Why (some) GM products suck

[sugarpop]

Yes, gas mileage has actually gone down over the years, instead of up. It's sickening. And on this show I watched recently (Futurecar), they said that only 25% of the fuel is actually used to propell the car. 75% comes out the tailpipe. I was stunned! How extremely inefficient is that, and STUPID? Other forms of fuel don't have that inefficiency.

[tw]

Originally Posted by sugarpop

... they said that only 25% of the fuel is actually used to propell the car. 75% comes out the tailpipe.

Where were you when those numbers (along with maybe 100 others) were posted?

In ten gallons of gasoline, something above 1 gallon does productive work. No, not all that energy is lost in a tail pipe. Other losses include heat (ie radiator) and vibration. What are the world's lowest performance cars? Ones that make the most noise. Crappiest vehicles include most every truck and car with a V-8 including Mustang, noisy Corvette, Camaro, etc.

Another myth is pollution control. Fools believed what was told without facts and numbers. Propaganda experts, spin doctors, and business school graduates said more pollution control means lower gas mileage, less horsepower, and slower cars. Reality. How to increase gas mileage and increase performance? Decrease pollution.

What does a catalytic converter do? If you don't know this, then you were always part of the problem. Burns the gasoline that the engine didn't. Burns gasoline that should have been making energy in the engine.

Hydrocarbons burned in an engine means less pollution, increased efficiency, and more horsepower from a smaller engine. Nitrogen oxides broken up into non-pollutants (nitrogen and oxygen) also create more productive energy. But many American auto executives (and the politicians who protected them) had a George Jr brain. So they lied (to us and themselves). Too many of us also worshipped George Jr's brain; believed those lies.

If three out of every ten purchased gallons of gas did something productive, then global warming, pollution, and the energy crisis are averted. But since so many of us so hated the world as to buy GM cars (tell GM to not innovate) and promote other myths such as ethanol and hydrogen, then something close to 1 out of every 10 gallons is productive. The waste is that massive.

Those numbers assumed we need 200+ hp engines. Another solution just waiting for innovators to solve. A 60,000 pound 18 wheeler only needs 350 or 500 horsepower. Why does a vehicle 30 times lighter need 200+ horsepower? It does not. But we install engines with ten times too much horsepower so that innovation need not be done. So much stifled innovation all to the glory of people with a George Jr intelligence level.

The opportunity for innovation and its resulting advantages are that large.

What do wackos want? Drill, drill, drill! Wackos cannot innovate, cannot admit what the real problem is, and only understand "More Power" - a Tim Allen joke about people who remain that dumb. Wackos want "More Oil". Then wackos can get their $40million paychecks while stifling innovation.

Yes, much less gasoline (than your numbers) does productive work. Well understood by those who used the same logic that also challenged the Saddam WMD myths.

Your numbers give automobiles too much credit. Those numbers say how easily we could massively reduce our energy consumption if we built gas ovens to cook MBAs and wacko politicians inside them.

Notice, I did not give numbers for the amount of energy saved and usefully used; if we only burned the problem - and not its symptoms.

[Urbane Guerrilla]

Originally Posted by sugarpop

Yes, gas mileage has actually gone down over the years, instead of up. It's sickening. And on this show I watched recently (Futurecar), they said that only 25% of the fuel is actually used to propell the car. 75% comes out the tailpipe. I was stunned! How extremely inefficient is that, and STUPID? Other forms of fuel don't have that inefficiency.

Though about the best you can see (in recent electrical generating plants) is right around 50%, up from around 35% thirty years ago.

A good part of this is actually due to the piston engine: roughly a fifth of the heat energy developed inside the cylinder with every firing is needed to exhaust the combustion gases out the exhaust valve. This is one reason aero engine makers stopped developing piston power about the end of WW2 and the turboprop engine came out, and this is also why turboprop engines are small, shaft horsepower for shaft horsepower.

Turbosupercharging came around as one way to scavenge some of that thrown-away heat energy. Handling a lot of turbosupercharging power was the reason the WW2 Thunderbolt was so bulky a fighter plane; it was full of ducts, behind a great big two-row radial engine.

Tiny turboshaft engines for automobiles probably best suit an electric powertrain, though: spin an alternator, not a transmission and driveshaft, feeding two or more electric motors turning the wheels. It works for locomotives...

[Shawnee123]

I've wondered about that too. An expensive hybrid gets about what my 1990 CRX used to get, and way less than the CRX HF model got.

Again, something's rotten.

[Clodfobble]

Originally Posted by sugarpop

only 25% of the fuel is actually used to propell the car. 75% comes out the tailpipe. I was stunned! How extremely inefficient is that, and STUPID? Other forms of fuel don't have that inefficiency.

You should totally ask tw what he thinks about that...

[ZenGum]

This thread had seemed somehow incomplete, until now.

[classicman]

:giggle: at Zen.

[classicman]

Used Car Lemons and Lemonade

Check out our list of the best and worst used cars. Remember, while this list is a good start, all used cars are different. Before buying, make sure you give any used car -- even one on our best list -- a thorough inspection.

Worst Used Cars:
GMC Canyon
Chrysler Sebring
Ford Explorer
Dodge Intrepid
Pontiac Aztek

Best Used Cars:
Honda Civic
Subaru Impreza
Toyota Prius
Ford Mustang
Mazda MX-5 Miata

Not very surprising - except for the mustang.

[xoxoxoBruce]

The Aztek is on the worst list because it's ugly as sin, and the mustang is on the best list because it's popular. Not very comprehensive.

[classicman]

I was wondering if this was more of a popularity list - The American cars bad - foreign good.

FWIW - My dads explorer has 260 on it and is still running strong.
Oh and Mazda Miata???


Perhaps tw will ask why they hate America so much to even publish that list. j/k

[tw]

Now that GM cannot take revenge on honest reporters, the reporter said what he really saw. From the NY Times of 23 Jun 2009 is the description of a crap design implemented only so that the world 'hybrid' can appear on its sheet metal:

A G.M. Hybrid That Misses the High Notes
Queried about the hybrid — how many they would build, when we might see it — officials hemmed and hawed like parents pressed for the whereabouts of a pregnant teenage daughter.

Now we know why. ... But it’s time to add the Malibu Hybrid to the growing pile of hybrid failures from General Motors.

These half-hearted efforts have included pickups (now defunct) that couldn’t save fuel, but could run your power tools. Even the guys who wear tool belts to weddings wouldn’t bite. Then G.M rolled out full-size hybrid S.U.V.’s from Cadillac, Chevy and GMC. These 20-m.p.g. behemoths have proved as popular as the A.I.G. corporate jet.

And last week ... G.M. abruptly pulled the plug on the car after just a year of production. In May, Chevy sold just 706 Malibu Hybrids, along with only 35 units of its sister car, the Saturn Aura Hybrid.

The Aura and Malibu are so-called mild hybrids, which makes them as authentic as supermarket salsa. To keep the price down, the Malibu forgoes the things that let full hybrids generate impressive mileage: a large electric motor that can propel the car with no help from the engine, a sizable battery pack and a continuously variable transmission to efficiently mix and match electric and gas power.

Instead, the Malibu adopts a simple motor-generator driven by a wide engine belt and connected to a small nickel-metal-hydride battery pack in the trunk. ... Unlike full hybrids, the system delivers only supplementary squirts of electricity; aside from automatically shutting down and restarting at stoplights, the engine is always on duty.

What is the Saturn? Just a Chevy with a different name. Business school graduates are still designing GM cars.

It's a hybrid only if one thinks an MBA can be honest. It is exactly what happens when Rick Wagoner got promoted Chairman of all GM because he ran GM North America into record losses. Another trophy for bean counters - and also why Ford need not run to the government for protection. When do we fire up the oven in Detroit - so that business school graduates will be removed?

[ZenGum]

Hell, stick a hamster on a treadmill in the glove compartment, use the little fella to power the dome light, and voila! ECO-GREEN HYBRID SYNERGY BIO-DRIVE!!!