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Voltswagen of America

media.vw.com

401–410 of 632 posts

Re: Voltswagen of America

#401
post #179

I previously owned a VW, but swore on my life that I'd never buy another one after the emissions cheating scandal. There are plenty of reasons why a VW likely wont be my next choice, but I'm softening my stance a bit. What they did was absolutely reprehensible, but I later learned that the more accurate story is that they bore the brunt of media attention for something that nearly every auto manufacturer was later fo…

Regardless of what you think they did was right or wrong, it was pretty clever.

Re: Voltswagen of America

#402

Pronunciation is no longer “folks wagen” but “faults wagen”. The classic German ironic sense of humor.

"V" can be randomly soft or hard, "Volk" is pronounced like "Folk" but "Volt" like "Wolt". THere's no real equivalent sound in English, I think. But, yeah, I've owned several VWs and electrical wiring is usually faulty so I'll go with Faultswagen as well.

Volt uses "W" sound instead of F, because Volt comes from the name of Italian physicist Allessandro Volta. Italian sound for V is W or english V.

Are there proper German words that don't read V as F? I've been lead to believe German is strict with phonem/letter combination.

Re: Voltswagen of America

#403

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How about 'rolling coal'?

Never heard of this before, I looked it up, but I still don't get it -- you're not getting more power, you're not getting better fuel efficiency, you're not getting a smoother ride, what's the point - you're literally burning money for no reason?

It's a popular way of making a political statement:

Own the libs!

Re: Voltswagen of America

#406

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are letting them off too easy. It’s probably a game of stag hunting. I don’t think this blacklisting applies either. You are ignoring the fact that whistleblowers can operate anonymously. These companies chose to then a blind eye on themselves and each other.

I'm not saying they're doing the right thing - just that the game theory is what it is. I'm trying to give an explanation, not an excuse. Anonymous only works in a small spectrum of possible whistle blowing - where the issue and the players are large enough to matter, but small enough that it won't be trivial to guess who the anonymous tip came from.

It's funny how game theory gets fouled up all the time in real life. A rainstorm or a faulty mechanism or a careless installer or 100 other human or non-human factors that aren't part of the game theory intervene to change everything.

If game theory is stacked against ethical behavior in a particular situation, I'll back ethical behavior. It's encouraging how often the game theory gets tripped up by factors outside the "rules".

Re: Voltswagen of America

#407
post #377
post #362

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What about it? No vehicle will do it from the factory, so I don't see how it's relevant here. It's the result of running a diesel massively, massively over-rich (with aftermarket tuning), and it's absolute hell on the engine - that amount of diesel in the cylinder washes down the cylinder walls and wipes off the lubricating film, so the cylinder wear is insane from even fairly short periods of it. Even in diesel truc…

I used to live next to a freeway and I know the true cost of dirty diesel engines. Get on any US freeway and you'll notice that while a majority of diesels are fine, there is a minority that is belching soot any time the driver steps on the gas. This is simply unacceptable - this tiny minority of diesels kills people over time - especially the poorer populations who live close to the freeways. I would prefer much mor…

The pointless out of band emissions testing of an emissions compliant truck (that easily passes the tests) having to go in for a test because it smokes a bit under hard acceleration and someone called it in for "rolling coal" is very much a nuisance to the truck owner and a waste of time/resources for all parties involved.

An older diesel engine can smoke a decent bit under hard acceleration and still be entirely emissions legal - it's not until you get into the particulate filters in the... oh, 2010s or so (not sure, I don't have anything that new) that you can contain all the particulate matter.

If your stance is that diesels shouldn't be permitted, or that anything older than a certain age shouldn't be allowed to be registered, that's fine, but that's not what I'm referring to here.

Re: Voltswagen of America

#408
post #377
post #362

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What about it? No vehicle will do it from the factory, so I don't see how it's relevant here. It's the result of running a diesel massively, massively over-rich (with aftermarket tuning), and it's absolute hell on the engine - that amount of diesel in the cylinder washes down the cylinder walls and wipes off the lubricating film, so the cylinder wear is insane from even fairly short periods of it. Even in diesel truc…

I used to live next to a freeway and I know the true cost of dirty diesel engines. Get on any US freeway and you'll notice that while a majority of diesels are fine, there is a minority that is belching soot any time the driver steps on the gas. This is simply unacceptable - this tiny minority of diesels kills people over time - especially the poorer populations who live close to the freeways. I would prefer much mor…

I’m obsessive about using the air recirculation button when driving to isolate the cabin any time I’m in the wake of a diesel vehicle, for this reason.

While health issues from diesel particulate is documented on a wide statistical basis, there’s ample reason to believe single exposure events may lead to individual negative health outcomes i.e. getting a lungful one time might just kill you.

Re: Voltswagen of America

#409
post #179

I previously owned a VW, but swore on my life that I'd never buy another one after the emissions cheating scandal. There are plenty of reasons why a VW likely wont be my next choice, but I'm softening my stance a bit. What they did was absolutely reprehensible, but I later learned that the more accurate story is that they bore the brunt of media attention for something that nearly every auto manufacturer was later fo…

We've owned three VW's including a diesel. I am not going to condemn an entire group of people (they employ over 600K people) for the acts of a few. Particularly when authorities have dealt with the situation.

This is no different from forming opinions about a population, social, ethnic or religious group based on the actions of a very small percentage of people belonging to said group. I think it's wrong in all cases.

Even if 100 people were involved (I think it was a LOT less than that), this would represent 0.02% of the "population" of VW. How is it, in any way, fair, to condemn them all for the sins of a group that has already met their deserved legal consequences? Let's say the entire world stops buying VW because of this and over 600K people lose their jobs. How is that a morally and ethically supportable position?

Of course, everyone is free to reach their own conclusions. I would rather buy an electric vehicle from any company other than Tesla and, VW will certainly be a candidate. No, I don't hate Tesla, I want to support electrification of our transportation system. That can only happen if other companies earn our business. As more competition surfaces we'll have better and better options. Tesla might still win my business. I just want to see what the top ten auto manufacturers have to offer first.

Re: Voltswagen of America

#410

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you also have to ask "reliable compared to what?". my first car was a golf tdi. the only maintenance cost was the annual service. it never got close to 100k miles though because vw had to buy it back from me in the dieselgate settlement. statistically, I'm sure a toyota corolla is a much more reliable car, and I would have replaced it with one if that's all I cared about. but I've driven a few of those, and golfs are…

Which Corolla did you drive as the new ones are pretty performant? I've got the 2 litre hybrid with 200nm torque from each engine and a combined bhp of 186 (could be ~305bhp and 400nm of torque if remapped as it has a 2 litre 200bhp petrol engine with 200nm of torque and a 105bhp electric engine with 195nm of torque but you'll lose linear acceleration and the fuel efficiency that Toyota equipped it with) with good mp…

last time I drove a corolla was several years ago, probably a 2017 model. it wasn't an awful car, but to me, it felt like a step down in driving dynamics over the tdi I was forced to get rid of. I believe that model made about the same peak power as my old tdi, but obviously at a much higher rpm. the steering felt vague, etc. I was also cross-shopping a gti (whose price was very depressed at the time), so it wasn't entirely a fair comparison.
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