Will automakers rethink importing diesel cars to North America?
Those of us who enjoy driving and owning ‘higher’ performance and efficient diesel cars have had this nagging suspicion that diesel cars may not arrive as planned, considering the auto slowdown and noting the price spread between gasoline and diesel fuel. According to a USA Today article, Honda Motor spokeman David Iida commented that Honda is reconsidering the timing to bring diesel cars to America. He states, “we are re-evaluating, due to trends in gasoline and diesel prices, and the price of raw materials we use in the exhaust clean-up system.” Hopefully they’ll continue as planned and that they realized their competitor Volkswagen still has little problem selling their ‘clean diesel’ TDIs.
It wasn’t entirely doom and gloom for diesel advocates as Iida says Honda will decide “sooner rather than later” on going ahead with U.S. diesels, but wouldn’t pin down a date. The excellent Honda diesel engine that is (was?) to first show up in a 4 cylinder in the luxury Acura brand sedan and be followed by a V-6 diesel in SUVs and perhaps the van. But problems still exist — most Americans have a less than positive view of diesel stemming from past experience and what they see with trucks and with the economy are not really in the car buying mood. They have also notice that the average price of diesel fuel is running 40% to 50% more than average gasoline prices and its difficult even with the improved fuel mileage provided by a diesel engine to pay a buck a gallon more for fuel. It certainly wipes out cost savings buyers expected to recoup by buying a diesel. When gasoline was hitting $4/gallon, a diesel SUV or small car getting 20% to 40% better fuel economy was starting to make sense, even if the original cost was $1500 more than the similar gasoline model, but now with gasoline averaging $1.75 across the nation its not quite as logical. Obviously automakers are rethinking “when” to bring over their diesel cars. (BTW, often overlooked by the buyer is the strong residual values and longevity seen in diesel vehicles)
Besides Honda, there are a few other “car” makers planning to bring diesels to America. I’ve heard Subaru is still planning theirs and know Nissan has a few test vehicles floating around. According to the article, Nissan says it still plans to sell a V-6 diesel in the premium Maxima sedan in the U.S. in 2010. But spokesman Scott Vazin says the price premium for diesel fuel is worrisome. “It’s why we’re putting it on our flagship. We don’t know where (fuel prices) will be when we launch, but we expect some pent-up demand. And our perception of the diesel buyer is someone who keeps the car longer,” minimizing the drawback of its higher price.
Current manufacturers offering diesel cars in the U.S. are: Volkswagen, Jeep, Mercedes-Benz and BMW with Audi offering a TDI in their large SUV next fall.
Those who find baby animals cute (and a miraculous creation) might enjoy these photos to music video. (Really it is just a second test of Twitterfeed to be sure it is working.)
While waiting for a project to finish printing, I thought I would test a new Twitterfeed account set up to update a separat MyDesultoryBlogTwitter account. It is suppose to update with a Tweet whenever my Feedburner RSS feed receives a blog update — or at least within 60 minutes of a post. So … I’m using a the University of Akron’s new Stadium project webcam as a test post. This particular multiple view video setup is one of the better webcams I have seen; hmm … I might even try to convince my son (a student at UA) to walk over in the cold and wave at the camera!
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Ward’s Auto World has published its 15th annual ten best engines list and two new diesel engines made the list. The dual turbocharged 3.0L inline 6 cylinder diesel from BMW and the Volkswagen 2.0L TDI were the first new 50-state legal diesels to be picked by the Ward’s editors. The other fuel efficient engine was in the Ford Escape hybrid as it also is able to record 30 mpg in real world testing by the magazine.
I had written and forward dated a December 7, 1941 post that was to show up … unfortunately it has disappeared (and I’m not rewriting it). I have been having a few problems with my recent WordPress update and how it interfaces with the MySQL database; I wonder it that’s the problem?
For now I’ll just link to my post back in 2005 or 2006.
The crude oil pendulum is swinging back just as quickly as it went up, and might even drop lower than most drivers have seen in quiet a few years. According to reports from a Merrill Lynch Commodity report, oil prices may crash below $25 a barrel in 2009 and gasoline prices could fall below $1 per gallon. Demand for oil continues to decline as economic growth has already down to its weakest level since 1982. The report also states that the global recession could extend to China and that non-Opec cuts will be required. Since October, oil has moved from $100/barrel to a close of $43.64/barrel on Friday. So much for alternative fuels and alternative energy.
While traveling yesterday, I darted across the state of Ohio on Route 30 knowing that occasionally the gasoline prices are less expensive at a truck stop in Beaverdam, Ohio(Route 30 and Interstate 75), but before jumping onto the rural highway and leaving “known” stations, I pulled up GasBuddy‘s GasBuddyToGo on my Palm Treo. A quick check into recent price postings confirmed that I could save 13 cents per gallon by waiting. Give GasBuddyToGo a try on your phone.
It’s hard to imagine General Motors going the diesel route again after their last go-around 30 years ago, but considering a number of vehicles desired by American purchasers are the larger SUV and light trucks, a clean, highly efficient diesel would make sense. Besides the fuel efficiency of a diesel engine mated to the GM Light-Hybrid drive for these larger vehicles, the diesel’s notorious long life and superior highway mileage makes them an attractive option for U.S. highways and interstates.
From the late 1970s and into the early ’80s, Oldsmobile sold the most popular car in America: the Cutlass. Olds was on a sales roll; it seemed nothing would be able to stop the division. Then came the Oldsmobile diesels, and stopping is exactly what they did best.
Instead of designing a new series of diesel engines from scratch, GM decided to base its new diesel V8 architecture on the existing gasoline Oldsmobile 5.7-liter V8’s. Of course the modifications were extensive in order to handle the 22.5:1 compression ratio of diesel operation—much stouter iron block, new cylinder heads, reinforced bottom end—but it was still a series of modifications rather than a clean-sheet design. Soon after the 5.7-liter diesel V8 debuted in Oldsmobile full-size 88 and 98 models (during 1978), the engines started tearing themselves apart.
That extreme fragility was despite the fact that the 5.7-liter diesel option cost between $800 and $1000 extra per car and only made a puny 120 hp and a stingy 220 lb-ft of peak torque at 1600 rpm. In short, these engines were awful. But the 4.3-liter version of the diesel V8 was even worse—rated at only 90 hp, it was somehow even more fragile.
The diesel V8s (and a short-lived diesel V6) were eventually offered throughout most of the Oldsmobile line and spread to the other vehicle divisions as well. And when the engines inevitably blew up, the cars they were in would either head to an early death in a junkyard or have a more reasonable powerplant swapped in.
I’ve posted a few times on the social networking/micro-blogging tool called Twitter. This inspired a reader to send me his favorite Firefox add-on and an excellent Twitter related website that is worth sharing. First is the Pingfire(Ping.fm) Firefox add-on which isn’t working on my VistaOS notebook (surprise, surprise) and the other, a search tool called TwitterLocal.
TwitterLocal in particular is a great way to connect with others using Twitter in a specific geographic area, either by “City, ST” or zipcode, tweaked to the number of miles around this locale. It is also an easy way to follow an RSS feed from locals that you may not want to add to your own “following” list. I’ve recently added a couple more local friends to my Twitter/RichC account, but may have to once again trim back to under 50; in my opinion following too many active users over 50 becomes unmanageable for all those with “Master Geek” credentials.
While traveling through Akron, Ohio today, I sat for a few minutes at a newly remodeled McDonald’s — actually I just stopped to use the restroom. It was my second look at the McCafé which debuted back in 2001 outside Chicago. It was also a chance to upload a Palm Treo photo directly to Ping.fm — a Twitter updating service.
Click about photo for full sized photo unimproved from aging Palm Treo 700p.
Will automakers rethink importing diesel cars to North America?
Ward’s Auto World has published its 15th annual ten best engines list and two new diesel engines made the list. The dual turbocharged 3.0L inline 6 cylinder diesel from BMW and the Volkswagen 2.0L TDI were the first new 50-state legal diesels to be picked by the Ward’s editors. The other fuel efficient engine was in the Ford Escape hybrid as it also is able to record 30 mpg in real world testing by the magazine.
