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Volkswagen Is Ordered to Recall Nearly 500k Vehicles Over Emissions Software

nytimes.com

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Re: Volkswagen Is Ordered to Recall Nearly 500k Vehicles Over Emissions Software

#201

Post by ryandrake »

CamperBob2 wrote: post #195
toomuchtodo wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Very happy to hear CARB is working!

ryandrake's point was probably that his car is cleaner than necessary, but failing because of stupid, arbitrary rules imposed by CARB for no reason other than bureaucratic intransigence. It's similar to the feeling I got when I waited in line for an hour to have my Miata smog-checked at a busy urban test station, and then choked on diesel exhaust from a dump truck when I made the mistake of driving away with the top…

Bureaucratic intransigence is a really upbeat way of putting it. How about corruption through regulatory capture? Big auto needs to sell their over-priced parts. Why let people buy a $150 after-market part, when you can just call up CARB and have them make people buy equivalent $1,100 factory or OEM parts?

Wow, judging by the down-votes, people don't seem to realize how expensive CARB deliberately makes it to own an older car, regardless of how clean its emissions are.

EDIT: To further demonstrate that it's all about money and not about smog, you can get a "Repair Cost Waiver"[1] if you've spent at least $650 (on CA-approved parts, of course), and they'll approve your polluting car, no problem. All they really want is that $650 in the pockets of their car industry buddies and $XYZ worth of repeated tests in the pockets of the test stations.

1: http://www.bar.ca.gov/Consumer/Referee/Referee_Centers.html

Re: Volkswagen Is Ordered to Recall Nearly 500k Vehicles Over Emissions Software

#202

Post by ryandrake »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #199
CamperBob2 wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

ryandrake's point was probably that his car is cleaner than necessary, but failing because of stupid, arbitrary rules imposed by CARB for no reason other than bureaucratic intransigence. It's similar to the feeling I got when I waited in line for an hour to have my Miata smog-checked at a busy urban test station, and then choked on diesel exhaust from a dump truck when I made the mistake of driving away with the top…

Should we fault CARB though? They require more stringent emissions regulations due to California's geography, and both the federal government and automakers are rarely amiable to their needs. With cars going electric, its a bit of a moot point, except for the part where pressure needs to be applied on heavy trucks now (hopefully pushing them to natural gas from diesel until energy storage catches up).

I'm all for keeping the air clean, but that's obviously not the motivation behind CARB's policy of failing cars with clean-blowing after-market parts.

Re: Volkswagen Is Ordered to Recall Nearly 500k Vehicles Over Emissions Software

#203

Post by CamperBob2 »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #199
CamperBob2 wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

ryandrake's point was probably that his car is cleaner than necessary, but failing because of stupid, arbitrary rules imposed by CARB for no reason other than bureaucratic intransigence. It's similar to the feeling I got when I waited in line for an hour to have my Miata smog-checked at a busy urban test station, and then choked on diesel exhaust from a dump truck when I made the mistake of driving away with the top…

Should we fault CARB though? They require more stringent emissions regulations due to California's geography, and both the federal government and automakers are rarely amiable to their needs. With cars going electric, its a bit of a moot point, except for the part where pressure needs to be applied on heavy trucks now (hopefully pushing them to natural gas from diesel until energy storage catches up).

I'm still not being clear, I'm afraid. It's not a question of how stringent the emissions specifications are. The problem is CARB's reliance on equipment checks rather than tailpipe emissions checks. ryandrake's car might well be cleaner than a perfectly-stock vehicle, but if each and every component doesn't have a CARB certification number stamped on it, it's illegal.

You could argue that equipment checks are in place to prevent the very situation described in this article, where people might install shady aftermarket hardware to game emissions tests, but as we've seen, the aftermarket is not where the problem actually lies.

Re: Volkswagen Is Ordered to Recall Nearly 500k Vehicles Over Emissions Software

#204

Post by toomuchtodo »

ryandrake wrote: post #201
CamperBob2 wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

ryandrake's point was probably that his car is cleaner than necessary, but failing because of stupid, arbitrary rules imposed by CARB for no reason other than bureaucratic intransigence. It's similar to the feeling I got when I waited in line for an hour to have my Miata smog-checked at a busy urban test station, and then choked on diesel exhaust from a dump truck when I made the mistake of driving away with the top…

Bureaucratic intransigence is a really upbeat way of putting it. How about corruption through regulatory capture? Big auto needs to sell their over-priced parts. Why let people buy a $150 after-market part, when you can just call up CARB and have them make people buy equivalent $1,100 factory or OEM parts? Wow, judging by the down-votes, people don't seem to realize how expensive CARB deliberately makes it to own an…

> Wow, judging by the down-votes, people don't seem to realize how expensive CARB deliberately makes it to own an older car, regardless of how clean its emissions are.

I upvoted you even though I disagree with you for what its worth.

You're an edge case. Most people with older cars no longer maintain their emissions controls. The older the car, the more likely it is that its polluting. Is it fair? Not at all. You're just swept up in the process.

Re: Volkswagen Is Ordered to Recall Nearly 500k Vehicles Over Emissions Software

#205

Post by emn13 »

refurb wrote: post #192
swang wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

See: Johnson & Johnson w/ their drug risperdal: $2 billion in penalties... $30 billion in sales. http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/17/opinion/nicholas-kristof-w...

That's a poor comparison. Not all of the $30B in sales were fraudulent. Actually, in order to come up with the $2B penalty, the gov't determines the number of fraudulent Rxs, then hits the manufacturer with triple damages (this is typical). J&J would have been better off financially had they never committed the fraud they did.

You need to account for the probability of being caught. It's quite likely to be significantly lower than 1/3, so they might still have come out ahead.

Even if they're just breaking even, it's a kind of loan - they had the gain a long time ago, and pay the costs much later. If you're a risky business, that's potentially worth a lot, since investors might be hard to find.

And if you account for that you need to account for the asymmetry of risk due to bankruptcy protections - even if the average payout is negative, fines are effectively capped at what the firm can pay, so the effective expected payout may still be positive. (Assuming those making this decision escape personal liability).

Re: Volkswagen Is Ordered to Recall Nearly 500k Vehicles Over Emissions Software

#206

Post by lmm »

joosters wrote: post #164
nissehulth wrote: post #132

While this seems to be made on purpose, my gut feeling is that car makers shouldn't do software...

Who should write the software then? People who don't know anything about cars?

People who know software, sitting in the same room as people who know cars.

I fear a big company would find it impossible, but that's how you get good software.

Re: Volkswagen Is Ordered to Recall Nearly 500k Vehicles Over Emissions Software

#207

Post by rakingleaves »

tzs wrote: post #137
oppositelock wrote: post #124

The NYT is being disingenuous in presenting this as VW detecting the EPA test cycle and doing something to cheat. I think they've confused open loop and closed loop engine operation. VW's 4-cylinder engines which failed the EPA tests are all turbo engines. Turbo engines run hotter than naturally aspirated engines and so, they produce more NOx, since it's one of the high temperature byproducts. In fact, EGR (exhaust g…

> The NYT is being disingenuous in presenting this as VW detecting the EPA test cycle and doing something to cheat. I think they've confused open loop and closed loop engine operation. The NYT is not at all confused. The cars in question have software in the ECM specifically meant to detect testing. The software looks at various inputs, including steering wheel position, speed, duration of operation, and barometric p…

Wow. From the source:

"VW continued to assert to CARB and the EPA that the increased emissions from these vehicles could be attributed to various technical issues and unexpected in-use conditions. VW issued a voluntary recall in December 2014 to address the issue. CARB, in coordination with the EPA, conducted follow up testing of these vehicles [...] to confirm the efficacy of the recall. When the testing showed only a limited benefit to the recall, CARB broadened the testing to pinpoint the exact technical nature of the vehicles' poor performance"

I remember spending half a day at the dealership to deal with this recall, which was required to get my CA registration renewed. Can't believe it was just a BS update that didn't really fix anything. Shocking and extremely disappointing behavior from VW

Re: Volkswagen Is Ordered to Recall Nearly 500k Vehicles Over Emissions Software

#208

Post by swang »

nradov wrote: post #197
swang wrote: post #97

I love the look/feel/drive of a VW, but I will never again own one. My parents bought a 2002 VW which I mostly drove and the maintenance costs were through the roof. There have been at least 3-4 recall notices, one time while parked on an incline, it rained and flooded the back of the car with water. When I went to VW, they said that I had to manually clean out some drainage underneath the car. How the hell am I goin…

Individual anecdotes don't mean much. You can find objective data on car reliability on TrueDelta and Long-Term Quality Index. Those aren't true random samples but still pretty useful. http://www.truedelta.com/car-reliability http://tradeinqualityindex.com/reports/Volkswagen.html

_My_ story is anecdotal but early 2000 VWs are known for being really shitty. this have this history. I heard they have gotten "better" but a bit too late for me to care about.

Re: Volkswagen Is Ordered to Recall Nearly 500k Vehicles Over Emissions Software

#209

Post by lhc- »

jcreedon wrote: post #27
CodeWriter23 wrote: post #20

I don't understand how California detected this. The one time I had to take my 2010 Jetta turbo diesel for a smog check, the inspection was ENTIRELY visual. The inspector did not insert a probe into the tailpipe. He did plug the test rig into the OBD-II port under the steering column and turn the key to the accessory position (presumably to electronically capture the VIN), but that's it. I even asked him at the end i…

I'm not sure about CA specifically, but some states only do full inspections on newer vehicles every other year. e.g. In a particular year the odd year models get the full inspection and the even year models just get a quick inspection and then vice versa in the next year.

Wisconsin doesn't test any cars older than 1996, because they would need dynos for it. Much cheaper for them to just only test ODBII cars.

Re: Volkswagen Is Ordered to Recall Nearly 500k Vehicles Over Emissions Software

#210

Post by dougb »

joshrotenberg wrote: post #67
bpodgursky wrote: post #60

What actually incentivizes a customer to take their car to a shop to get this fixed though? It's not causing harm to individual car owners, and it's not like they can get collections agencies to sieze them. Seems like they're going to have trouble getting compliance here...

I've got a 2013 Golf TDI and was thinking about this as well. If it isn't a safety related recall, I'm not sure how you get people to comply aside from some other action related to, say, their next years registration (i.e. if your VIN doesn't have this fix applied, you can't reregister your car). Not sure if that's a thing, though. I'd personally plan to take my car in "real soon now" to get the fix.

I wonder how you car will drive after the "fix." I suspect you won't be very happy with it.
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