Audi abandons combustion engine development • Hacker News Board

Re: Audi abandons combustion engine development

#21

Post by seanmcdirmid » Wed, Mar 17, 2021, 4:49 AM UTC

bootlooped wrote: post #12

steve_adams_86 wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The word development. They won’t be developing ICE technology any further. It seems unlikely to me that they’d stop producing ICEs altogether, but I can see why they’d focus on developing electric technologies instead.

But they're still iterating on current ICE engines, which you could call development. And in that case they're still developing ICE technology. It sounds like the only thing they're claiming is they will not come up with completely new designs.

The old product will get big fixes and some minor performance improvements (basically maintenance mode), but all the real R&D is happening on the new product.

Re: Audi abandons combustion engine development

#22

Post by diebeforei485 » Wed, Mar 17, 2021, 4:51 AM UTC

vbezhenar wrote: post #20

I don’t like those developments. I’m living in Kazakhstan which is huge and cold in winter. People are poor and average car age is 20 years (plenty of cars with 30+ age). Everything is just opposed to electric cars use-cases. And of course we’re too small to be able to manufacture our own engines.

They will still be produced for many years to come. Combustion engines are basically at the peak of their efficiency at this point, they are heavily dependent on computers and there is not much gain in developing it further.

Re: Audi abandons combustion engine development

#23

Post by pmorici » Wed, Mar 17, 2021, 4:51 AM UTC

sjwright wrote: post #11

kashprime wrote: post #5

ICE’s have over a century of development behind them now. I’m not going to miss them, but I wonder if there’s a way to ‘archive’ this kind of specialist mechanical engineering knowledge. It may come in handy one day. It’s depressing to read about engineers having to go to the Smithsonian to study the lunar lander to relearn some of the innovations and improvisations made at the time.

Even if we get to 99% EV within fifty years, it’s going to be a long while after that before EV takes over 100.000% of ICE.

There are something like 1.4 billion vehicles in operation world wide and 80 million new vehicles are sold every year.

That is at most 17 years once new vehicle sales are effectively 100% electric which will probably happen around 2030. The value of used gas cars will deteriorate rapidly as the spare parts and repair networks disappear and electric vehicle costs become much cheaper pulling forward demand for the transition to electric.

Re: Audi abandons combustion engine development

#24

Post by Gibbon1 » Wed, Mar 17, 2021, 4:53 AM UTC

dv_dt wrote: post #9

Audi is just one of the brands of Volkswagen group. I wonder if Audi will just get support from other groups.

Don't know if it's true or not, but saw a comment elsewhere that said Audi mostly uses engines designed by other VW groups. On the other hand VW is showing a heavy commitment to electric vehicle production.

Re: Audi abandons combustion engine development

#25

Post by axaxs » Wed, Mar 17, 2021, 4:53 AM UTC

kashprime wrote: post #5

ICE’s have over a century of development behind them now. I’m not going to miss them, but I wonder if there’s a way to ‘archive’ this kind of specialist mechanical engineering knowledge. It may come in handy one day. It’s depressing to read about engineers having to go to the Smithsonian to study the lunar lander to relearn some of the innovations and improvisations made at the time.

Yeah, it's always a real shame when that happens. We have the internet, now, at least, hopefully lots can and will be made available once ICE falls further out of favor.

I'd read recently something similar about Colt. Not only did they 'lose' their bluing formula, but apparently never documented much about their smithing process, as they had trouble hand fitting revolvers due to a knowledge gap.

Re: Audi abandons combustion engine development

#26

Post by tra3 » Wed, Mar 17, 2021, 4:53 AM UTC

kashprime wrote: post #5

ICE’s have over a century of development behind them now. I’m not going to miss them, but I wonder if there’s a way to ‘archive’ this kind of specialist mechanical engineering knowledge. It may come in handy one day. It’s depressing to read about engineers having to go to the Smithsonian to study the lunar lander to relearn some of the innovations and improvisations made at the time.

Don’t even have to go back that far. US govt is calling for contractors to reverse engineer b2 bombers: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26333649

Re: Audi abandons combustion engine development

#27

Post by account4mypc » Wed, Mar 17, 2021, 4:54 AM UTC

diebeforei485 wrote: post #22

vbezhenar wrote: post #20

I don’t like those developments. I’m living in Kazakhstan which is huge and cold in winter. People are poor and average car age is 20 years (plenty of cars with 30+ age). Everything is just opposed to electric cars use-cases. And of course we’re too small to be able to manufacture our own engines.

They will still be produced for many years to come. Combustion engines are basically at the peak of their efficiency at this point, they are heavily dependent on computers and there is not much gain in developing it further.

> there is not much gain in developing it further

i think there's still cool developments e.g. https://www.freevalve.com

Re: Audi abandons combustion engine development

#28

Post by benrbray » Wed, Mar 17, 2021, 4:57 AM UTC

akamaka wrote: post #17

kashprime wrote: post #5

ICE’s have over a century of development behind them now. I’m not going to miss them, but I wonder if there’s a way to ‘archive’ this kind of specialist mechanical engineering knowledge. It may come in handy one day. It’s depressing to read about engineers having to go to the Smithsonian to study the lunar lander to relearn some of the innovations and improvisations made at the time.

It seems inevitable that much of the practical knowledge is lost. Look at how few old sailing ships survive, despite that being the most advanced transportation technology for centuries. The schematics of the engines will survive, but future generations who study them will struggle to understand the design choices that went into them. I’m happy that might change in the world of software, since so much collaboration i…

Will they? Most companies' internal systems are locked down and we'll suffer the same problem. Open source is the best way we have right now to preserve software knowledge.

Re: Audi abandons combustion engine development

#29

Post by cameldrv » Wed, Mar 17, 2021, 4:58 AM UTC

Aperocky wrote: post #16

devoutsalsa wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t remember the lunar lander, but I do recall reading how each rocket engine on the Saturn V was one of a kind, because the engineers had to assemble each one by hand, and each acted slightly differently. So there’s no way to reproduce a specific Saturn V engine now, but there also never was back when the Saturn V was still flying.

Would we do any differently today? I think we gravitated towards smaller and more numerous engines (that are easier to construct to the same exact copies), but nobody since has built anything remotely as large as the Rocketdyne F1.

The RD-170 is about the same as an F1 although it has 4 nozzles and 4 combustion chambers.

Re: Audi abandons combustion engine development

#30

Post by donavanm » Wed, Mar 17, 2021, 4:59 AM UTC

pmorici wrote: post #23

sjwright wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if we get to 99% EV within fifty years, it’s going to be a long while after that before EV takes over 100.000% of ICE.

There are something like 1.4 billion vehicles in operation world wide and 80 million new vehicles are sold every year. That is at most 17 years once new vehicle sales are effectively 100% electric which will probably happen around 2030. The value of used gas cars will deteriorate rapidly as the spare parts and repair networks disappear and electric vehicle costs become much cheaper pulling forward demand for the tran…

You making a lot of assumptions that arent born out by current experience. Its not uncommon for 100 year old cars to be registered and driven on public roads today. I personally have registered “daily drivers” from the 1970s and 80s. I actually rebuilt my 1972 motorcycle using factory parts from the dealership. As cars get rare they tend to increase in value, which also increases the return on effort/money put in to them. The “last running ICE car” is going to be a prized gem in a collection, not scrap metal.