but the station nearest my home does not connect with the station nearest my work, they are not the same system, the station nearest my home does not connect with the station nearest my work either, same system different lines, the station farthest from my home connects with the station farthest from my work. But the train ticket would be more expensive than driving, plus I's still end up walking 5 mi a day, on a trip that is only 5mi one way to begin with.
Why not walk or bike the whole way? I did when I lived farther away. Now the route I drive is all interstate highways where pedestrians and bikes are prohibited, there is an alternative route but it does not have sidewalks or even a shoulder for riding on.
Everyone complains about gas prices being high, despite the fact that they are cheaper than other places (like Germany) but we are not willing to spend money on making alternatives to driving practical. The train station near my work does not have a cross walk, a light or a sidewalk.
Trains can be very useful, here they are not, and with at system that is so poorly implemented no one wants to use it, its very design seems intended to discourage use. Since no one uses it why would anyone spend money to upgrade it?
I'm not sure what my point was other than the rail system in the usa is broken and it would take much more than faster trains to fix it.
Pilgrim International begins producing composite RVs {Autoblog Green}
Jun 12th 2008 9:48AM I hear you me2, my wife and I are thinking about getting an RV, even if we only got 6 mpg at $4 a gallon it would still be cheaper to drive than to buy 3 and soon 4 plane tickets to visit my family.
I like the idea of a lighter weight RV, not because I think it would save much gas, but every lb of savings in the RV translates to 1 more lb of cargo capacity that can be added.
GM jacks up incentives on trucks and SUVs {Autoblog}
Jun 10th 2008 9:58AM My wife and I are looking at buying a suburban, and/or and RV. Used obviously, if I had 50K to drop on a new suburban I would rather spend 50K on an RV.
Before you say I am stupid and gas is expensive I'll say it myself yes gas is expensive. We would not be buying a RV or suburban for a daily driver, we have no need for that. We would be using the suburban / RV twice a yr when we travel to visit my family who live 1300 miles away. Even with an RV getting 6 mpg it is still cheaper to drive than 4 plane tickets, rental car, gas, hotel, going out to eat.
Prius sales down 40% in May, tight supplies blamed {Autoblog Green}
Jun 4th 2008 11:20AM If you have a long commute and already have a car payment it could be worth while.
I have a short commute, no car payment, and a vehicle that does not require a $3000 battery pack. Even an engine overhaul costs half that.
Gas prices are high, hybrids are expensive and don't get that much better mpg.
44 mpg vs 20 results in a $136 a month savings in fuel costs per month at $4 / gal and 15k per yr.
Can you get a vehicle that gets 44 mpg for less than $136 a month?
Financing a $23,000 works out to $450 to $700 a month in payments depending on terms.
How is this a good deal?
Mercedes-Benz Actros sets fuel efficiency World Record {Autoblog Green}
Jun 3rd 2008 1:09PM A prius is over 1.5 tons curb weight. I haven't been able to find max GVW for it. Lets say it can carry 5 150 lbs passengers and some luggage lets say they each have a bag that hits the 70 lb airline limit and call the total weight 2 tons.
The EPA say it gets 45 mpg hwy. So 2 tons moved 45 miles for 1 gallon of gasoline. 90 ton miles per gallon
If it emits 100g co2 / km then.
2 tons (not metric) moved 1 km 100 g co2 = 50 g co2 per mile.
" 20,5 grams per tonne of payload "
So if we are hauling 1000 lbs of passengers and cargo in the prius.
100 g co2/ km 1/2 ton = 200 g co2 per mile
25 tons moved 12.5 miles per 1 gallon of diesel 312.5 ton miles per gallon.
From a truck driving relative 80,000 lbs @65 mph = 6 to 6.5 mpg
40 tons 6.5 miles per gallon = 260 ton miles per gallon.
Either way you look at it the big truck wins in terms of efficiency.
Bottom line it is interesting to compare a prius to a semi but it is silly to consider using one as a replacement for the other.
2009 Dodge Ram cuts fuel usage by 20 percent {Autoblog Green}
May 30th 2008 7:41AM Explain to me why the dodge with a 5.7 L V8 with 380 hp 404 ft-lbs of torque gets better mpg than a honda ridgline with a 3L v6 247 hp 245 ft-lbs.
Both the 2008 ram and the ridgline tip the scales at around 4500 lbs.
For that matter the CRV awd is only rated at 26mpg hwy.
The tundra has similar ratings for its 5.7 l V8 at 381 hp and 401 ft-lbs with a curb weight of a little over 5500 lbs it only manages 17 mpg hwy.
