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America’s Cars Are Getting Faster and More Efficient

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451–460 of 528 posts

Re: America’s Cars Are Getting Faster and More Efficient

#451

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The refraction doesn't matter, its the precision. Given a reading (of 02 ppm), how can you prove that it matches the reading a ground station would have made? How could you filter out the noise from materials in the ~100km of atmosphere between the satellites and the targets? More pragmatically, could you explain it in a courtroom & convince the jury that it works? I understand that you're disappointed that this extr…

Nah, I'm not disappointed, just trying to understand the limits of current sensors. I also don't think it needs to be extremely accurate - maybe there's even proxies that could be used, like the shade of green on cloudless days for land coordinates, however this opens up a lot of abusive avenues of course. Btw. how about something like OCO-2? I couldn't find anything about its spatial resolution, but it seems to allo…

Its spacial resolution is on the linked page:

> OCO-2 records how much sunlight is reflected off the CO 2 molecules in an air column. OCO-2 makes measurements in three different spectral bands over four to eight different footprints of approximately 1.29 km × 2.25 km (0.80 mi × 1.40 mi) each.

It's air columns, so again you would have a hard time proving that the source of the detected pollutants came from the area & excluding the case that they drifted into the area at a higher altitude.

Re: America’s Cars Are Getting Faster and More Efficient

#452

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Electric vehicles are a tough sell now though. The Chevy Bolt EV has a 60 kWh Lithium-ion battery; to charge that fully costs $8.7 in Utah (14.5 cents per kWh). Per the EPA's measure that gets you 238 miles. Gas costs approx $2.24/gallon in Utah. A Prius has a 11.3 gallon tank and a 540 miles range (again, EPA standard). That means that $11.15 would get you the same distance as a full Bolt EV charge in gas. Now, befo…

Everyone buying new cars is buying them for non-economic reasons. The purchase price of any new vehicle is a tough sell. If your primary concern is cost-per-mile, it's hard to beat an old $250 moped off Craigslist that gets 100+ mpg. If you claim you need something more enclosed, an old truck for $2000 might be your answer. In that rustbucket, you're belching smoke into the atmosphere and burning a dollar of gas ever…

Right. I drove an old corolla many years for this reason. It got 40mpg, got it for a song. 500 in maintenance per year.

Cheap. One kid still has and drives that car. Approaching 400k miles now.

Re: America’s Cars Are Getting Faster and More Efficient

#453
post #62
post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Median car horsepower has increased 50% since your car was made!

Not for Toyota Corollas incidentally. The 2001 model 1.8L Corolla RunX with 189hp is still just about the most powerful Corolla ever made. New Corollas top out at 138hp.

They can go up just about any grade without slowing down, though (unless you're talking about "slowing down" from some speed near the limit of the car's performance and transitioning to a steep grade, I guess).

Given the CVT and the soft suspension and brakes designed for being a mild-mannered passenger car, it'd be a little goofy to make an option for a much more powerful Corolla. You'd end up with something not a lot of fun to drive, or a completely different car.

Re: America’s Cars Are Getting Faster and More Efficient

#454
post #412

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not any more. A 2017 Camry (family car) with the V6 is 6.1 seconds. http://www.zeroto60times.com/vehicle-make/toyota-0-60-mph-ti...

Some perspective: a beautiful 1964 V8 Mustang goes from 0-60 in 7.8 seconds. I'd say both these cars are pretty fast and that you're nitpicking. http://www.automobile-catalog.com/car/1964/829160/ford_musta...

The list of 6-second cars is pretty long. One that stands out is the 2017 Buick LaCrosse at 6.0 seconds and is currently selling in the $28k range (there are some amazing deals out there at present). Again, family sedan. With numbers that 20 years ago would have been "race car numbers".

That Buick beats the time of the 1996 Saleen S281 Mustang.

http://www.zeroto60times.com/6-second-cars-0-60-mph-times/

Re: America’s Cars Are Getting Faster and More Efficient

#455

A few weeks ago I bought a Chevy Bolt EV...according to the dealer it was the first one sold in my state (Utah). I'd been on a waiting list for almost a year. Sure, ICE engines are getting better, but EVs are rapidly gaining and will soon surpass. The Bolt is a bit expensive for a car of its body type, but "gassing up" at home is amazing, the 200+ mile range is great, and the sharply reduced emissions are a weight of…

Electric vehicles are a tough sell now though. The Chevy Bolt EV has a 60 kWh Lithium-ion battery; to charge that fully costs $8.7 in Utah (14.5 cents per kWh). Per the EPA's measure that gets you 238 miles. Gas costs approx $2.24/gallon in Utah. A Prius has a 11.3 gallon tank and a 540 miles range (again, EPA standard). That means that $11.15 would get you the same distance as a full Bolt EV charge in gas. Now, befo…

Honestly you can take the $10k+ difference and donate it to charity or save it up for your kid's college, if you have children. $10k can buy malaria nets for 4000 kids in Africa, if you donate to some place like Against Malaria Foundation. At the moment, I don't see any altruistic outcome from buying EVs. Personally, I am also against using any non-economic arguments in choosing cars, unless you are really rich and the difference is only a drop in the bucket.

Re: America’s Cars Are Getting Faster and More Efficient

#456
post #358

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And I never have to change the oil. Well yeah, you kind of do need to change the oil if you don't want the gearbox to die an early death. There's also still coolant that needs to be changed regularly as well. EVs have significantly less maintenance, but there's still critical maintenance that must be done on time if you don't want to damage your car.

What are you talking about? Here's the official maintenance interval for the Bolt: http://i.imgur.com/gU4FfdY.png It calls for tire rotations every 7,500 miles - not a lot you can do about that, and I suspect tire wear will be worse in a torque-happy EV. Skipping them will only reduce your traction, which I suppose could damage you and your car. And of course you have "required services" like brake pads when those we…

To be fair, I didn't know that the coolant in a Bolt is supposed to be good for 150,000 miles, that's a good bit longer than I figured. I was thinking closer to 90,000 miles, but you're right, the lower service temperature and also less metal surface area will make it last longer in an EV. But in an ICE, exhaust and oil should not be getting into the coolant at all. If it is, any long life coolant is going to need to be changed out immediately while your head gasket is replaced to fix the oil/exhaust leak. One of the major reasons why coolant has a service life is because of corrosion inhibitors present in it that get used up over time.

You're also right that brake pads are going to last longer, on an EV, they barely wear at all. However, there's the brake fluid that will wear out just as fast as on any car. Over time brake fluid picks up humidity, there's no easy way around this. It'll cause the car to potentially lose the brakes if ignored long enough or even rust out brake lines.

Then there's still every single suspension component that a traditional car has. Balljoints and tie rod ends are always going to wear. If you're lucky, your manufacturer might have chosen components with built in grease fittings so that with regular maintenance you can extend the lifespan of those components but that's the exception, not the rule. There's still bearings, shock absorbers, CV joints, motor mounts, and bushings on various things. Every one of those has a finite service life, just because Chevy doesn't list a recommended interval to replace them doesn't mean that they don't need to be inspected and replaced as they wear down.

As for the actual oil comment though, the Bolt isn't direct drive, it has a fixed ratio gearbox with a differential built in. It only has a couple of gears and the differential, but still, they're helical gears and they need the right viscosity oil. Over time, those gears are going to degrade the oil from the shear forces and add contaminants to it. Contaminants are also slowly going to seep in from the vent, you can't completely seal up a gearbox, you need to have a vent on it otherwise running it is going to push oil out of the seals around the axles. As for the recommended intervals you quoted, that's pretty unrealistics and most manufacturers aren't recommending crazy intervals like that.

Here's the maintenance schedule for a Honda: https://techinfo.honda.com/rjanisis/pubs/om/SI9999/SI9999O00...

It doesn't have that high of a service interval but for something like a 2015 Honda Civic it's still just using their regular long life coolant which is supposed to be good for 5 years or 60,000 miles. Brake fluid is something that's pretty much always going to last around 3 to 5 years regardless of manufacturer. And manual transmissions typically have a much more reasonable recommended fluid life of somewhere around 90,000 to 120,000 miles. Some manufacturers are listing some transmissions as having "lifetime" fluid, but there's also identical transmissions with the same fluid in other vehicles where the recommendation is 90 to 120 thousand miles. There's no such thing as "lifetime fluid", every single fluid in any vehicle wears down in use and picks up contaminants, eventually every fluid will need to be replaced. Any manufacturer who tells you otherwise is lying to you.

Do you have a source for some of your claims? Honestly the recommended change interval of 200,000 to 300,000 is higher than I've ever seen and even on stuff like a 2015 VW Jetta you're supposed to change the manual transmission fluid every 40,000 miles. Here's the 2014 Jeep Wrangler service interval for the manual transmission and transfer case: http://www.wranglerforum.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=198...

250,000 miles is much too long for a differential, I'd imagine the drain plug was probably coated in metallic sludge right? I've seen a few drain plugs out of differentials and transmissions that were all treated way better and still be coated in what used to be the gears.

Re: America’s Cars Are Getting Faster and More Efficient

#457
post #403
post #358

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And I never have to change the oil. Well yeah, you kind of do need to change the oil if you don't want the gearbox to die an early death. There's also still coolant that needs to be changed regularly as well. EVs have significantly less maintenance, but there's still critical maintenance that must be done on time if you don't want to damage your car.

The coolant on a Bolt EV needs changing after 150k miles ( http://imgur.com/7hF0Ijg ). What gearbox?

The Bolt is not direct drive, it has a single motor hooked to a fixed gear ratio final drive and a differential in it. It looks like Chevy doesn't actually provide a maintenance schedule for the oil in the gearbox but it's no different than any other gearbox, the oil will wear down from shearing and contamination will build up over time. 100,000 miles is probably a good service interval but Chevy doesn't bother to tell you how often you should change it.

Re: America’s Cars Are Getting Faster and More Efficient

#458

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One day you'll be so intent on checking dents on other peoples cars you will cause an accident yourself! My theory is that people should be looking at traffic, not at the detailing on someone else's vehicle.

I'm not that hardcore focused on it haha. Most of the time I'm trying to get away from them and get a distance. I'm also checking in on them for any sudden movements. If someone's car is dented, like real dents from a crash, I take extra precaution. It's a filter that works. I'll notice big dents all the time and then the person drives like shit but I'm aloof and safe. I look for people on the phone (calling or texti…

Driving through Chicago always worries me. People in big cities like that often drive like maniacs, and the number of BMWs, Audis, and other expensive luxury cars I see missing their bumpers or with large amounts of damage on quarter panels is astounding. Yet they're still zipping in and out of their lanes to get to their exit 20 seconds faster than everyone else.

Re: America’s Cars Are Getting Faster and More Efficient

#459
post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same thing could be said about the Toyota AE86 in its day. The AE86 came out around the same time when the e30 M3, the mk3 supra, and the FC RX7 were also being released. The AE86 made "only" 128hp, the RX7 turbo made 200hp, and the mk3 supra made 230hp. Guess which one became the icon of drifting in Japan? Take one look at the grassroots drift scene over at Ebisu Circuit and you'll notice that nearly everyone's runn…

The Subaru BRZ, and its Toyota equivalent (FRS/86/GT86/FT86) sharing the same platform, was designed to be the spiritual successor to the AE86.

yes, that's why I pointed it out. :)

Re: America’s Cars Are Getting Faster and More Efficient

#460
post #358

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And I never have to change the oil. Well yeah, you kind of do need to change the oil if you don't want the gearbox to die an early death. There's also still coolant that needs to be changed regularly as well. EVs have significantly less maintenance, but there's still critical maintenance that must be done on time if you don't want to damage your car.

Coolant on my Nissan Leaf is 75k miles. Reduction gear oil is just inspect; it's a single gear. Brake fluid is the normal 30k miles.

>Reduction gear oil is just inspect; it's a single gear.

Well actually, a Nissan Leaf is going to have 8 gears in the reduction drive. 4 in the differential, 2 to couple the differential to an intermediate shaft, and another 2 to couple that shaft to the motor itself. That being said, ATF does wear out over time, those gears are going to be adding finely powdered metal to the fluid and even just the shearing forces on the fluid literally breaks down the oil chemically. It'll certainly last a whole lot longer than engine oil but eventually that inspection is going to necessitate a replacement.

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