Kill the Messenger - this time the LA Times
The Wall Street Journal writes an article about GM. It's only common knowledge. GM takes revenge when they don't like what a reporter writes. From the Wall Street Journal of 8 April 2005
As GM has struggled to stop losing market share in the US, executives there have stepped up the volume of their complaints about negative press. ... In a Wednesday column, Los Angeles Times auto writer Dan Neil sharply criticized GM for what he said were a series of poor management decisions.
"An American idle" in the LA Times of 6 April 2005
"GM is a morass of a business case, but one thing seems clear enough, and Lutz's mistake was to state the obvious and then recant: The company's multiplicity of divisions and models is turning into a circular firing squad" ...
There is some precedent for such harsh action among auto advertisers. Ford Motor Co yanked ads from the New Yorker magazine when the magazine failed to alert it about a Jun 1995 article containing a four letter word. In response, the New Yorker set up a formal system to warn about 50 companies on a "sensitive advertiser list" about articles that might offend.
In 1954, GM threatened to cancel its advertising in The Wall Street Journal, and not speak to its reporters, if the Journal published a story revealing the next year's cars. During the 1950s and '60s, the Journal put enough money into liquid assets that it would be able to keep publishing even if five big advertisers withdrew.
As a result, WSJ reporters such as Maryann Keller ("Rude Awakening") were reporting more honestly about GMs product problems.
Honesty is not GM. Example: new Pontiac G6 that GM promoted by giving away on Oprah. Lutz inherited this car and another pathetic product - Buick Lacrosse - when he arrived. Other pathetic designs include the Saturn L series that was forced upon Saturn by corporate bean counters. These are products of a #1 problem in GM - Rick Wagoner. But then let's do the numbers - which GM fears to put on their window stickers. 200 horsepower from a 3.5 liter V-6 is a paltry and low performance 57 horse power per liter. Well at least that is an improvement over their 52 HP per liter cars of the last ten years. 70 HP/liter was standard performance more than 10 years ago. A technology that GM was ready to put into all vehicles in 1975 - more than 25 years ago - if car guys (not bean counters) were permitted to design.
Why put the 70 Hp/liter in cars when so many Americans are so anti-American as to buy cars that must have two extra pistons (and less gas mileage). Those higher prices? Blame the unions.
Two years ago, (July 2003?), the New York Times wrote a scathing review of another pathetic GM product - the Pontiac Grand Prix. Maybe because Pontiac was replacing this product with the G6, then it was safe for the NY Times to report facts. The Grand Prix was called pathetic. Rick Wagoner could not be blamed for that so called 'Wide Track' car. BTW wide track means it is the same width as identical models sold in Buick and Chevy. Wide track is an expression for those who like to be lied to. Pontiacs are only wider in their exaggeration.
Rick Wagoner was head of GMs North American operation when, in February 2000, he was in competition with the European head of operations to succeed Jack Smith. North American operations were losing money while the European operations (Vauxhall and Opel) were providing GM with up to $1billion in profits annually. And so GM promoted the man whose operations lost money every year (North America) rather than promote a man who provided profitable products (Europe). Now that Wagoner is top boss, both operations are losing money heavily. No wonder GM management is blaming everyone except themselves. GM bonds somehow managed to stay out of junk status this week. GM wants the press to spin facts for them. Don't tell the truth about how bad GM products really are - especially their low performance, higher polluting, and lower gas mileage engines. Ignore that $100 million provided by the government in 1993 to develop hybrid products ... that GM still does not sell more than 10 years later. Never attack GM management. They are even more important than the product line. The emperor has no cloths. Fix the problem. Muzzle the press.
This month is the Consumer Reports April car issue. Consumer Reports (not to be confused with Consumers Digest) has a long history of being honest. Why? GM cannot use its advertising budget to take revenge. One famous CR article was entitled "Oldsmobile Achieva is an under achiever". An understatement. But CR can be honest. GM is depicting the LA Times to threaten the news media - because GM products are that bad due to Rick Wagoner.
Dan Neil's LA Times article is not that negative. But it identifies a problem in GM - Rick Wagoner. Not permitted.
It was Lutz, after all, who candidly averred at a Morgan Stanley meeting last month that GM might have to phase out some of its product lines, even using the word "damaged" to describe Pontiac and Buick.
GM utterly missed the boat on hybrid gas-electric technology and lobbied Congress not to raise fuel-economy standards on the grounds that meeting higher standards would divert funds from critical research in the ultimate propulsion technology, hydrogen fuel cells - an argument that, shall we say, lacks authenticity. Today, GM has no hybrids of consequence on the street, while rivals Toyota and Honda are selling as many as they can build.
Responsible technical publications from the IEEE to Scientific American noted that hydrogen as a fuel is not realistic. Better still - it was a lie once you did simple engineering numbers. Not enough energy in a hydrogen fuel. Too much energy lost to store and distribute it.
Hybrids were long known by the technically informed as a viable solution. But GMs top management had to understand simple numbers for BTUs in fuel, pounds per square inch, leakage rates, thermodynamic concepts, ... All things known to an executive who can provide a strategic objective - a product oriented thinker. Ask current GM management to provide the strategic objective? Not possible when bean counters design the products. Currently GM has pathetic products as one should expect from a bean counter - who could not even run a profitable North American operation.
BTW what were Rick Wagoner's previous jobs? Finance.
Signs in GM a decade ago spelled the word "employe". Why? This is how Roger Smith spelled the word in his memos. Therefore all signs in all GM plants were changed to spell the word as Smith insisted. Dan Quayle? Anyone remember how to spell "potatoe"? Immediately after Roger Smith left GM, all signs were immediately changed to spell it correctly: "employee". That is GM. The boss - not the product - is important. A principle promoted by business school management. A problem so deeply embedded in GM's bad management that Rick Wagoner decided to take personal control of jobs by both Cowger and Lutz. A management so deeply entrenched that the head of one few profitable GM operations in China quit when a new boss moved to Shanghai to better 'oversee' operations there.
Rick Wagoner's history was losses when he was boss of GM's North American operations. How do GM managers get their jobs? Clearly not on designing better products or reporting profits. Get Americans to foolishly buy GM products and lies. Better to get news services to spin half truths - so a naive 23% will continue to buy classically anti-American GM products.
They vote to save Rick Wagoner's job. They buy low performance, gas guzzling, pathetic vehicles that cannot be exported and still don't have technology that GM was ready to market in 1975 - 25+ years ago. Technology now found in all patriotic products since 1992. And that was the standard technology before hybrids. Let’s see. No 70 Horsepower per liter engine in the Pontiac G6 or Buick Lacrosse. No hybrids in any models. Who would be so foolish as to buy products from this company?
Why put the 70 Hp/liter in cars when so many Americans are so anti-American as to buy cars that must have two extra pistons (and less gas mileage). Those higher prices? Blame the unions.
I'm buying those two extra cylinders to get more liters to get more horsepower...duh.
Don't forget there's a price for that horsepower, the more horsepower the shorter the life span for the same engine.
Blame the unions? For the high prices of cars? Think again pal, the union labor accounts for 12 to 15% of the cost of that car. :eyebrow:
As far as I can tell, hybrids get about the sort of gas mileage you'd expect for a car with the OTHER technological improvements they contain, with an equivalently-sized gasoline engine. That is, they get better mileage because they've got less power.
Horsepower per liter is a somewhat interesting figure, but it means nothing in and of itself, and your religious devotion to it is silly. If HP/L was so important, everyone would be using Wankel engines.
Horsepower per liter is a somewhat interesting figure, but it means nothing in and of itself, and your religious devotion to it is silly. If HP/L was so important, everyone would be using Wankel engines.
Religions? I have no respect for Spanish Inquisitions.
In the meantime who do I believe - Roger Heimbuch, executive engineer for power train systems at GM? Or Russotto. Who do I believe? Jack Obermeyer, a chief engineer for Magnavox who increased horsepower 15 to 20 percent (including less pollution and increased gas mileage)? Or Russotto? Which one has better credibility. Which one in the group never even provides numbers? Russotto.
Which should I believe. The improved gas mileage, longer engine reliability, and wider operating range in the cars with a 70 Hp/liter engine? Or should I believe Russotto who provides no such examples.
Damning question. Once Porsche was the dream car because it had the 70 Hp per liter engine. Then the superior technology became standard in cars with longer life expectancy such as Honda, Toyota, and Mercedes. What cars fail so often that they are also the most stolen? Those low performance GM products.
Ahhh but Horsepowe per liter tells us nothing even though it explains why a GM car (comparitively equipped) costs more to build than than a Mercedes Benz. The GM car must add two extra pistons and all that other machined parts only to output equal horsepower (with less gas mileage, less responsible engine, and higher failure rates that occur with lower performance engines).
Ahhh, but Russotto just knows HP/liter tells us nothing. No reason to tell us why he knows. It is just better that he knows and we do not (a subtle way of saying, "Prove it").
Horsepower per liter is a somewhat interesting figure, but it means nothing in and of itself, and your religious devotion to it is silly. If HP/L was so important, everyone would be using Wankel engines.
Religion? I have no respect for Spanish Inquisitions. Instead I cite an enemy of religion - the numbers.
In the meantime who do I believe - Roger Heimbuch, executive engineer for power train systems at GM? Or Russotto. Who do I believe? Jack Obermeyer, a chief engineer for Magnavox who increased horsepower 15 to 20 percent (including less pollution and increased gas mileage)? Or Russotto? Which one has better credibility. Which one in the group never even provides numbers? Russotto.
Which should I believe. The improved gas mileage, longer engine reliability, and wider operating range in the cars with a 70 Hp/liter engine? Or should I believe Russotto who provides no such examples.
Damning question. Once Porsche, with its standard 70 Hp/liter engine, was a benchmark dream car. Then the superior technology (which also means longer life expectancy) appeared in standard vehicles such as Honda, Toyota, and Mercedes. What cars fail so often that they are also most stolen? Those with low performance and therefore high failure engines: GM products. I guess it is just an accident that GM is again on the verge of bankruptcy.
Horsepower per liter tells us nothing - even though it explains why a GM car (comparatively equipped) costs more to build than a Mercedes Benz? The GM car must add two extra pistons, extra machined parts, and a bigger body only to output equal horsepower (with less gas mileage, less responsible engine, and higher failure rates that occur with lower performance engines). Horsepower per liter only accidentally identifies which cars are inferior?
Russotto just knows HP/liter tells us nothing. No reason to tell us why he knows. It is just better that he knows and we do not (a subtle way of saying, "Prove it").
Don't forget there's a price for that horsepower, the more horsepower the shorter the life span for the same engine.
Which cars on the race track (real racing is about innovation) break down less often (and win more races)? Those with the high performance engines. Higher performance means the parts are not vibrating themselves into destruction. Higher performance means more energy applied to the wheel and less energy applied to the destruction of engine and drive train.
One advantage of 70 Hp per liter engines was longer life compared to 1975 lower performance 35 HP per liter V8s. Which cars lasted longer? The Chevy type car (of 1975 vintage) sold under a Mercedes nameplate with a higher performance engine (because it was machined better) or the 1975 Chevy?
"Bigger engines last longer" is a myth promoted by motor heads who cum over V-8s rather than first learn basic engine technology. The same people who called those Hondas and Toyotas junk. In reality, any engine designed and machined better is the one that lasts longer - no matter how many pistons are inside. That means higher Hp/liter.
BTW, which long haul (diesel) trucks have engines that last longer? Trucks with the higher performance engines are the more reliable. Larger engines that only get the same horsepower tend to fail more often.
In the meantime, Louis Hughes is the GM executive who made GM's European and even GM's Chinese operations profitable. When Wagoner, a finance guy who ran unprofitable operations instead got promoted, then Hughes left to become head of (I believe it was) Lockheed Martin. Promote the guy you see more often rather than the guy who makes things work. And so GM market share plummets along with their stagnant technology.
The one reason cited by Roger Smith (of the movie Roger and Me) for buying Hughes Spacecraft was so that GM cars could feature 'heads up displays'. Twenty plus years later - where is it? Well Roger Smith, like so many GM executives, did not know how to drive. Head up displays? I finally saw my first 'heads up display': on a Toyota Prius. A hybrid.
Where is Hughes Spacecraft? GM spun off Direct TV, On-Star, and Delco (all contain Hughes Spacecraft divisions) to cover GMs 1990s losses. I wonder if Toyota gets that 'heads up display' from a former Hughes Spacecraft operation.
Jack Obermeyer, a chief engineer for Magnavox who increased horsepower 15 to 20 percent (including less pollution and increased gas mileage)?
:confused:
Why do televisions need more horsepower?
You’re stuttering, TW. You read this in an article (Economist?), understood the concept and their sources but trying to condense it into a short post (after being beaten up for making long ones so often) the cites/ quotes don't fully support the premise.
OK, what in hell is a “High Performance” engine?
Are you saying the more horsepower per cubic inch/liter the longer it will last? That’s simply not true. The longevity of the engine depends on how that HP was achieved. Displacement is a surefire way, in two engines of the same technology. So is nitros oxide injection but neither will help longevity.
You’re right about vibration being the enemy of engines. As a matter of fact it’s engine enemy #1. Enemy #2 is heat(excessive). Both these culprits interfere with lubrication but that’s the method, not the cause, of failure.
Comparing a 1975 GM V-8 to the Mercedes of that vintage, yes, the Merc will probably last longer. And yes it was machined to closer tolerances but it also cost 3 times as much.
That highly touted Honda or Toyota engine was pulling much less weight. They would both fail much sooner than a big V-8, trying to lug a big GM car around.
Engines are most efficient when they’re working their hardest but that hurts longevity.
Remember HP and efficiency don’t mean torque. That’s the value of a diesel, the tremendous torque it produces at low RPM. Those 80,000 lb over the road rigs are turning about 2,000 rpm which helps longevity significantly but they also use transmission/differentials you have to shift 26 times. :mg:
Heads up displays were ONE of the reasons for buying Hughes but it makes a good sound bite for the TV news or quick fact for the automotive press.
The primary reason is they could see electronics was the future of automobiles and experience, capacity, knowledge are easier and cheaper to come by, when you buy a company that has it rather than creating a division from scratch.
They hadn’t planned to spin off On-star, it was a financial necessity.
BTW, GM has heads up in the high end models...it ain’t cheap and of questionable in normal driving.
Bottom line...GM has gone to hell in a handbasket. The MBAs haven't a clue about the car culture so they've made bad moves consistantly. Some of their high end products have finally turned around but the bulk of the products and the Corporation itself are deep, deep in doo doo.
The stupidest part of the whole engineering issue is that the federal goverment wants to slam down Californias efforts at tougher emission standards. The Feds, those corporate ass-kissing former and future lobbyist wannabes, are claiming that although California could write a tougher clean air law, when it comes to auto emissions the only way to improve auto emissions is by improving mileage, which is the sole province of the federal government.
This is of course pure horse manure, since a catalytic converter does not improve mileage.
So here is our "state's rights" conservative Congress using a loophole to prevent a state from trying to resolve a clean air issue on it's own.
bastards.
Kahnwe, Dewey, Fucem & Howe
Attorneys at Law
Detroit, Michigan
Mr. TW Cellar
Onthenet, PA
Dear Sir,
It has come to our attention you’ve been casting aspersions on the General Motors Executives.
Your actions have caused these fine members of the Grosse Point Country Club embarrassment and ridicule by their peers, in the clubhouse.
Your public ridicule has subsequently forced them to increase compensation to their mistresses in lieu of their ability to perform.
Their wives have increased European shopping junkets, their children have been working for Democratic candidates, their dogs have growled at them and their paperboy has been aiming for the roof.
Tsk tsk, Sir. As legal representatives and golfing partners of the aforesaid executives, we demand you cease and desist your criticism, stifle your passion and button your lip.
Should you ignore our demands, we will have no choice but to turn this matter over to the General Motors Corp, Homeland Security Division, Black Helicopter Branch, Field Testing Group.
We will also take all necessary steps to tell on you.
Respectfully Yours
Shirley Fucem
And the creativity prize goes to.....
xoxoBruce!!!
Are you saying the more horsepower per cubic inch/liter the longer it will last? That’s simply not true. The longevity of the engine depends on how that HP was achieved. Displacement is a surefire way, in two engines of the same technology. So is nitros oxide injection but neither will help longevity. You’re right about vibration being the enemy of engines. As a matter of fact it’s engine enemy #1. ...
Comparing a 1975 GM V-8 to the Mercedes of same vintage. Yes, the Merc will probably last longer. And yes it was machined to closer tolerances but it also cost 3 times as much.
Two engines using same technology. Obviously nitrous references were made only to confuse the issue. Obvious when industry standard numbers for fuel injected engines were different from turbo which were different from supercharged which are different from nitrous. Clearly those are all different technology engines. Lower performance GM engine (of same technology) is larger because it creates less horsepower for many reasons including excessive vibration, poorly designed exhaust systems, etc. GM engine wears out faster. Obviously. The GM engine has a lower HP/liter number AND costs more to build than the Mercedes.
Don't let those dealer prices fool you. The Mercedes comparatively equipped sell for same or less than the GM product throughout the world. At the same price, Mercedes earns a profit. GM sells many cars at losses which is why GM is so anxious to protect their SUVs with a $5000 profit margin.
Horsepower per liter number accurately identifies both crappy and superior engines. Even an advanced auto engine development engineer from Magnavox cited the number. Hondas and Toyotas move same weight car with smaller engines that also last longer. Why? Same technology engine has a higher HP/liter number due to superior design, less vibration, smarter exhaust system, better fuel combustion (meaning less pollution), etc.
BTW, what does the catalytic converter do? Burns gasoline the engine did not (and a few other functions). How to decrease pollution? Increase gas mileage as was even proven by Japanese cars in the 1970s and 1980s. Burn gasoline in the engine and not in a catalytic converter. Why does Honda ,et al have those ultra low emmission vehicles? They properly burn gasoline in the engine and therefore get higher gasoline mileage to boot.
Properly noted by xoxoxoBruce is that some GM products have improved. How do you know? Those are the few GM products that finally got a 70 Hp/liter engine. Most noteworthy is the performance improvement in cars that are (unfortunately) styled like Bizarro Superman's face - Cadillac.
A worse case problem that virtually everyone says is a GM problem. They have 18 models in 8 divisions. They have three different cars of the same size and market that don't even share any component parts. VW markets numerous nameplates from only three cars. Names such as TT , Pasat, and VW Bug are the same vehicle with modified metal curves.
These recent posts are simply updated details on what was posted many years previously. GM did not fix their problems. Rick Wagoner is no different from previous GM leaders who (for example) short the pension fund contributions to invent profits. Then blame the pension fund for their financial problems years later. Financial problems today were obvious many years previously in the background of top GM management and the resulting pathetic products. What does GM do? Blame the LA Times and seek revenge. Yea. That will fix everything. Kill the messenger.
First of all Nitros Oxide (laughing gas the dentist uses) is a legitimate way to increase hp and NOT obviously made only to confuse the issue. 600/700 cubic inch engines routinely produce 3,000 hp but they are rebuilt after a couple of minutes running. Lot’s of hp/ci but not longevity, which is the point. HOW the increase in hp/displacement is achieved dictates any increase in longevity.
The GM engine has a lower HP/liter number AND costs more to build than the Mercedes.
Where on earth did you get that from? :headshake
The Mercedes comparatively equipped sell for same or less than the GM product throughout the world.
If your comparing the Mercedes to GMs sold in Calcutta, but not in NY.
BTW, what does the catalytic converter do? Burns gasoline the engine did not (and a few other functions).
The Catalytic Converter was invented to remove the NOx (nitrogen oxides) that come from higher combustion temps. The higher temps are required to make the engine operate more efficiently. Engine coolant temps that used to be 160 to 180 degrees F are now over 200 to keep the combustion chambers and incoming charge passages hot.
Now they have 3-way Cats that will act like a furnace to burn some of the carbon monoxide and any hydrocarbons (fuel or oil) that get by the engine. BUT their primary function is still removing the N from the NOx resulting in O2(oxygen) and N2(nitrogen).
One reason Hybrids pollute less is that huge battery pack has the power to heat the Cat, getting it working quickly.
All these are just technical points. The fact remains GM's management has sucked for some time and still does. The only reason they've survived this long is the momentum and clout of such a behemoth with a better than 50% market share takes a long time to run down.
First of all Nitros Oxide (laughing gas the dentist uses) is a legitimate way to increase hp and NOT obviously made only to confuse the issue.
Again, nitrous only confuses the issue. Do we all run nitrous in our cars? Of course not. We are discussing a technology called fuel injection using standard 87 Octane gasoline. Which versions of these engines last longer? Those with a higher HP/liter number.
If your comparing the Mercedes to GMs sold in Calcutta, but not in NY.
Again you are looking at retail price and assuming that retail price is reflected in manufacturing costs. When selling a Mercedes in the US, add upwards of $20,000 profit because the equivalent GM car (of inferior quality) must sell at that price to break even or earn a small profit.
About ten years ago, profit margins for GM products averaged - $125 per vehicle. $125 for a less than $20000 vehicle. Ford and Chrysler were both earning about $1000 per vehicle. GM automobiles were sold at a loss which is why GM was about 2 hours away from bankruptcy sometime on or after 1990. One of the biggest losers was the Chevy Caprice. It has been long understood that GMs costs are some of the world's highest - higher than Daimler Benz. (Maybe Fiat had higher costs?)
Look at labor. How many man-hours to make every part and assemble the vehicle? 1000 man-hours? No way. Not even in the ballpark. When GM was making every part from scratch into a completed car: 120 man-hours. However most of GMs competitors were doing same in less than 90 man-hours. When GM was bragging they got their manufacturing labor down to (I forget the exact number) 70 man-hours, well, the industry was doing a car in only 40 man-hours. It is estimated that some Toyota facilities are doing cars in less than 30 man-hours. Again, that is everything from putting threads on the screws to assembling the final product.
For those who listen to silly propaganda about labor costs: first do the numbers. A man earning about $30,000 per year on the assembly line takes 120 man-hours to manufacture one vehicle. Labor costs were about $2500 per vehicle. At $2500 per vehicle, a car company could not be profitable even in the late 1980s. At $1200 labor per vehicle, still GMs costs are some of the highest in the world. Labor has always been that little in the price of a new car. But at $2500 per vehicle, you can understand why GM tried to sell Chevy Cavaliers at $12000 per car. Eventually GM had to lower the base price to under $10000 per car because better designed imports took less man-hours to build.
Was Japanese labor cheaper? More myths. Japanese auto industry labor has traditionally been more expensive per hour than America. Typically 10% higher paid.
GMs problems are directly traceable to bad designs that cost more to build and that have worse reliability problems. And yes, the Daimler Benz products have long cost less to build than comparatively equipped GM models. It is why Mercedes are even found in ghettos such as the Gaza Strip. The dirty little joke played on naive Americans who "Buy American". They say, "Keep making crap that cannot even be exported". They still buy GM products and therefore say it is good to make crap. Patriots believe in the free market and buy the best - which is not an American GM product.
The Catalytic Converter was invented to remove the NOx (nitrogen oxides) that come from higher combustion temps. The higher temps are required to make the engine operate more efficiently. Engine coolant temps that used to be 160 to 180 degrees F are now over 200 to keep the combustion chambers and incoming charge passages hot.
Completely wrong. Newer design catalytic converters also address the NOx problems. But the original early 1970s converters only did one thing - burn the hydrocarbons in the exhaust. In fact, some carburetors were so badly constructed that early catalytic converters would set fire to the grass. Too much gasoline dumped into the catalytic converter cause too much heat and grass fires.
To do the same thing (mostly found in low performance American engines) was an air pump. Pump more air into the exhaust to burn the gasoline the engine did not. Nonsense. Innovators instead burn hydrocarbons in the engine - the higher performance 70 HP/liter engine.
This nonsense of about 'burning gas in the exhaust pipe' was made most glaringly obvious when DeLorean rescued Vega from MBA corporate management. Corporate executives wanted GM's Rochester carburetor in Vegas. DeLorean (a product oriented thinker) protected the Holley 5210C (licensed by Weber) that caused more fuel to be burned inside the engine. DeLorean summarizes the story quite bluntly in his book "On a Clear Day, You Can See GM". Rochester carbs were designed by bean counters. Holley innovated - licensed and tuned the world's best carburetor to be used on small engines. When DeLorean left GM in 1977, then the Holley Carb was immediately replaced in 1978 Vegas. But because the carb was so crappy, GM then had to install an air pump - to burn gasoline in the exhaust because gasoline was not fully burned in the engine.
The air pump and catalytic converter were to burn gasoline in the exhaust pipe when engine was lower performance and poor gas mileage; therefore polluted more.
Again, the catalytic converter has been improved since then to also process NOx and CO emissions. But its original and primary purpose is to burn hydrocarbons - as was its purpose in the 1930s when first installed at GM painting facilities by Airco.
What first addressed the NOx problem? EGR valve. Originally developed as part of the Chrysler CAP system in the 1960s. Its purpose: to lower combustion temperatures and reduce NOx. Yes, thermodynamic principles says a high temperature engine should be thermodynamically more efficient. But high NOx production meant more energy was lost manufacturing NOx - a pollutant. High School Chemistry. Break apart NOx into nitrogen and oxygen. Get no pollution and get more energy. An engine that outputs high NOx (pollutants) is using gasoline energy to instead make an air pollutant. To get better gas mileage and reduce pollution (less NOx), all cars now have the EGR (Exhaust Gas Recirculation) valve.
Americans were leading the world with 'less polluting' technologies in the 1960s. However the chief engineer for Chrysler's CAP program was (by 1970) banned from SAE meeting because top bean counter executives did not want those lower polluting technologies known. When top executive testified before the Senate (about 1969) that the 1975 standards could not be met, Chrysler’s CAP program was already testing engines in CA that met 1974 standards. Top auto executives don't like to be exposed by Senators as liars.
Today, many still believe those myths of bean counter auto executives. They claim more pollution control means less gasoline mileage. As demonstrated by the science in that above history, those who make a higher mileage engine also reduce pollution.
When the US auto industry in the late 1970s virtually did everything they could to deny pollution reduction, then patriots appeared in places like Bosch. Bosch developed the oxygen sensor now found in all cars. What does it do? Reduced pollution and increases gasoline mileage by reporting oxygen levels in the exhaust. A device that maximizes gas mileage also reduces pollution. But this has always been the secret to superior products that also have higher Hp/liter. Innovation. It means the top management must be car guys; not bean counters.
One reason Hybrids pollute less is that huge battery pack has the power to heat the Cat, getting it working quickly.
Nonsense. You don't need a hybrid battery to heat the catalytic converter. Any energy source (such as the alternator) can do that just fine. Hybrids pollute less and obtain better mileage because they adapt better to changing loads. To solve this 'load' problem, GMs solution was bigger engines. Hybrids do as diesel electric locomotives were doing in the 1930s. The concept was that well understood. Adapt better to changing load conditions and the engine can be smaller. A one liter Hybrid is now doing what a 2.2 liter (or in GM's case, a 3.0 liter) conventional engine does. And this is expected only to get better since the current hybrids are currently so crude.
Why are GMs costs so high? They stifled a 1972 technology even 25 years later - the 70 Hp/liter engine. That technology has since been replaced by Hybrids. Government gave GM (no strings attached) $100 million to develop a hybrid. But GM management is so anti-American, anti-innovation, and anti-humanity as to still not have a hybrid ready for production. $100 million dollars - no strings attached - and they still cannot innovate? Of course not. Look at where GM top executives come from. Finance Department. They even promoted the bean counter who operation was losing money every year - Rick Wagoner - over the engineer whose operation was delivering profits every year - Louis Hughes. A company so much its own enemy that GM cannot even see the difference between a good and bad executive? That has been GMs problems ever since the accountants took the company away from car guys about 1968 and after.
BTW, every executive I personally know in GM is either a lawyer or an MBA school graduate.
Again, nitrous only confuses the issue. Do we all run nitrous in our cars? Of course not. We are discussing a technology called fuel injection using standard 87 Octane gasoline. Which versions of these engines last longer? Those with a higher HP/liter number.
You were talking about 70's and 80's during which fuel injection was not universal by a long shot. Obviously you're trying to confuse the issue by using different technologies, apples and oranges, calling them the same, and comparing outputs of horsepower as king. Meanwhile completely ignoring the effect of torque output and the type of technology on longevity.
Shame on you for misleading these good people.
Again you are looking at retail price and assuming that retail price is reflected in manufacturing costs. When selling a Mercedes in the US, add upwards of $20,000 profit because the equivalent GM car (of inferior quality) must sell at that price to break even or earn a small profit.
The dirty little joke played on naive Americans who "Buy American". They say, "Keep making crap that cannot even be exported". They still buy GM products and therefore say it is good to make crap. Patriots believe in the free market and buy the best - which is not an American GM product.
It doesn't matter what they make in the profit column at Mercedes, when they charge 3 times as much as a Chevy people can't afford them. Duh. Use your head. People aren't shopping technology they're shopping price.
Look at labor. How many man-hours to make every part and assemble the vehicle? 1000 man-hours? No way. Not even in the ballpark. When GM was making every part from scratch into a completed car: 120 man-hours. However most of GMs competitors were doing same in less than 90 man-hours. When GM was bragging they got their manufacturing labor down to (I forget the exact number) 70 man-hours, well, the industry was doing a car in only 40 man-hours. It is estimated that some Toyota facilities are doing cars in less than 30 man-hours. Again, that is everything from putting threads on the screws to assembling the final product.
Horseshit, GM has never made all it's content. They've always bought parts and fasteners from outside venders. Not as much as today but always a significant percentage. The only hours you can add up is assembly of major components and final assembly of the vehicle. Oh, and vehicle assemblers make more than $30k....a lot more..
What first addressed the NOx problem? EGR valve. Originally developed as part of the Chrysler CAP system in the 1960s. Its purpose: to lower combustion temperatures and reduce NOx. Yes, thermodynamic principles says a high temperature engine should be thermodynamically more efficient. But high NOx production meant more energy was lost manufacturing NOx - a pollutant. High School Chemistry.
But when you reduce the combustion temp the other two pollutants go up. BTW- the automakers were forbidden by federal law to work together on emission controls.
Completely wrong. Newer design catalytic converters also address the NOx problems. But the original early 1970s converters only did one thing - burn the hydrocarbons in the exhaust.
Ahem. Catalytic converters were not introduced to reduce lead, as is sometimes suggested. It was the drive to reduce nitrogen oxides and CO that forced the converter
Nonsense. You don't need a hybrid battery to heat the catalytic converter. Any energy source (such as the alternator) can do that just fine.
Ahem. The catalytic converter does a great job at reducing the pollution, but it can still be improved substantially. One of its biggest shortcomings is that it only works at a fairly high temperature. When you start your car cold, the catalytic converter does almost nothing to reduce the pollution in your exhaust.
One simple solution to this problem is to move the catalytic converter closer to the engine. This means that hotter exhaust gases reach the converter and it heats up faster, but this may also reduce the life of the converter by exposing it to extremely high temperatures. Most carmakers position the converter under the front passenger seat, far enough from the engine to keep the temperature down to levels that will not harm it.
Preheating the catalytic converter is a good way to reduce emissions. The easiest way to preheat the converter is to use electric resistance heaters. Unfortunately, the 12-volt electrical systems on most cars don't provide enough energy or power to heat the catalytic converter fast enough. Most people would not wait several minutes for the catalytic converter to heat up before starting their car. Hybrid cars that have big, high-voltage battery packs can provide enough power to heat up the catalytic converter very quickly.
BTW, every executive I personally know in GM is either a lawyer or an MBA school graduate.
I'm sure every executive you personally know at GM would make me question your definition of exectutive. :eyebrow:
You were talking about 70's and 80's during which fuel injection was not universal by a long shot.
Thank you for admitting technology found even in German WWII fighter planes could have been in production in 1975 GM cars. So why was technology stifled until fuel injection (and other innovations) appeared in 1992 in competition products? Some are so in denial as to now try to obfuscate this discussion. They would fill the air with nitrogen oxide pollution - and even claim that catalytic converters were for NOx reduction. Even the original catalytic converter was only for the burning of hydrocarbons - because the engine did not. Nonsense. No. Outright lie. Someone has been listening too much to GM propaganda rather than learning reality. If GM propaganda was so accurate, then why is GM losing so much money – and now even attacking the LA Times for only publishing the obvious facts?
Daimler products cost less to manufacture than a comparable GM car - in part because so many Americans keep buying those inferior GM products. So many Americans so hate America as to not let GM engineers use technologies both developed and stifled in America. They buy the crap. That vote says “Keep making crap”.
Chrysler was the perfect takeover for Mercedes. They could still sell the Benz with large profit markups, and then sell the same car in much greater numbers as a Chrysler. Massive profits from the rich and large profits from the masses by selling the same platform. The Chrysler 300 is but one example of a Mercedes sold under the Chrysler name. Expect more Mercedes sold at Chevy prices under a different brand name because Daimler products cost less to build than pathetic and boring GM products. And BTW, even the BBC tonight discusses those boring GM products. BBC specifically used the word “boring”.
In the meantime, what do some Americans do? They continue to buy the crap GM products. A patriot believes in the free market - buy the best. But some Americans only make the American economy worse. They pay more for the crappy GM product. So crappy that it cannot even be exported.
Correctly noted is that GM has never made all its content. Therefore the average salary of a GM production worker (GM employee and their suppliers) was somewhere around $30K. Japanese labor cost more. And still the Japanese car costs less to build. Why? Numbers were provided previously. A superior product takes less man-hours. Just another reason why a GM car - using less expensive labor - costs more to build than a comparatively equipped Mercedes.
What does GM management blame? The government, the tax structure, their pension funds (which GM management under funded to mask losses on their inferior products), the education system, you, me, the labor unions ... everyone except the enemies of America - GM top management. Especially Rick Wagoner who was losing money for GM’s North American operation when he was promoted to CEO.
Numbers posted were correct. Assembly line workers did get paid more. But when the labor numbers all averaged out, the GM worker averaging $30,000 per year (about $20 an hour) got paid less than his Japanese competition. Still the GM product cost more to build. Who did management blame? Blame the overpaid unions (and not the grossly overpaid top executives who did not even know how to drive).
BTW automakers were not forbidden to sell their emission technologies to other companies - even their competition. Why is the EGR valve developed in Chrysler found in all other cars? Clearly this must violate some federal law... not. But then I keep knocking down myth after myth. The bottom line is that a GM product costs more to build than a Mercedes and it still an inferior product. So inferior because GM management still will not put the 70 Hp/liter engine in all cars. You can tell which GM cars have the lowest performance engines. They are the ones that make the most noise - and are therefore wearing out faster.
Watch GM run to the government for protection. Maybe ask for another $100 million to develop a hybrid engine? No. A $100 million to develop a hydrogen fuel vehicle - which even fundamental science says is not feasible. But then when did Congress look at facts when bribery of Congress is legal? We all get rich - in GM and the Congress. People protected by public fools whose entire decision is based only on "Buy American" - screw the numbers.
Fuck it. The pig just doesn't want to learn to sing. :p
Fuck it. The pig just doesn't want to learn to sing. :p
xoxoxoBruce - inventing numbers such as a Mercedes costs three times as much to manufacturer does not make your posts credible. Provided are numbers such as labor costs. You can deny those numbers all you want. But without better numbers, again, you are just nay saying. Where are your facts? I only read from you speculation. Where are your numbers. I provided many numbers direct from industry professionals. The most damning being Hp/liter and man-hours of labor to manufacturer each vehicle. Where do you provide a better industry benchmark? If you post as if Saddam's aluminum tubes are for WMDs, then you will only be confronted with reality you don't want to hear. Industry numbers would go a long way to making your point.
Meantime, I found another example of what has happened to GM since car guys stopped designing the product around 1970. IOW I come to opinions by first learning these facts:
From the New York Times of 23 April 2005
Bicoastal Blues for G.M. and Ford
Washington and Oregon plan to become the 9th and 10th states to adopt California's tough car emissions rules, forming an increasingly potent market for more fuel-efficient vehicles on the West Coast and in the Northeast.
The states that already follow California's stringent tailpipe emissions rules also happened to fall in the blue column of the 2004 presidential election: Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island and Vermont. ...
Further pressure comes from Canada, which recently forced automakers to agree to substantial cuts in emissions of global warming gases; California has a similar plan that automakers are challenging in court. ...
... on the coasts the last two domestically owned automakers face their biggest challenges, with customers turning to competitors like Toyota faster than in the rest of the country. Together, Ford and G.M. controlled 49.1 percent of domestic sales last year, but according to Polk, their market share in the 10 states was 40.6 percent.
... G.M. is diverting engineering resources from passenger cars to rush a new generation of its largest S.U.V.'s into production, betting that new models will stimulate the market for big sport utility vehicles ...
"The reality is that both companies are heavily invested in large S.U.V.'s and both companies have more risk than they have opportunity with their current sales mix," said John Casesa, an auto analyst at Merrill Lynch. "There is a secular trend towards lower emissions and higher fuel economy, which can only be met with lots of technology investment and probably smaller vehicles. There's only so much you can do with a Suburban."
Since more consumption means higher gasoline prices, where is the logic in GM's planns. Those who lived through this kind of downturn in the 1970s can also appreciate what GM, Chrysler, and Ford's solutions were back then. They simply kept building more large vehicles with low performance, low mileage engines. History tends to repeat itself in 30 year cycles when we don't learn those lessons.
In TW’s original post he made the assertion that GM’s management sucks. I agree with this assertion. However, he offered up as proof the magic 70 hp/liter as evidence of higher efficiency, better mileage and longevity which is utter bullshit.
Russotto offered an opinion which TW twisted until it was unrecognizable and belittled the poster as unworthy. You’ve seen it before.
Actually I made two mistakes. One was trying to respond to TW’s jumping around history and technology, and trying to answer his accusations of things I didn’t say, when I was too busy to devote that kind of attention to the thread.
The second, and more important mistake, again because of hurrying, was to reverse the chronological order of the catalytic converters. I apologize if I misled anyone. :o
More hp/liter doesn’t prove anything because there are so many ways to make hp. Better manufacturing tolerances, better balance for lower vibration (preferably by design and care rather than counter balance), better air flow in and out, more accurate spark and fuel delivery/timing, higher compression, variable valve timing, supercharging, turbo charging and
NOS not to be confused with
NOx.
I said
Comparing a 1975 GM V-8 to the Mercedes of same vintage. Yes, the Merc will probably last longer. And yes it was machined to closer tolerances but it also cost 3 times as much.
And TW responded
Two engines using same technology. SNIP Lower performance GM engine (of same technology) is larger because it creates less horsepower for many reasons including excessive vibration, poorly designed exhaust systems, etc.
Carburated, pushrod Chevy is the same technology as an overhead cam, fuel injected Merc. Yeah right. :rolleyes:
Next
“So why was technology stifled until fuel injection (and other innovations) appeared in 1992 in competition products?”
1992?? By '92 everything had injection for several years. Before Bosch invented the oxygen sensor enabling electronic fuel injection and electronic engine management, fuel injection was a nightmare. Prestigious, yes, but tremendously complex to manufacture and maintain. Easily clogged, impossible to keep in tune more than a few months at a time, and no advantage for street driving. That’s one reason the Mercedes engines cost 3 times as much as GM’s to buy.
I also said mercs cost 3 times what a Chevy does, in reply to TW’s,
“The dirty little joke played on naive Americans who "Buy American". They say, "Keep making crap that cannot even be exported". They still buy GM products and therefore say it is good to make crap. Patriots believe in the free market and buy the best - which is not an American GM product.”
I guess “patriots’ are much richer than most of us if they can spend 3 times as much for a merc.
So then he says,
‘xoxoxoBruce - inventing numbers such as a Mercedes costs three times as much to manufacturer does not make your posts credible.”
You see how he’s twisted what I said from the cars cost the consumer 3 times as much to the manufacturing costs being 3 times as high? Man, your nose must be growing.
I also said,
”But when you reduce the combustion temp the other two pollutants go up. BTW- the automakers were forbidden by federal law to work together on emission controls.”
And he responded,
, “BTW automakers were not forbidden to sell their emission technologies to other companies - even their competition. Why is the EGR valve developed in Chrysler found in all other cars? Clearly this must violate some federal law... not. But then I keep knocking down myth after myth.”
This time "work together" becomes "sell". Liar, liar, pants on fire. :p
All the manufacturers had a deadline to come up with a system of controlling their pollutants. The Fed’s were afraid collusion would prevent independent research to come up with the best possible solution(s) so they made it illegal to work together or even to know what the other was doing. After they had met their targets they were free to use any method to meet their mandated levels.
Make up a myth and knock it down. Wonder if he knows anyone named Sancho Panza?
An engine cylinder has a set displacement so it needs a certain amount of fuel to maintain a ratio of 14.7 pounds of air for each pound of fuel. At times of low or no load it's wasting that required minimum fuel but if they give it less fuel the combustion temperature soars and the engine will melt down plus the NOx climbs with the temperature. The ERG valve replaces part of the oxygen rich air with oxygen poor exhaust gas so they can withhold part of the fuel and not go lean, causing the temperature and NOx to climb.
Unfortunately the ERG valve is a trouble spot because its controling exhaust flow which tends to clog the valve with deposits. But since GM didn't invent it, that's ok.
You know...I’m beginning to think Bush didn’t lie. :lol:
Well done deconstructing, B. Good information.
However, [tw] offered up as proof the magic 70 hp/liter as evidence of higher efficiency, better mileage and longevity which is utter bullshit. ...
More hp/liter doesn’t prove anything because there are so many ways to make hp. Better manufacturing tolerances, better balance for lower vibration (preferably by design and care rather than counter balance), better air flow in and out, more accurate spark and fuel delivery/timing, higher compression, variable valve timing, supercharging, turbo charging and NOS not to be confused with NOx.
Listed are things required in the standard 70 Horsepower per liter engine. However, somehow xoxoxoBruce feels GM products still use carburetors?
Fuel injected engines come with and without specific features. Those (in the same fuel injected category) which include these features last longer, get better gas mileage, pollute less, and cost less to build. Why was carbureted engine technology replaced by fuel injected technology? Because the engine lasts longer, gets better gas mileage, pollutes less, and costs less to build. Or in GM's case, because it was all but required by the EPA.
Curiously, the same technolgy GM engine either compromises or forget to include standard features of current technology fuel injected products. As a result, their engines must have two extra pistons which means costs more to build, vibrates more, fails more often, burns more gas, etc.
Compare current GM technology to that of Daimler Benz. For example, the Chrysler 300 can be purchased with a 2.7 or 3.5 liter V-6. They output 70.4 and 71.4 Hp per liter. Why? Daimler uses world standard (post 1992) technology that GM could have sold in even 1975. (Chrysler is a Daimler Benz company).
Let see what GM sells. The base engine of the Buick Lacrosse (called Allure in Canada because LaCrosse had too sexy undertones for GM Canada) has a 3.8 liter V-6 outputting 52.6 Hp/liter. The Chevy Impala uses 3.4 l and 3.8 liter V-6s that do 52.9 and 52.6 Hp/liter. Spend more for the Pontiac Bonneville and get … 53.9 from the V-6 or 59.7 from the V-8. Spend more and get lower performance? Where is te 70 Hp/liter technology? GM 2005 technology is still even using push rods. No wonder Ward's Automotive said that GM could not even give new 3.8 liter engines to Honda or Toyota - for free. What is 2005 technology to GM is obsolete pre-1992 technology to the competition.
Why would anyone buy those lower performance products? No wonder a GM car costs more to build than a Mercedes product. Base price of the Chrysler 300 - $23,370. Of the Buick Lacross: $22,835. The Pontiac Bonnevile - $27,965. As industry insiders note, a Mercedes (Chrysler) product selling for same price also has a higher profit margin as well as the superior engine. Why? Which vehicle has the higher HP/liter? Notice again, Hp/liter means the superior product.
Ahh... but Hp/liter means nothing to some here. They know more than industry professionals. Then explain why GM cars make more noise, their larger engines wear faster, and have higher failure rates? Why do cars with lower HP/liter come from the auto company that has no profits and is losing market share every quarter? One need only look at that so-called *useless* number to see why GM lost $1 billion last quarter. Why they were literally giving away products with 0% interest sales incentives just to maintain market share.
Consumer Reports April issue lists their Quick Picks. For high ratings in all areas, not one GM product with their low performance engines is listed. Vehicles with 70 Hp/liter engines dominate the list in every category. For those who consider fuel economy important, one GM product made the list: Pontiac Vibe. The Pontiac Vibe comes with a 68, 72, or 94 Hp/liter engine. And who makes it? Toyota. To make the list - to have a 70 Hp/liter engine - GM sells a Toyota product. (yes GM does sell a few 70 Hp/liter products if you are willing to spend premium dollars).
For those who consider reliability important, again, 70 Hp/liter products dominate the list. A lowest performer in that high reliablity group being the Subaru Forester at 66 Hp/liter.
Other Quick Pick categories include safety and owner satisfaction. Every category is dominated by vehicles that do about or more than 70 Hp/liter. What is missing in every category? Low performance GM products that do only 52 or 60 Hp/per liter. Of course. Hp/liter strongly indicates product quality.
Numbers mean nothing because xoxoxoBruce and russotto are clearly more knowledgeable? They need not post numbers. They need only say that tw is wrong. That alone proves they must be right? Heaven forbid should they post any numbers. Why post supporting facts? Only those who must be always wrong would provide numbers and facts.
Let’s look at the list of “Used Cars to Avoid” for Chevy. Chevy Astro 1997-2003 never did more than 44 Hp/liter. 2002 Avalanche: 54 Hp/l. Camaro in ’97, ’99, & ’01: 50, 52, 53, 54 & 57 Hp/l engines (classic of what GM hypes as a high performance vehicle). Cavalier ’99-’00 & ’03: 52 & 63 Hp/l. Impala ’01: 53 Hp/l. Lumina ’97 & ’99: 52, 63 Hp/l (Chevy dropped the 63 Hp/l engine after 1997). Malibu ’97-’00: 48, 50, 62 Hp/l. Monte Carlo ’99: 52 & 53 Hp/l. Also listed as Used Cars to Avoid: Pontiac Bonneville ’98-’02: 54 Hp/l. Grand Am ’97-’01: 50, 51, 62 Hp/l. Grand Prix ’97-’98: 51 & 52 Hp/l.
That 62 Hp/l engine? Only available in 4 cylinder versions. Even GM could not sell a 4 cylinder engine that was lower performance. At least GM engineers got to do some designing.
Yes, some 70 Hp/liter models do exist in that long list of Used Cars to Avoid. But the list is dominated by vehicles with low performance engines. Again performance (horsepower per liter) suggests which vehicles will last longer, get better gas mileage, pollute less, and cost less to build.
Which should we believe? Two posters who just know that Hp/liter means nothing – and never post any supporting facts? Clearly they know better only because they say so. Or do we believe industry professionals who discuss the concept at length. John Hutton, chief power train engineer at Ford discusses Hp/liter when he noted how Ford had to do with only 4 liters what their 5 liter engines were doing. Roger Heimback, executive engineer for GMs power train systems group discussed engine development strictly in terms of Hp/liter. Jorg Abthoff noted how Daimler must get 15 to 20 percent more power from their current designs. All talk about Hp/liter.
xoxoxoBruce and russotto know better than these engineers? They say so and that is all one need believe?
GM recorded a $1billion loss in the past 3 months. GM cars have long been selling at pathetically low profit margins - low performance SUV covering up losses in their automobile line. One need not wait for spread sheets to report the obvious four to ten years later. Long before the spread sheets can measure it, the product oriented numbers have been reporting which companies will be in trouble. Hp/liter is an excellent example of which automobiles cost more to build, are less reliable, burn more gas, and pollute more. One simply does the HP/liter number for GM cars. At 52 Hp/liter, GM products are so pathetic as to clearly explain those $1billion losses.
Which company, with so many low performance products, also would not build a hybrid. Ten years after the US government gave them $100 million to do so, they still don't have one hybrid product. Ever hear the expression "corporate welfare"? Look who the recipient is. Free money and they don't have to build anything. What more do they want from the US government. Protection from the imports? They already got that.
Patriots believe in the free market. Patriots stopped buying Fords when all Ford products were designed in the accounting department. Patriots stopped buying Chryslers in 1979. Therefore Chrysler finally addressed their only problem - top management. Those in 1979 who were so anti-American as to buy Chrysler said, "Don't replace bad management with a guy who has a driver's license." Patriots always buy the best. Patriots believe in free markets. Not the communist propaganda called "Buy American". Patriots who stopped buying Ford and Chrysler products back then saved both companies. It took the threat of bankruptcy to remove the only problems in both Ford and Chrysler. Anti-Americans say "keep making crap" and therefore blindly "Buy American".
What is GM's problem? Their top management. What is the thing that removes bad management? Patriots buy the competition's products. German Chryslers and VWs. Japanese Hondas and Toyotas.
Unfortunately, many still buy GM products. Products so inferior as to require two extra pistons and other expensive hardware. GM will then blame everyone else but top management for their pathetic and grossly expensive products. They will beg you to 'buy American'. A product line that still does not feature 70 Hp/liter engines. They hope you never learn that fact.
The competition uses technologies pioneered in GM 30 years ago. And yet still GM does not install their own technology in every vehicle. Why? One need only read the reasons provided by xoxoxoBruce and russotto. Reasons? What reasons? They just know that Horsepower per liter means nothing. All those numbers and industry professionals be damned.
Clearly the very best car in the world is the Subaru Impreza WRX STi, which manages to get 300 HP out of a (turbocharged) 4 cylinder (!) 2450cc engine for 122.4 hp/liter.
Never mind, turns out the Mitsubishi Lancer Evo gets 276 hp out of a 2 liter for 138.
I'll see your Subaru and raise you a Mazda RX-8 Wankel--161.5 hp/liter, NON-turbo
Mazda RX-8 Specifications
Engine
1.3L displacement gas engine, 210 hp @ 7200 rpm 164 ft-lbs. @ 5000 rpm, premium unleaded fuel
http://www.allautoreviews.com/auto_reviews/mazda/mazda-rx-8.htmDo you have an MBA tw? I only ask because it seems to be an MBA-ish trait to latch onto one little "factoid" (70 HP/litre!), which isn't accurate under all circumstances, and parrot it endlessly, as though it's some universal guiding truth. It's more commonly known as "tunnel vision."
As flawed as some of your logic is, you are right about one thing... modern low-end and middle-of-the-road GMs suck. But I'd enjoy the hell out of a Corvette Z06.
Well, they have a much bigger messenger to kill, since
S&P just downgraded GM and Ford stock to 'junk'.
Right now, Kirk Kerkorian and his company still want to buy GM shares, but that might have more to do with GM's finance arm than the auto manufacturing.
It looks like GM management is running it into the ground. Unfortunately, unlike K-Mart, I don't see how any one person can get in there and fix all of the problems.
not to nitpick, but this has nothing to do with stock. what was downgraded was the credit rating of each company. similar to your FICO, each entity has a credit rating assigned, based on the books and financial outlook. this credit rating affects only debt (bonds) not equity/ownership (stock).
what that means is that if GM wants to borrow more money, the terms under which they can do so just got a lot worse.
the reason stock prices drop dramatically with this news is that stock price is based on expectation of profit. if GM has to pay significantly higher interest payments on newly issued debt then that will erode profits even further... and people aren't as likely to want to own the stock of a company with downward spiraling profit margin... and the cycle continues.
not to nitpick, but this has nothing to do with stock. what was downgraded was the credit rating of each company. similar to your FICO, each entity has a credit rating assigned, based on the books and financial outlook. this credit rating affects only debt (bonds) not equity/ownership (stock).
what that means is that if GM wants to borrow more money, the terms under which they can do so just got a lot worse.
the reason stock prices drop dramatically with this news is that stock price is based on expectation of profit. if GM has to pay significantly higher interest payments on newly issued debt then that will erode profits even further... and people aren't as likely to want to own the stock of a company with downward spiraling profit margin... and the cycle continues.
I stand corrected Lookout, it was the credit rating. What this means is that certain institutional investors will have to pull out since they can only own investment grade bonds. GM and Ford were at the lowest investment grade prior to the downgrade.
Let’s look at the list of “Used Cars to Avoid” for Chevy. Chevy Astro 1997-2003 never did more than 44 Hp/liter. 2002 Avalanche: 54 Hp/l. Camaro in ’97, ’99, & ’01: 50, 52, 53, 54 & 57 Hp/l engines (classic of what GM hypes as a high performance vehicle). Cavalier ’99-’00 & ’03: 52 & 63 Hp/l. Impala ’01: 53 Hp/l. Lumina ’97 & ’99: 52, 63 Hp/l (Chevy dropped the 63 Hp/l engine after 1997). Malibu ’97-’00: 48, 50, 62 Hp/l. Monte Carlo ’99: 52 & 53 Hp/l. Also listed as Used Cars to Avoid: Pontiac Bonneville ’98-’02: 54 Hp/l. Grand Am ’97-’01: 50, 51, 62 Hp/l. Grand Prix ’97-’98: 51 & 52 Hp/l.
Astro 97-03 ~ engine is a problem some years especially 03 but the exhaust and ignition are a problem every year. Also in the later years cooling, fuel, paint/trim/rust, air conditioning and transmission are a problem. But by golly we'll recomend you not by this car because it doesn't put out 70hp/liter. :headshake
Right on down the list.......same shit....different car. They all have multiple problems.
John Hutton, chief power train engineer at Ford discusses Hp/liter when he noted how Ford had to do with only 4 liters what their 5 liter engines were doing.
And what did they have to do? Move the damn car! But more than that, move it in a manner buyers in that catagory/price range expect. You know, performance. Hutton was talking about delivering the performance the customer expected...no, demanded, with a 4 liter engine. Why? Don't know. Somebody/something dictated that they would use a 4 liter. Could have been space restrictions or often as not marketing said so. Marketing?? Yes, to differentiate between models(read, price breaks) one of the most popular items is engine size. A $30k model will lose market share to a $20k model from the same manufacturer, with the same size engine, even if it has a lot more goodies.
Patriots believe in the free market. Patriots stopped buying Fords when all Ford products were designed in the accounting department. Patriots stopped buying Chryslers in 1979. Therefore Chrysler finally addressed their only problem - top management. Those in 1979 who were so anti-American as to buy Chrysler said, "Don't replace bad management with a guy who has a driver's license." Patriots always buy the best. Patriots believe in free markets. Not the communist propaganda called "Buy American". Patriots who stopped buying Ford and Chrysler products back then saved both companies. It took the threat of bankruptcy to remove the only problems in both Ford and Chrysler. Anti-Americans say "keep making crap" and therefore blindly "Buy American".
Dear me, I guess you're not a true patriot unless you have a good enough job(or credit) to buy the very best. OK, all you damn poor people...get out of our country...go to Mexico or Canada and don't come back until you've got enough money to be a true patriot. Damn pushrod lovers! :p
sigh TW, right for the wrong reasons....and so emotional, tsk, tsk.
Do you have an MBA tw? I only ask because it seems to be an MBA-ish trait to latch onto one little "factoid" (70 HP/litre!), which isn't accurate under all circumstances, and parrot it endlessly, as though it's some universal guiding truth. It's more commonly known as "tunnel vision."
Horsepower per liter is a trend. A trend that engineers can appreciate and MBAs will routinely ignore. Horsepower per liter is something a spread sheeter would never understand and the myopic would rather deny.
Even GM has pockets of unstifled innovation. A recent Corvette engine did 70 Hp/liter with only two valves per cylinder. But when Hp per liter is applies across the GM product line, it becomes painfully obvious why GM cars cost more to build and why GM has no domestic profits. GM cars must install two extra pistons - and all those other expensive parts such as valves, piston rings, cam and crank lobes, fuel system components, etc to only do same as everyone else. GM products have been so bad for so long as even exposed by one little factoid - Hp/liter.
No, I am not just focusing on Hp per liter to say GM products suck. Only a fool would say that number is complete proof for only one model. Provided is one damning number - historically accurate - that every consumer can calculate. GM products are so bad that even Horsepower per liter for GM vehicles is 20% lower.
When VW went from crap products back to being a profitable company, VW's 'Horsepower per liter' increased to seventy across the product line. VW went from 'bottom of the barrel' reliability to mid level reliability at the same time their products started doing 70 Horsepower per liter. Horsepower per liter indicates that VW was going to be profitable because HP/liter is a typical product oriented indicator that MBA types must ignore.
Thirty years ago, GM could have been doing what is now world standard. GM products are so crappy as to still not do what is world standard. xoxoxoBruce noted other reasons why GM products are such crap. They still sell as 2005 technology engines using push rods. That 3.8 liter engines is so crappy that an editorial in Wards Automotive said GM could not even give it away to Honda or Toyota. Obviously. Ward's Automotive said the 3.8 liter engine uses technology that only a bean counter could love. It is a pathetic 50+ HP per liter engine. Products so pathetic as to even use push rod technology.
GM had the technology long before anyone. But when MBAs get finished instituting cost controls, then product oriented advances get stifled. Obviously GM has no profits. Look at the Hp per liter number. Therein lies the reason why. Innovation from even 30 years ago could not be implemented. Today, even the MBA types can now see what the consumer could have seen ten years ago. GM products have low Horsepower per liter numbers which suggests the entire product line is crap. A number that even demonstrates why GM still has no hybrid vehicles.
Right now, Kirk Kerkorian and his company still want to buy GM shares, but that might have more to do with GM's finance arm than the auto manufacturing.
GM does have pockets of stifled innovation. What has happened in Cadillac is contrary to a trend imposed by GM corporate. How many more pockets could be liberated? So maybe Kerkorian sees a long term profit as he did for Chrysler.
Others had considered doing same as Kerkorian with other intentions. For example Carl Icahn had intended to break up GM into parts. GMs value as separate entities has been long considered worth more than GM as a whole. Even smaller Toyota has an equity (stock market) value five times that of GM.
But Icahn discovered that GM is structured to make a break up difficult. For example, so that each division could not be sold off, 1970s GM created GM Assembly Division that manufacturers cars from each division in the same factory.
Does Kerkorian see part of GM that can be spun off as Delphi and EDS Systems were? Or does he see a company that could trash its current management to liberate pockets of innnovation?
Liberation of the innovators, after all, saved Chrysler. Iacocca simply put bean counters as subordinates the the car guys. Letting car guys make decisions resulted in profits so large and so fast that Chrysler could pay off those emergency loans in less than four years. Maybe Kerkorian sees another Chrysler. But again, that means GM must first perform serious top management shakeouts.
The current top man, Wagoner, never ran a profitable North American operations. So they made him the CEO. Now he is running even the international division into the ground. His entire job experience is a finance guy. Eliminating Wagoner and his peers could quickly liberate GM innovators. And so the question is whether GM stock at $30 per share has dropped enough to make this risky venture profitable to Kerkorian. If he does not intend to break GM up into more profitable entities, then he must be intending to eliminate the problem in GM - its top management. Or he may simply discover what both Ross Perot and Carl Icahn discovered - and back out.
I stand corrected Lookout, it was the credit rating. What this means is that certain institutional investors will have to pull out since they can only own investment grade bonds. GM and Ford were at the lowest investment grade prior to the downgrade.
What makes this rather confusing is that Ford is still profitable. GM has long been the sicker company with lesser products. Why is Ford getting lumped in with GM? Ford also has product line problems. One was four years of stifled new product developement when Jacque Nasser was running Ford into the ground. But Ford's problems are not as bad as GMs.
As a non-engineer, I am curious about what HP per liter means in the real world. Sure, the engine is more efficient at producing power for it's size, but I think a better measure is how much power is produced per unit of fuel. You can get a lot of extra power out of a small engine by bolting a turbocharger or supercharger on, but then it also uses more gas. Or you can drop a bigger engine into the car and it also use more gas. Either way, you are burning more gas to get more power.
I'm with you on making as efficent an engine as possible. Dual overhead cams with 4 valves per cylinder are better than the old pushrods/rocker arms I had on my first car. Fewer moving parts, less internal friction. Seems to me it should use less fuel to gain extra power. Along the same line of thinking, the Wankel engine seems promising for using less fuel too.
Some technology like superchargers and turbochargers seem to me to use more fuel per unit of HP than without. You are adding moving parts. More friction. More fuel.
Do you have statistics for which engines (not cars) are the most fuel efficient? Does it matter?
As a non-engineer, I am curious about what HP per liter means in the real world. Sure, the engine is more efficient at producing power for it's size, but I think a better measure is how much power is produced per unit of fuel. You can get a lot of extra power out of a small engine by bolting a turbocharger or supercharger on, but then it also uses more gas. Or you can drop a bigger engine into the car and it also use more gas. Either way, you are burning more gas to get more power.
The HP per liter number for a fuel injected engine is not a valid for diesel or super charged engines. The latter only forces more fuel into the engine with an obvious increase in HP/liter. But the ballpark measurement among engines of the same technology is Hp per liter. For example, GM makes a supercharged Buick that only does 63 Hp per liter. And yet supercharged engines should average about 100 Hp per liter. The Buick supercharged engine is so low performance that even fuel injected engines are superior. But Buick does not install a supercharger to make a higher performance engine. They install a supercharger so that naive 'feel' they have a high performance engine.
Advanced diesels do something on the order of 40 Hp per liter. But diesels are more fuel efficient, for reasons below. IOW HP per liter performance number is unique within the technology. For normally aspirated engines, the carburetor engine at 35 HP per liter is usually inferior to a fuel injected engine. Ignoring that GMs throttle body fuel injected engine was about the same inferior performance of carbureted engine. GM used throttle body only because a throttle body injector cost less than a carburetor. GM knew their customers would read fuel injected and 'feel' they had a race car. Eventually GM had to relent - let their engineers do what everyone else had. 70 HP per liter engines use sequential fuel injection as was found in pre-WWII German fighter planes.
Does it sound confusing? It should. The problem gets rather more complex as we add new technologies to the brew.
Diesels are more efficient at using fuel for one simple reason. Application of energy to a changing load. Gasoline engines are poor at adapting to changing loads even with more gears in the transmission. We solve this gasoline engine weakness by making bigger gasoline engines. Bigger hypes the emotion. But making an engine that can adapt to changing loads is clearly sexier. And that too is a characteristic of higher HP per liter engines. They tend to adapt better to changing loads which is why higher Hp/liter aspirated engines more often meet EPA mileage numbers.
We put a 250 Horsepower engine in a 3000 pound car. How many Horsepower to move a 60,000 pound truck? It weighs 20 times more so it must need 20 times more horsepower? 5000 Horsepower? Of course not. The truck may have only 400 or 500 horsepower engines. One tenth the horsepower because diesel adapts better to changing loads. Since diesels adapt so much better, then trucks do not use gasoline.
How many Horsepower to maintain a car at 50 MPH? Well it has a 200 Horsepower engine. Therefore it must need at least 120 horsepower to maintain 50? No. Car maintains 50 MPH using 10 or less horsepower. Therein lays the problem. Because cars spend a small amount of time in acceleration and other higher load conditions, we then enlarge the 10 Horsepower engine to 250 Horsepower. Then a car can accelerate in 10 seconds while climbing the high.
The myopic among us still insist we must always output excessive horsepower so that we have this horsepower during rare acceleration times. The myopic demand that an engine's energy output not change so they don't have to downshift to climb a hill.
The car generates massive amounts of energy when it only needs 10 horsepower because sometimes the driver may periodically require hundreds of horsepower. Since gasoline is so cheap, then oversized engines have always been the simple solution. And yes, at $2.00 per gallon, history says the price of gasoline remains cheap. The bigger engine remains a cheap and simple solution.
So now we come to what is currently a crude technology. The Hybrid is about putting only 10 horsepower to the wheels when 10 HP is required. And putting 100 Horsepower to the wheels at rare times when high power is required. Electric motors better adapt to changing loads which is why diesel electric locomotives uses electric motors before WWII and why navy ships use electric motors to drive propellers. The hybrid shuts down its one liter engine when so much energy is not required. The conventional gasoline engines (current normally aspirated, turbo charged, etc technology) will never solve this changing load problem.
Adapting to changing loads has long been a simple solution to adapting more energy productively. But notice how complex even the simple solution is. Reality of numbers complicates things.
And yet the numbers are where innovation and the advancement of mankind come from. HP/liter measures performance only within a specific technology. A number that must be taken within context.
Reducing friction would do little to improve the HP/liter number. But things such as getting more useful energy from each gasoline molecule and adapting better to changing loads does result in higher performance.
Another factor in getting more work from less energy is a concept called thermodynamic efficiency. Currently maybe 10 to 20% of the energy in a gas tank is used. That much energy in the gas tank is wasted. Cars with higher performance numbers - greater Hp per liter - would be closer to the 20% number. Electric fossil fuel and nuclear power plants do maybe 30 to 35% thermodynamic efficiency - nuclear plants tending to be lower. Natural gas turbine plants are claiming numbers approaching 60%. The long term solution to innovation - to making smaller engines that produce more useful energy - is also found in addressing these thermodynamic efficiency problems. An engine lined in ceramics that did not absorb heat from the combustion chamber would mean more energy moves the piston or turbine. Other advanced techniques are studied, tested, and refined. But solutions typically take generations to develop.
Hydrogen fuel cells maybe could put higher fuel energy onto the drive wheels. But then we must look at the larger picture. The manufacturing, storage, and transportation of hydrogen means something like 70 to 90% of the energy is lost. Once we look at the bigger picture, then hydrogen fueled vehicles have ridiculously low thermodynamic efficiencies. Shhh. Don't tell GM executives. They are convinced that hydrogen is the future only because pollution does not exist. Those without dirt under their fingernails have used spread sheet reasoning as if it were science. They saw symptoms and then claimed they are scientifically informed.
Random snapshots of the problem have defined two ways of applying more existing energy to useful work. Adapting more energy only when the load changes. Addressing the thermodynamic efficiency problem. Both require innovation. The Hybrid being a superior and proven solution to adapting to changing load as diesel electric trains have been doing for 60 years. The hybrid then may make the turbine a viable solution. Fundamental engine changes such as (maybe) turbines to increase thermodynamic efficiency.
But for the consumer, there exists the normally aspirated gasoline driven vehicle. Within technology restrictions, the consumer maximizes his fuel economy, pollutes less, and gets a longer life vehicle when he uses newer technologies. Technologies that mean the engine gets higher horsepower per liter. Higher Hp/liter being a symptom of superior technologies. A symptom, meaning to better understand the underlying concepts, one must appreciate the adapting of energy to chaning loads and the thermodynamic efficiency problem.
To get more energy from each gasoline molecule, a normally aspirated engine means the HP/liter number must increase. This is what performance is really about. Those who never learned about cars foolishly believe a low performance but bigger engine is 'high performance'.
Well done TW, although I disagree with your take on GM's throttle body injection was about fooling the public.
A carburetor is nothing more than a barely controlled leak and expensive to make with all those little bits and pieces. With the advent of electronic controls made possible by the oxygen sensor it is much cheaper to build a throttle body injection unit that gives you much more control over the fuel flow especially on deceleration where a carb keeps feeding fuel as long as there is air flow.
The real reason they went to throttle body was to save the expense of retooling the intake manifolds, the rest of the plumbing and electronics for port injection. It was all about money.
Even when port injection became standard it was batch with sequential a ways down the road.
Putting a "fuel injection" sticker on the fender is a marketing deal. If they didn't inflate the tires to save air, marketing would say " Now, with new flat tires". Those people don't have a clue.
Engines and motors do work by transforming potential energy into torque.
Gasoline engines produce maximum torque at relatively high RPM.
Diesels engines at relatively low RPM and motors(electric) at no RPM.
Diesels and motors also produce more torque for the potential energy used.
Big trucks use up to 27 forward gears to keep the diesels running at the RPM where the maximum torque is produced for maximum efficiency. It's still not great efficiency but they're doing the best they can with what they got.
Motors have the advantage of maximum torque where it is needed most, which is the initial movement from rest, plus the ability increase the torque by feeding it more energy(electricity) with changing load.
This is why motors have always been the best solution for propulsion but unlike locomotives and ships, automobiles have not been big enough to carry means to supply the power for the motor(s). As generating equipment became more efficient the possibility of onboard generation became a reality. Of course California's zero emission mandate rules out hybrids, but until they make some great advances in battery technology the only thing left is hybrids, so CA better get real.
Hybrids provide their biggest advantage in urban stop and go, where the fossil fuel engine shuts off at stops and the regenerative braking recoups some loss. Driving down the expressway at a steady 50/60 mph won't give the hybrid nearly as much advantage over a fossil fuel engine and certainly not enough to offset the expense of buying and maintenance. That's comparing one model like the Honda with and without hybrid technology.
Oh, and "Performance" is exactly that. What she'll do. Doesn't matter how or why.....it's simply what she'll do. "High Performance" means she's faster. Again, it doesn't matter how or why..."High Performance" means she's faster. :biggrin:
Cool. Thank you both for such informative posts.
Cool. Thank you both for such informative posts.
I was hoping you would ask more questions. I still had one more basic concept to explain. But the previous post was getting too long.
Gasoline engines have a narrow range at which they burn gasoline most efficiently. For most cars, this peaks as somewhere between 2400 and 2900 RPMs. This is why shifting is mostly conducted in a range from 2000 to 3200 RPMs (again varies by engine design).
Most interesting is how an engine manages to idle at 800 RPMs. The efficiency of that engine is lowered. IOW give an idling engine more oxygen for the same gasoline at idle, and the engine will increase speed to something like 1200 or 1600 RPMs. That’s right. Idling is (proportionally) a massive increase in gasoline for energy produced. Idling is intentionally making an engine less efficient.
Some neat tricks used over the past decades. Carburetors would dump rich mixtures of fuel into an engine that is expected to be going slower. After all, the engine thought it should be idling which means dumping more gas and less air in the engine. You heard backfiring as the vehicle decellerated. The foolish 'feel' that is a cool sound. But backfiring was always the sound of a crappy engine dumping gasoline into an engine that does not need it. It is the sound of a catalytic converter being flooded with more hydrocarbons to uselessly burn.
Fuel injected cars substantially decreased pollution by simply turning off fuel when decellerating. No backfiring is the 'cool' sound of a superior engine that is not wasting fuel and not destroying the exhaust system. Some Harley owners won't like that reality. Backfiring means a crappy engine.
Hybrids take innovation one step farther. Idling is the engine burning gasoline in a most inefficient way - ie the rich mixture meaning more gas and less air. Intentionally making the engine less efficient so that it spins slower - 800 RPMs. Hybrids simply turn off the engine rather than run so inefficiently. Why waste gas in idle and 'bumper to bumper' traffic? Idling causes some of the highest percentages of pollution. Obviously. The engine is intentionally running a minimum efficiency. Simply run the gasoline engine only when it can use fuel efficiently to recharge a battery. Hybrids only burn gas when gas can be burned more efficiently.
What is a solution to rush hour traffic? Hybrids waiting and not burning fuel most inefficiently. Watching a car idling in rush hour traffic is, to me, one of the most gross and perverted things we will see during the whole day. But then I appreciate why idling in bumper to bumper traffic (without a Hybrid) is so destructive.
How to make a gasoline engine (or any other fossil fuel engine) more fuel efficient? Operate only at its efficient point (maybe 2800 RPMs), then more energy will be used to useful purpose. This little trick means better thermodynamic efficiency AND better adapting to a changing load.
The above saved for last because it is some of the easiest to explain and comprehend.
I must relate one personal experience. I studied the electronic fuel injection on the 280Z(?) (1976). It featured no fancy computer. Control electronics even used 1960s technology - 741 op amps. It was one of the most simple and yet most fascinatingly advanced design I had ever seen. The Z was but another reason why I was driven to learn more. First pass through those tech manuals and I knew fuel injection was the future long overdue.
Big trucks use up to 27 forward gears to keep the diesels running at the RPM where the maximum torque is produced for maximum efficiency. It's still not great efficiency but they're doing the best they can with what they got.
I did not realize trucks were using 27 gears. Is it three overlapping ranges of 9 speeds?
I have long been intrigued by the CVT (Continuously Variable Transmission). But have not had the opportunity to study the CVTs found in the Toyota Prius or some Fords. This too has long been an overdue technology that may become obsoleted by Hybrid advances before it ever gets a chance.
CVT long ago being another method of adapting to a changing load.
I also agree with your perceptions on GMs throttle body injector. But that design always made me sick. For example, GM management went through painful intermediate designs - throttle body and multi-port - before they finally let the engineers design the injection system even found in WWII German fighter planes. Now you would think GM would then only put the sequential injectors on all cars. Nope. The accountants said if they abandoned throttle body and multi-port, then they would lose all that development (invested) money. So GM made three different fuel systems. That meant stocking and buying different fuel systems for all factories and stocking spare parts for all three designs. Just another reason why GM products cost so much more to build.
How did Honda do it? When Honda designed a four speed, they stopped making all three speed transmissions. When they made a five speed, then the four speed design was immediately discontinued. Therefore their factories only purchased and installed one part. Their dealers only stocked spare parts for one transmission that year. Honda made it simple - rather than cost control. When Honda made a fuel injection, then only made sequential. They did it right the first time.
:typing: "Help! I can't stop typing!" -- tw
Just kidding, tw. Very informative and clearly explained.
I'd be incredibly surprised if the majority of modern cars were most efficient below 3000 RPM. Maybe pushrod V8s, but DOHC 4s are a different animal entirely. And spark-ignition engines are typically most efficient near (but not at) wide-open throttle.
The (thermodynamic) efficiency of an engine at idle is not particularly important. The fuel efficiency of the vehicle containing that engine is zero regardless; an idling engine isn't moving the vehicle.
CVTs have long had a small niche in the economy segment of the market. The two big problems they have is that the rubber belts they use can't handle a lot of power, and they cause poor throttle response and even worse perceived throttle response (you push the pedal, hear the engine rev up, and THEN the car speeds up). Audi has a steel-belted electronically controlled CVT which supposedly solves both these problems, but it's only available on a few models. It's unlikely CVTs will be obseleted by hybrids, as often CVTs are paired with hybrids.
As far as I know, no one has yet managed to get a practical _serial_ hybrid (like that in a locomotive) into a car.
CVTs are on Nissans and Infinitis now. I drove a G35 with it. It was faaaaabulous. And I hate driving automatics, but I would drive this thing.
I don't know how CVTs are made today, but I saw some old antique car from the early 1900 that had a CVT. It was pretty basic. The driveshaft ended in a flat disk that was maybe a foot or two in diameter. Then a rubber wheel rode that disk like a needle on a record player, except without that groove. The driver could move the wheel in and out on the spinning disk to either go slower in the center or faster in the edge. The wheel drove the axle. I was with my grandfather at the time, and we both marveled at this thing that was so cool, and so simple. I wonder how efficient it was. The friction fit of the wheel against the disk was the weak link.
tw likes to talk about technology so old it was on WWII planes. This thing was from the 1920s or so.
I found it with a Google search. No identifying information though.
Very, very weak. :lol:
I did not realize trucks were using 27 gears. Is it three overlapping ranges of 9 speeds?
Yes, 9 in the trans and 3 behind it.
I've never heard a catylitic converter equiped car backfire. The cat being so hot and close to the engine should burn the excess fuel as quickly as it is presented. Backfires usually require a build up of fuel to a concentration where it will flash explode. I'll have to get new hearing aid batteries. ;)
My first car, a 1984 Datsun 210, backfired with some regularity.
How many miles on it Wolf? Sounds like the catylitic was dead. :confused:
48K when I bought it, 88K when I traded it in.
The problem did actually stop eventually, about 2 years after I bought the car ... that would be "eventually" after the original exhaust cracked off in front of the cat and they had to replace everything from the manifold back ... including the cat.
Is not the photo in post #44 about the same drive train that's, was used in Snapper lawn mowers? To go faster it move to outside of disk.
Previously posted were discussions about GM's Mona Lisa room, created by one who would later start the Saturn division. It was and still remains an example of why GM products are so bad.
Maryann Keller again writes, in waves, of problems in GM. An informed person best never misses what she writes about cars. Even the LA Times article (that created GM revenge) was not so damning. From the Washington Post of 12 Jun 2005 on page B1:
Dull at Any Speed
In a Detroit suburb in the late 1980s, General Motors established a large technical facility it called the Mona Lisa center, where its engineers disassembled Honda Accords and Toyota Camrys in a desperate search for the secret of their Japanese competitors' success. They analyzed the smallest pieces trying to figure out the best attributes to include in future GM models.
The reasons for GM's decline could have been found there on the floor of the Mona Lisa center, but not among the parts. It was the whole approach. Taking apart existing cars is a backward-looking exercise; it doesn't tell you what's going to sell four or five years down the road. So while GM was staring in its rearview mirror, its competitors were zipping ahead.
What ails GM today is much the same as what ailed it then -- and it's not just a matter of big pension plans, health care costs for workers or undervalued Asian currencies.
This article is interesting.
GM Halts Stock Trading by Top Executives By DEE-ANN DURBIN, AP Auto Writer
DETROIT - General Motors Corp. has forbidden senior executives and other employees with access to internal financial information from buying or selling company stock indefinitely, a spokeswoman for the automaker said Monday.
GM spokeswoman Toni Simonetti said a memo was sent to senior executives May 24 barring them and some of their employees from buying or selling stock. Simonetti said she didn't know how many people were affected, but the company has about 400 senior executives.
Simonetti said GM regularly has blackout periods when employees aren't supposed to buy or sell shares, such as before quarterly earnings announcements. But this one is unusual because it's indefinite and was put in place because the company has declined to update its full-year earnings forecast since April.
"What's notable in this one is that it's been mandated right now because of the lack of financial guidance in the public domain," Simonetti said.
Simonetti said the ban will be lifted when GM's legal advisers feel it's appropriate to start trading again.
"I suspect that would be at a time when we are getting back to a routine environment here," she said.
At least this is a reverse-Enron, with senior management locked out and the rank-and-file able to bail if they want.
GM now has lost something like $5billion this year. Trivial intelligence is necessary to appreciate why GM is losing so much money. Routinely perform HP/Liter calculations for their crappy engines. GM products need typically two extra pistons to obtain same horsepower. So the technology originally pioneered by GM in the early 1970s still will not be sold in that brand new car - using the same technology from 1955 models. From the NY Times of 4 Dec 2005:
Engines Go Back to the Future
GERMAN automakers gave up pushrod engines long ago, in favor of more complex overhead-cam power plants. The Japanese have essentially quit making the old-design engines. Ford is down to just a couple.
But Chrysler, with seven, and especially General Motors, with about a dozen in 21 different forms, remain bastions of the pushrod engine, also known as an overhead-valve design.
Not only has G.M. continued to carry forward older engine designs, like the famous "small block V-8" in your grandfather's 1955 Bel Air (and your son's 2005 Corvette), it has been designing new ones. The Chevy Impala offers two pushrod V-6's that are new for 2006.
Today we have another GM solution. Promote more MBA types into top management. From Bloomberg News of 6 Dec 2005:
GM's Henderson Is Finance Chief; Devine Stays 1 Year
General Motors Corp., the world's largest automaker, appointed Frederick Henderson chief financial officer and vice chairman to help end losses in North America after he trimmed jobs at its money-losing European business.
Henderson, 47, will replace John Devine, who will serve as a vice chairman, GM said in a statement today. Henderson will help Chief Executive Rick Wagoner eliminate 30,000 factory jobs and close 12 facilities in North America, where GM has lost $4.8 billion from its auto operations this year. ...
Henderson since June 2004 has led an effort that included slashing 12,000 jobs in Europe, where GM hasn't had an annual profit since 1999. The European business in this year's second quarter posted its first profit in five years, before slipping to a $382 million loss in the third quarter.
GM was once making a profit in that International division when Louis Hughes was runnning it. Hughes is a car guy. But Rick Wagoner, the finance guy (bean counter) who was running North American into losses, instead, got GM's top executive position.
Hughes left. MBA types ran his operation for years losing money. At what time does someone in GM start cutting the heads off of finance guys and start promoting car guys? When we finally drive this anti-American company into bankruptcy so that it will fix the problem - top management?
Can you believe it. They are still designing new engines with 1950 push rod, obsolete technology. Then promoting more of the problem - bean counters - to solve their crap product line.
Let's see. The government gave them how many hundreds of millions of dollars in 1994 to build a hybrid? Where are those products? It requires an MBA to worry about the product - to innovate. Finance people cannot innovate except on spread sheet. In some places, spread sheet innovation is still called fraud - when they don't contribute enough to Bush Cheney campaign funds.
Here's to all you fools who voted for an MBA educated (mental midget) president - and buy GM cars designed by MBAs. Thank you for pomoting the 'heart attack of America'.
I believe in being fair to Republicans. You don't. I think that's known as bigotry, tw. Not a mental problem with me, but it keeps your mind in some pretty unsavory ruts.
I buy German autos, and voted twice for Bush. That's because I'm brighter than you, you know, and I never tire of reminding you of that. The Democratic Party is once again demonstrating they have no more ability to win the war than you do. Crankery is bad for your brain, laddie, but you aren't capable of understanding that.
It has been another bad week for General Motors. Their bond rating has dropped two more notches to Grade B. One notch above a worst possible rating - Grade C. Bond analysts are being generous to GM. General Motor's product line under the MBA Rick Wagoner has become that worse. Their engines alone are some of world's worst.
Other automakers, since the 1970s, design new engines with overhead cams. GM will debut two new engines next year - both using 1950 technology push rod designs - not overhead cams. No problem. If George Jr can get a 47% approval rating by being incompetent, then enough stupid Americans will also buy this - what we already know will be - GM crap. Industry analysts who have seen what are coming have already panning those crappy products. So bad that those new products should be aborted in the foundry.
Wagoner would not know. Where is his driver's license?
Kirk Kerkorian had declared intentions to become a major GM stockholder as he was when Chrysler made a comeback. Kerkorian bought a maximum number of shares - 9.9%. Quietly last week, Kerkorian sold some 12 million of his 56 million shares. Obviously for major losses. But that suggests Kerkorian is coming to a same conclusion that both Carl Ichan and Warren Buffet had long ago concluded. GM will remain that poor an investment. Their bad management is that deeply entrenched.
While listening to Rush Limbaugh's show last week, who was a guest right after coming out of the White House? Rick Wagoner. That caught my attention. Why is Wagoner visiting the White House? Do you remember the $8+billlion that a mental midget president gave to the airlines with no strings attached? He did so and Americans said something equivalent of, "We don't care how many die in New Orleans." Airlines then burned through that money in months and went begging to George for more. A complete gift so that badly run airlines would protect their only problem - their MBA management.
So who is on George Jr's gift list this year? Let's see. A $450,000 campaign contribution from First Energy permitted them to keep running a nuclear reactor with its potential Three Mile Island problem. Happy Holiday. Citizens of Toledo don't matter when there is money to scoff. Will George Jr now gift Rick Wagoner so that stockholders don't rise up against Wagoner - an MBA with George Jr's competence? Well, Wagoner made same type of lame arguments on Limbaugh's show that George Jr also used to justify unauthorized wire tapping. With some basic newspaper reading, one should have seen right through his lies.
Somehow, Wagoner forgets to mention the pension funds and health benefit that were underfunded many years ago so that GM's 'profit and loss' sheets looked better. IOW the real losses should show more than $5billion hole that now exists. GM should make up those missing funds - with interest. So Wagoner claims those 'unfair' pension funds and health benefits cause GM's downturn. Bull. Those accounts should have been funded when employees were still working. Rick Wagoner and his predecessor used that money to cover up massive losses years ago. Rick Wagoner hopes you don't remember that missing fact when he blames others.
So yes. A visit to Rush Limbaugh - to talk to radio listeners who do not think. Who blindly believe what they are told. Who forget to ask why those pensions funds were so underfunded years ago. (Let’s not forget that George Jr can have a government Pension Guarantee Trust Fund pick up the tab for those pension funds - more corporate welfare.) After all if Rick Wagoner visited George Jr, then Rick Wagoner must be a good guy - to Rush Limbaugh listeners? Only if you believe in astrology, spontaneous regeneration, intelligent design, and that George Jr never lies.
GM in one month has become worse. Bet that your government will give GM free money - this time fund the underfunded GM pension fund. Only thing that will save GM is bankruptcy - so that American workers don't lose their jobs. Bankruptcy so that Rick Wagoner is removed. But George Jr will always protect rich people at the expense of workers. And then lie - claim he saved American jobs. George Jr will save the only job that provides rich campaign contributions - Rick Wagoner.
Will Toyota become the world's #1 automaker next year? Toyota announced next year's sales will increase another 10%. Toyota permits car guys - not bean counters - to design their products. Wagoner probably hopes to add Rush Limbaugh listeners as customers - so that he can continue getting rich as American workers (current and future) lose more jobs and their pensions.
I believe in being fair to Republicans.
So do I. Notice how I never once mentioned what a crook Tom DeLay really is? Not that I expect Urbane Guerilla to be honest and mention it. That would be too honest and too much against his political agenda.
But George Jr will always protect rich people at the expense of workers.
Well, duh. Isn't this some sort of Republican platform plank or something? For Republicans, everything starts with the business. The people who make up the workforce are simply pieces in the machine. Why do you think they call it "Human Resources"? People are just another tool to be managed, exactly the same as an inventory of spare parts or hard drives, man.
Labor costs money, it does not produce money. Or so goes the Republican financial theory. That's why jobs are being sent where people will do them for the least possible amount of money.
Don't think for a moment that people like Bush look at people like us as anything other than cattle, just as disposable, and just as subservient.
Disclaimer: The Democrats are no better.
From MarketWatch.com on 21 Dec 2005:
Kerkorian's GM sale raises questions
The last time General Motors Corp. shares traded around these levels, Ronald Reagan was busy waging his war on drugs, Pac-Man was all the rage, and Michael Jackson's Thriller was flying off the shelves. ...
More than two decades later, Kerkorian is swimming in red ink with his investment in Detroit-based GM, shares of which fell as low as $18.99 on Wednesday. Estimates put his losses at more than half a billion dollars. ...
This could be the first step in Kerkorian's eventual exodus from GM, according to Peter Morici, professor at the Robert H. Smith School of Business at University of Maryland.
"I wouldn't be surprised if he looks for a different situation where people are more receptive to change than General Motors," he said.
While to some the move comes as a sign of Kerkorian's weariness in holding tight to his evaporating stock value, others on Wall Street are hesitant to draw too many conclusions.
Today, GM's stock dropped another 2.15%.
Michael Jackson's Thriller was flying off the shelves. ...
Some how I'm glad I missed that one.
So do I.
Not on the evidence, dear boy, not on the evidence. Threads with numerous posts by you that
do not include less-than-justifiable railing at Republicans by you are more the exception than the rule.
Don't use a CVT in an electric final drive when you can have the series-wound motor. I understand this type does not need a transmission and its friction/heat losses because it develops high torque at near zero rpm. Useful for the motor-at-wheel kind of installation most electrics seem to be using.
Gravely brand power mowers also used a pretty feeble CVT back in the day. I used to wrestle one of the things as a teenager. The moving wheel was rubber-tired, the fixed wheel was steel. Power? -- not. This alleged self-propulsion was of some help getting the great heavy thing moving, but hell, I could push the thing along on my own legs two times faster than it could drive itself. Maybe the drive was prone to slippage, as I certainly never stalled it from (relatively) high speed that I can recall.
Not on the evidence, dear boy, not on the evidence. Threads with numerous posts by you that do not include less-than-justifiable railing at Republicans by you are more the exception than the rule.
You should qualify that by stating that TW is railing at the current crop of Republicans and not Republicans in general.
Even Warren Buffet and John Bogle, two incredibly smart men, have issues with the 'business at all cost' attitude of this adminstration.
I think pro-Communist leftists are wrong. I also think 'pure Capitalism' rightists are also wrong. Governments which let large amounts of their citizens starve don't last long, and there are inefficiencies in a purely caplitalistic system that can lead to systemic failure, especially when we move into a form of state-sponsored Capitalism where businesses are considered 'too large to fail' and are propped up using public funds.
Even the Bush adminstration has begun to concede this by finally taking action on pension funding to prevent a crisis that may become more expensive than the S&L bailout.
I do not think, for example, that the idea that it was overpaid workers who sunk GM is not being bought by the public. Anyone who has been in the market for cars, which includes a large segment of the population, realizes that the issue is that GM has failed to make cars that people want to buy. Noone believes that these kind of decisions are made by anyone other than 'top management', as TW correctly states.
Bogle and Buffet both seem disenchanted about the way this administration has approached regulating business as well as keeping the public finances. They know bad management when they see it.
I, as a Democrat for example, can criticize the Democratic party for failing to address racism and segregation until after 1960 without being anti-Democrat, since I am referring to distinct times within history. Currently, Republicans control two of the three branches of government. They are essentially responsible for every bad decision made by the goverment since they took control of Congress and the White House, which covers a
lot of territory.
From the NY Times of 1 Jan 2006:
Hybrids, Hydrogen and Hype
All hybrids are not created equal. G.M.'s "mild hybrid" pickups use electric motors to run accessories, but not to power the wheels.
Turn the engine off while rolling downhill. Accessories continue to run, but not from engine. Even you too can have a hybrid - according to GM.
Twelve years after the US government gave GM money to build a hybrid - and this is their best? GM will be running to the US government for protection. Why? Two new engines in 2006 - and both be 1950 technology pushrods - no overhead cam. Somehow they have a hybrid that does not drive the wheels? Plenty of Bull in an industry that is instead about power of horses.
You should qualify that by stating that TW is railing at the current crop of Republicans and not Republicans in general.
A distinction, perhaps, but a mighty small difference, especially in that both he and they exist in this moment. Consider that his sole approach to Republicans is intemperate. You won't catch me making that mistake.
I, as a Democrat for example, can criticize the Democratic party for failing to address racism and segregation until after 1960 without being anti-Democrat, since I am referring to distinct times within history. Currently, Republicans control two of the three branches of government. They are essentially responsible for every bad decision made by the goverment since they took control of Congress and the White House, which covers a lot of territory.
To be fair, they are likewise and to the same degree responsible for the good decisions made by the government, which also covers a lot of territory. Breaking totalitarianism is good for all mankind, by definition. Totalitarian organization models have their uses, primarily in the organization remaining functional under extremely difficult conditions and if damaged, but when the totalitarian model is applied to entire societies, the resulting regimes exist only to oppress. Oppression is simply bad.
Partisan enthusiasm for the respective philosophies of either the Democrat or Republican parties very much does not define which is actually good and actually bad. What it does define is which one you're sold on.
A distinction, perhaps, but a mighty small difference, especially in that both he and they exist in this moment. Consider that his sole approach to Republicans is intemperate. You won't catch me making that mistake.
No, you are quite temperate in your approach to Republicans. Your comments on Democrats, however......
Partisan enthusiasm for the respective philosophies of either the Democrat or Republican parties very much does not define which is actually good and actually bad. What it does define is which one you're sold on.
Again, we are not talking respective philosophies, we are talking execution. Until recently, the Republicans in Congress have voted as a block in rubber-stamping policies the President has wanted. Some of these policies are overtly pro-business at the expense of a majority of citizens.
What has begun to disturb moderates of both parties is the total fiscal breakdown associated with forcing tax cuts while denying the true costs of the war in Iraq as well as anti-terrorism spending.
Having any real criticism of this direction painted by partisan hacks as un-patriotic does not help to foster bipartisanship.
Well, since the criticism seems less real than partisan, and is leveled by partisan hacks itself, it's tainted.
My comments on "Democrats, however...." are temperate: they boil down to The lion's share of the Democratic Party doesn't come up to my idea of wisdom. What goes on is pandering where statesmanship is needed.
From The NY Times of 1 Feb 2006:
Ford and Chrysler Sales Break Losing Streak
General Motors Corp.(GM.N), on the other hand, was expected to post a sales decline of as much as 10 percent later on Wednesday. The world's largest automaker last week reported a net loss of $4.8 billion, its fifth straight quarterly loss.
GM wants to sell off a profitable division. Problem is that this division is the only profitable operation in GM - GMAC. But GM has conditions. GM reserves the right to buy back that division once GM becomes profitable. To potential buyers such as Citigroup and KKR, this is a problem. For if GM does not solve their problems, then GMAC has little value. But if GM does turn around, then the GMAC investment that has value must be surrendered.
GM is expected to drop $billions of underfunded pension funds on the American taxpayer as United Airlines, Delphi, and so many other companies have done previously. The game was simple. GM grossly underfunded those pension funds. Then when the stock market boomed in mid-1990s, GM claimed no more pension funding was necessary. When the stock market dropped back, then GM pensions fund were short $billions more. Then GM blames their losses on myths such as too many retirees. Had GM funded pension as they were suppose to when those employees were working, then GM would have no pension fund problem to blame. GM hopes you never learn these little details so that GM can blame unfair market problems and other diversions.
Why do market analysts let this continue without comment? No different than when Donald Trump was bankrupt. One analyst (Marvin Roffman by his employer Janney Montgomery Scott) had enough balls to accurately report that fact and was fired for honesty (as was demonstrated in the following courtroom battle). Even little Donald Trump has that much clot over honest assetments. Market analysts would never report, for example, that GM was only hours away from insolvency in 1990. Market analysts are unlikely today to declare how insolvent GM is for same reasons.
Pension Benefit Guarantee Corporation (PBGC) is but one way that GM will dump debts on American taxpayers when they are ready. It's called corporate welfare. It will continue as long as so many Americans buy their products rather than do what we did to save both Chrysler and Ford in 1979 and 1981. We stopped buying inferior products and therefore remove their only problems - Ford and Chrysler top management. GM will not recover as long as Rick Wagoner and his staff are protected by those who 'Buy American' and therefore cause more downsizing of GM's assets - their employees.
GM will be in the news again today. Some comments from market analysts.
"We continue to question how GM can maintain a business in which 40% of North American volume is directed to fleets and GM's own employees," according to Deutsche Bank's Rod Lache.
An analyst from Goldman Sachs:
Cites valuation, given belief that bankruptcy is very unlikely in the near term
A good price because they will not go bankrupt? Stock market was always willing to overlook GM weaknesses because of GM's size and how vindictive GM can be.
Twelve years after the US government gave GM money to build a hybrid - and this is their best? GM will be running to the US government for protection. Why? Two new engines in 2006 - and both be 1950 technology pushrods - no overhead cam. Somehow they have a hybrid that does not drive the wheels? Plenty of Bull in an industry that is instead about power of horses.
According to
this Wired article, GM has literally torn apart the competition to help it decide that hybrids are not the future, and that it should focus its efforts in the hydrogen fuel cell side of things.
GM thinks it has a better idea. [than hybrids] In the back of the teardown building, alongside the dissected Prius and Malibu, lie the parts of a GM demonstration vehicle powered by hydrogen fuel cells. Although the vehicle has more total parts than the Prius, almost none of them move, eliminating many of the finely machined gears and engine components of the traditional auto. The tables bearing the drive trains of the Prius and Malibu are laden with parts; those for the fuel cell car are nearly empty. The three teardowns tell the story of GM's plans: Go directly from gasoline to fuel cells with a mere nod to hybrid tech. At the Tokyo auto show in October, GM unveiled its fuel cell-powered Sequel. Larry Burns, GM's vice president for R&D and planning, announced that the company would be able to "design and validate a competitive fuel cell propulsion system by 2010."
According to this Wired article, GM has literally torn apart the competition to help it decide that hybrids are not the future, and that it should focus its efforts in the hydrogen fuel cell side of things.
It only takes basic numbers from science to see through those GM myths. Hydrogen - a carrier - does not hold enough energy per pound. Since that hydrogen vehicle requires so many more pounds of hydrogen, what is big enough (or high enough pressure) to hold all that hydrogen? These are damning numbers.
Meanwhile transport and storage problems associated with hydrogen - from basic thermodynamics - says little energy carried by hydrogen actually produces useful work. Hydrogen as a fuel - a carrier - its numbers for transport and storage again say not economically viable.
Return to a question about competency of top GM management - who don't come from where the work gets done. Hydrogen as a fuel is that ridiculous. But the article really hides a much larger management problem.
The Wired article is about teardown. It fueled the Mona Lisa room even long before 1986. Top GM executives could see why GM engines failed more often, cost more to build, and were even taller - causing increased costs in materials, more block, more body, more suspension, etc.
Alex Mair who created Mona Liza room would later create Saturn. GM management could see why 70 Hp/liter engines resulted in lower costs, better engine performance, lower costs, etc. GM executives would see first hand why a technology developed in GM before 1975 caused other automakers to make superior products. But once that technology went through cost control analysis, then, well, still GM does not manufacturer 70 Hp/liter engines for every vehicle.
The joke about tear down: management spends all that money, then completely ignores the lessons. 30 years after GM demonstrated the technology, still GM cars don't have the 70 Hp/liter engine. Even when demonstrated superior in competition products, still GM management even makes new engines only using push rods. Those teardowns demonstrated why 1975 GM technology made competition products with two less cylinders per car - a massive decrease in parts and costs. 15 years of tear downs of cars with that stifled GM technology and still GM management still will not use that technology. It is the pathetic joke about tear downs. An overpaid block of lumber just cannot learn once petrified by his business school training.
The previous post about GM attempting to bankrupt the LA Times is because the LA Times even discussed this Mona Liza room. With tear downs mounted on their own Mona Liza room walls on the 17th floor, still, GM management could not authorize 70 Hp/liter technologies. Better, instead, to bankrupt the LA Times for telling that story. Notice that Wired told the story in a way that GM might not attack.
Appreciate what that Wired article really demonstrates. They will spend a fortune to learn how the competition does it - and still not use the superior technology. That is what happens when so many so hate America as to 'Buy American' - protect top GM management that just cannot learn the obvious. Their paralysis is created by a cost control mentality - that fears to innovate.
I enjoyed this line.
An overpaid block of lumber just cannot learn once petrified by his business school training.
In my mind, there's no question that GM is trying to spin their inability to produce a decent hybrid as "we meant to do that."
Interesting.
I wonder how big the hydraulic accumulator pressure tank would have to be? And how much energy it can store? Will it explode like a bomb if the truck gets in a crash? So many questions...
Great, just what I need, another plumbing project. :smack:
Great, just what I need, another plumbing project. :smack:
Ever do helium leak checking for toxic, pyrophoric, and corrosive gases? Doing same for hydrogen makes such testing - finding and fixing leaks - simple by comparison. And yet GM says we will replumb the entire nation with hydrogen? Only those without experience and basic science knowledge would believe their myth. Hydrogen as a fuel - as a carrier of energy - is nonsense.
Why a carrier? Because there is no hydrogen that contains significant energy. Hydrogen must be created from some other energy source. Hydrogen is not really an energy source - a fuel - as GM would have you believe. Hydrogen is only an energy carrier - and not a very good one.
Great, just what I need, another plumbing project. :smack:
Ever do helium leak checking for toxic, pyrophoric, and corrosive gases? Doing same for hydrogen makes such testing - finding and fixing leaks - simple by comparison. And yet GM says we will replumb the entire nation with hydrogen? Only those without experience and basic science knowledge would believe their myth. Hydrogen as a fuel - as a carrier of energy - is nonsense.
Why a carrier? Because there is no hydrogen that contains significant energy. Hydrogen must be created from some other energy source. Hydrogen is not really an energy source - a fuel - as GM would have you believe. Hydrogen is only an energy carrier - and not a very good one.
From CBSMarketWatch.com of 20 Feb 2006:
Moody's dunks GM further into junk
Moody's Investors Service on Tuesday pushed General Motors Corp.'s debt deeper into junk, piquing concerns that the troubled automaker is not making adequate progress to avert bankruptcy. ...
The credit-ratings agency cut GM's $30 billion in debt to B2, five notches below investment grade, down from B1. Moody's outlook for GM is negative, which means another cut could be on the way.
As long as the GM problem remains - its top management and especially the bean counter Rick Wagoner - GM will only continue along a well worn path taken by AT&T, big American steel companies, and Penn Central. GM does not even have, standard, 70 Hp/liter engines in their products. In each case, top management was not removed while that top management blamed employees, unfair competition, the economy, economies of scale, the LA Times, and everything else but the only problem - top management.
Don't hold your breath. They've got a long, long way to go before that's going to happen around here. :headshake
Don't hold your breath. They've got a long, long way to go before that's going to happen around here. :headshake
Not really. It's the same as with the hybrids. An innovative Japanese manufacturer builds the first commercially viable models, licenses the technology, and drags the American manufacturers kicking and screaming into the marketplace.
Toyota had the first commercially available hybrid in the US, followed by Honda.
American manufacturers haved been working with fuel cells. There are even buses in the US running on fuel cells. I still own stock in Ballard Power, which has gone from $3 to $150 and back down to about $6. It is the company that was partnered with Ford.
The founder of the company has started a venture to attempt to build the infrastructure in the US and Canada. It is one of GM's
Advanced Technology Partners. It just seems odd that with all of these partners, and with concept vehicles already being built, the Japanese are still going to beat GM to the market.
BAE North America is working with Daimler Chrysler on their hybrid bus. Some of the work is being done in Johnson City.
At the heart of the Orion VII hybrid bus is the HybriDriveTM propulsion system provided by BAE Systems. The system propels the bus with a single electric motor that is powered by a diesel-driven generator and an energy storage unit. Among the system's benefits:
The engine is smaller than that used in conventional buses and runs at optimum speed for clean operation and efficiency.
The design offers quicker acceleration, helping drivers merge into heavy traffic.
Customers enjoy a quieter ride than on a conventional diesel bus.
The system design eliminates the transmission, thereby removing a major maintenance item on vehicles operated in heavy stop-and-go conditions.
A regenerative braking system uses the drive motor to slow the bus, effectively turning the motor into a generator to help recharge the energy storage system. This feature saves energy and also reduces brake wear by about one-third, reducing the frequency of brake maintenance.
Not really. It's the same as with the hybrids.
Bullshit. It's not the same as hybrids. H-Y-D-R-O-G-E-N!
Where you gonna get it? It takes a ton of energy to get hydrogen from anywhere. They're using natural gas and that's not cheap or plentiful. Getting it from water is even more expensive. Then you've got to distribute it.
Like I said, "Don't hold your breath. They've got a long, long way to go before that's going to happen around here."
Hybrids are viable right now, but this Honda/Hydrogen deal is way off, if ever, for this country. :headshake
What is wrong with GM? What is always wrong with GM, Back in the '70s my Dad had a friend who was a GM engieneer. When my Dad asked him why they didn't put a 4-53 2 stroke diesel in the pick up trucks instead of some POS made out of a big gas V/8? He was told that the public would not buy a 4 cylender engine when they could have a V-8.
And the GM 2 stroke diesel engines will last forever, Why put them in a car that will only last 5 years.
Ford uses a V-8 built by Navistar (International Harvester), and Dodge uses an inline 6 cyl. turbocharged monster. My 91 dodge 3/4 ton has a twisted frame and the transmission has only 2 speeds that can be used because that engine has so much torque that it destroyed the truck, after 750,000 miles. The only thing we use this truck for is feeding the cows. that engine starts and runs like it did when it was new.
As far as Hydrogen fuel goes, we have a viable fuel source now every time you flush your toilet. Self produced methane has been in use for years in many third world countries. Hog farmers, and dairymen have been using this technology to produce eletricity with very positive results.
GMs got a problem? Yes they brought on them selfs.
So many have considered saving GM from itself. Ross Perot tried and was eventually paid a massive and handsome reward to go away. T Boone Pickens had looking into it. Carl Icahn considered it. Kirk Kerkorian is the latest to try having bought just short of 10% GM stock over 18 months, suffered large losses, got GM to talk to Nissan and Renault, and has apparently just given up after initially suggesting he would increase his GM ownership to 12%. From the NY Times of 7 Oct 2006:
Dissident Quits Board at G.M.
More than that, however, Mr. York said he had not found “an environment in the boardroom that is very receptive to probing much beyond” data provided by management.
But Mr. York always faced the risk of being the board’s odd man out. Early on in his tenure as a G.M. board member, management experts suggested he would probably be isolated, given that every other G.M. director was chosen while Mr. Wagoner was chief executive or a top company manager.
In fact, Mr. York’s comments echoed those of another dissident G.M. board member, H. Ross Perot, who parted ways with the company nearly two decades ago after a brief but bitter stint on the board.
From the Washington Post:
In his resignation letter, York said he quit because the boardroom environment was not "very receptive to probing much beyond the materials provided by management."
That is what Ross Perot also complained of 20 years earlier.
The Nissan Renault alliance fell through when Wagoner (GM's top executive) insisted those other companies pay a premium surcharge for doing the alliance with GM. Wagoner somehow insisted that doing business with GM would vastly reward those other two companies. Maybe if GM had something of value to provide. GM products are some of the world's crappiest. The reason that Nissan and Renault were talking is because their changes to GM would make GM more valuable - in direct contradiction to Wagoner's thinking. GM without Nissan and Renault would only continue to stagnate. Why should they pay GM a premium to save GM?
1970s meant innovation with overhead cams. 1980 were the 70 Hp/liter engine (85 and 100 for turbo and supercharged). 1990s were the development of a hybrid. GM still has no overhead cam engines, still does not sell 70 Hp/Liter engines which is why so many GM cars are six and eight cylinders - for more expensive. And, of course, GM still has no hybrid. Classic when management all comes from business schools, does not drive, and fears innovation.
GM bitches about fuel standards.
DETROIT (Reuters) -- A proposal to increase U.S. fuel economy standards would force Detroit-based automakers to "hand over" the market for trucks and sport-utility vehicles to Japanese manufacturers, a senior General Motors Corp. executive said.
Bob Lutz, GM's vice chairman and the head of the company's global product development team, said the proposed changes to the government's Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standards would represent an unfair burden on the traditional Big Three automakers.
"For one thing, it puts us, the domestic manufacturers, at odds with the desires of most of our customers, namely larger vehicles," Lutz said in a year-end posting on a Web site maintained by GM.
He added: "That effectively hands the truck and SUV market over to the imports, particularly the Japanese, who have earned years of accumulated credits from their fleets of formerly very small cars."
Lutz, a long-time critic of government fuel economy regulations, compared the attempt to force carmakers to sell smaller vehicles to "fighting the nation's obesity problem by forcing clothing manufacturers to sell garments only in small sizes."
So basically, now that everyone else in the world has shown that fuel efficient cars can be made, it's unfair to actually set better standards. Cry me a river, Bob.:bawling:
Well it just comes down to the dollar sign at the end of the day.
If they choose to market more efficient cars more effectively, they'll have a growing market. If they choose to rest on their laurels and let the consumers buy what they've already been told they want, then that's what will continue to happen.
To manufacture more fuel efficient vehicles the initial costs would be exhorbitant and that's the only thing stopping the big guys atm. When they're either forced to do it, or realize that fuel for cars as they are now is starting to get a bit more thin on the ground, they'll have to bite the bullet. After that, they'll just tell consumers they don't want big huge gas guzzlers. What they want is something sporty and economical. ;)
Another issue is steel... there are other alternatives that are as strong and not as heavy, but the US auto industry is so deeply in bed with steel that the idea of anything else is just impossible for them to even think of.
So basically, now that everyone else in the world has shown that fuel efficient cars can be made, it's unfair to actually set better standards.
And why can some make more fuel efficient cars? Because they have been using and are now upgrading from a technology developed in GM in 1972 ... and GM still does not have those technologies in their 2006 vehicles.
Recently did some GM product numbers. GM products once only did 52 Hp/liter. Now GM is doing 61 HP per liter in some V-8s. Why would they spend any money developing V-8s? No vehicle needed a V8. 80% of Toyotas are four cylinder engines. And who is eating GM's lunch every day? Same company that put GM's 1972 technology in their 1992 cars - Toyota.
GM can cry all it wants. But its top management does not even drive. Its top management did not even come from where the work gets done. Even its chief engineer - a graphics art student.
Pretty is defined by what it does - not the shiny paint. Any whore can fix herself with more makeup. Does that really make her pretty? Only bankruptcy can fix GMs only problem - management that does not even know how to drive.
Ford problems are same. Ford also does not have 70 HP per liter engines in all vehicles. Like GM, Ford puts whore V-8s in trucks to appease ‘big dic’ mentalities – rather than go after intelligent customers. Well, at least Ford is admitting how bad Ford has stifled innovation. So Ford may be negotiating to buy that technology from Toyota.
To manufacture more fuel efficient vehicles the initial costs would be exhorbitant and that's the only thing stopping the big guys atm.
It is called Research and Development. If the executive is a graduate of a business school, then R&D (and engineers) is an expense. If the man comes from where the work gets done (by definition, an American patriot), then that same innovation is an asset.
Unfortunately it is that simple. And unfortunately, so many Americans so hate America as to 'buy American'. That 'buy American' attitude is why the problem remains. The real "only thing stopping the big guys" are still too many Americans who are so dumb as to believe George Jr and who also 'buy American'. The problem of intelligence starts at the source - those who keep telling GM, et al to keep making crap.
The R&D is done TW. They already know how to make more fuel efficient cars. It's converting the factories that provides the greater expense.
That was my point.
Ford's new CEO Mulally could make the difference. He turned Boeing around after 9/11. I heard he created a War Room where he presented the new strategy for the next 3-5 years to the management. All the assets have been mortgaged, including the blue Ford Logo and 82000 people will be laid off.
My brother mentioned yesterday that his Dodge 3/4 ton pickup with a "Hemi" V-8 and automatic transmission gets the exact same gas mileage as his Mazda Miata, 4 cylinder, stick shift. :D
And now this:
http://physorg.com/news122655117.html
Purdue University engineers have developed a new aluminum-rich alloy that produces hydrogen by splitting water and is economically competitive with conventional fuels for transportation and power generation.
"We now have an economically viable process for producing hydrogen on-demand for vehicles, electrical generating stations and other applications," said Jerry Woodall, a distinguished professor of electrical and computer engineering at Purdue who invented the process.
This summer!
http://www.portfolio.com/news-markets/national-news/portfolio/2008/02/19/Honda-Hydrogen-Fuel-Cell-Vehicle
Honda won’t disclose marketing plans, but several dozen California drivers are being tapped to sign $600-a-month leases. At the pump, hydrogen fuel costs roughly the same as gasoline, but there are only 66 operational hydrogen gas stations in the U.S. (19 in the Los Angeles area). So Honda is developing the Home Energy Station, a hydrogen pump for garages (which uses a process critics say releases greenhouse gases).
Not around here.
And now this:
http://physorg.com/news122655117.html
The terrorists will love this technology, beer cans to bombs.
They are going to the perfect source of corporate welfare - wacko right wing Republican extremists. GM, et al now wants free government money because, after all, throwing money at anti-American companies will save jobs and reduce the deficit. Right.
From MarketWatch.com:
GM (GM) Wants A Loan From Uncle Sam
Several reports indicate that GM (GM, Ford (F), and Chrysler are approaching the government for a total of $25 billion in loans at interest rates as low as 4.5%. The money could come in the form of loan guarantees.
Let's see. GM was given $100million by the government to develop a hybrid in 1994. Fifteen years later - 10 years obsolete - GM still does not have a hybrid. GM is hyping their first hybrid as the only new product - to save the company. The Volt will not appear for another two years – 16 years after the Congress provided corporate welfare to build a hybrid. How does a company run by MBA auto designers solve their problems? They will run to the government for money.
A country that believes in free markets would let GM go to bankruptcy. Then all those America jobs would be saved. The only reason for GM job losses is Rick Wagoner and his staff of bean counters. How did we save Chrysler? We gave Chrysler no government money; we forced Chrysler to eliminate their only problem. Top management was replaced by someone how knew how to drive - Lee Iacocca. Bankruptcy of GM would also eliminate the only reason why GM refused to innovate - Rick Wagoner. To save his job
The only problem with GM - its product line reflects how MBA school management innovates. GM deperately needs bankrucpty to save those employees jobs and eliminate the only problem in GM.
Ever significant innovation in a GM car in the past 30 years has been all but required by EPA regulation. It takes government regulation before an MBA will let car guys innovate? And then the same MBA will run to government for corporate welfare. Ironically, right wing Republicans support this 'bridge to nowhere'.
GM sucks - is that what you are saying T-dub....AGAIN. I think that horse has been beaten to death?
Hell, tw hates, it appears, any boss who ever went to boss college and passed boss lessons and graduated. You end up wondering just why.
Wonder how he feels about engineers with degrees in engineering?
Hell, tw hates, it appears, any boss who ever went to boss college and passed boss lessons and graduated. You end up wondering just why.
Hell no. This was bait so that the dumbest person I ever knew would post - UG. UG - fist fights never occured even in any bar I drank in. But the minute you walked in, everyone would want to hit you. You are that dumb. You are so stupid that even Forest Gump would want to hit you.
Chrysler got loan guarantees.
Chrysler got loan guarantees.
Only after Chrysler 1) fixed the problem - replaced bean counters Townsend and Richardo with Iacocca, 2) still had to obtain loans from private sources, and 3) still had to pay the same high interest rates. In fact, Chrysler almost failed when Deutsche Bank backed out at the last minute. Chrysler had to earn their loans by first fixing the reason for Chrysler’s near demise – bad management resulting in bad products.
GM does not want to fix their problem and wants the government to loan the money at much lower interest rates. IOW an anti-America company (paraphrasing classicman) now wants us to pay - corporate welfare - so GM can continue making the same mistakes. At what point does a GM stock holder suffer risks because stockholders remained in denial? At what point does a bankruptcy threat become so great that stock holders finally demand intelligent management?
So many tried to save GM including Ross Perot and Carl Icahn. GM stockholders refused to admit the obvious. Therefore GM stockholders should be rewarded as the partners of Bear Stearns were also rewarded. Bankruptcy is necessary to remove GM's only problem - Rick Wagoner and his staff. Instead, GM wants free money to keep making bad products.
Only two months ago, GM said they had plenty of cash. Suddenly GM need tens of $billions? Oh. Lying on the spread sheets is also acceptable? Well, when AT&T was finally exposed as lying, then AT&T had to disintegrate - be consumed by companies with responsible management. Just another example of free market bankruptcies solving the problem - bad management.
Gerald Ford to New York City: Drop dead. Without free Federal money, then NYC decided to solve their bankruptcy problems. As a result, NYC did become fiscally responsible again.
Hell no. This was bait so that the dumbest person I ever knew would post.
I call BS. Why you were just calling for his banning not too long ago.
Now you want him to post - :headshake
Hell no. This was bait so that the dumbest person I ever knew would post - UG. UG - fist fights never occured even in any bar I drank in. But the minute you walked in, everyone would want to hit you. You are that dumb. You are so stupid that even Forest Gump would want to hit you.
That the best you can do? Allegations of dumbth from a man unaware that the given name Forrest contains
two R's? While dodging any germane response to the point I brought up... did an MBA once fuck your chihuahua or something?
The Cellarites I fight with the hardest are really the most childish.
I call BS. Why you were just calling for his banning not too long ago.
When it comes to the same old bullshit time and time again, why does classicman always attack tw and never attack Urbane Guerrilla? classicman loves UG's extremist politics - not concepts based in reality?
UG routinely posts personal attacks and political rhetoric from the George Jr administration as broadcast by Rush Limbaugh. Apparently classicman approves. There is no significant inflation. George said so. There is no threat of recession. George said so. Throwing more tax rates at the rich has only make a stronger American economy (ignoring that the common man has seen a seven year decrease in his income). We don't burn too much oil. George said so. And classicman approves?
It is what wacko extremists do. They cannot challenge facts. So they attack the messenger.
When it comes to the same old bullshit time and time again, why does classicman always attack tw and never attack Urbane Guerrilla?
Please stop - you are whining like a little girl.
UG routinely posts personal attacks and political rhetoric from the George Jr administration as broadcast by Rush Limbaugh. Apparently classicman approves. There is no significant inflation. George said so. There is no threat of recession. George said so. Throwing more tax rates at the rich has only make a stronger American economy (ignoring that the common man has seen a seven year decrease in his income). We don't burn too much oil. George said so.
It is what wacko extremists do. They cannot challenge facts. So they attack the messenger.
There ya go making assumptions again Tommy Boy. Oh and wrong ones as usual. Weren't you the one who lived only in a fact based world? What ever happened to that?
And FWIW - you never addressed the actual comment I made even though you quoted it - another "as usual."
Please stop - you are whining like a little girl.
Which proves that classicman is as wacko extremist as UG. Posting personal attacks is what wacko extremists do. And again, classicman posts without offering any logical thought. UG has another disciple.
Posting personal attacks is what wacko extremists do.
Ahem. May I point you towards...
Hell no. This was bait so that the dumbest person I ever knew would post - UG. UG - fist fights never occured even in any bar I drank in. But the minute you walked in, everyone would want to hit you. You are that dumb. You are so stupid that even Forest Gump would want to hit you.
Hmmm.
Ahem. May I point you towards...
Absolutely. UG loves it when others mirror him. Can't you just feel his love?
do you completely miss that you fit the definition of a wacko extremist? a definition that you repeatedly post of our benefit?
Please stop - you are whining like a little girl.
Which proves that classicman is as wacko extremist as UG. Posting personal attacks is what wacko extremists do. And again, classicman posts without offering any logical thought.
No logical thought needed on this one - It was just an observation.
do you completely miss that you fit the definition of a wacko extremist? a definition that you repeatedly post of our benefit?
yeh but his wacko extremist is the complete polar opposite of UG's In fact, they are so far apart they are virtually mirror images.
Or opposite ends of the ping pong table. Etcetera.
A walking, brawling dialectic we.
When it comes to the same old bullshit time and time again, why does classicman always attack tw and never attack Urbane Guerrilla?
He has to ask. Man, that's funny. Well, it's probably because tw has never mastered the art of being lovable -- and is still single and very likely a virgin as well, being (stand by for the personal attack) about as attractive as a Morlock, on the evidence of what is present in his postings and what is absent. An ability to read between the lines is neither useless nor rare.
UG routinely posts personal attacks and political rhetoric from the George Jr administration as broadcast by Rush Limbaugh. . .
I dunno, I don't quote Rush. The guy who needs me to be a Pinocchio for the Administration is setting himself up for such a public crotchpunting he can use his 'nads for Jayne-hat pompoms by the time I'm done, so out to lunch on the topic is he. I get more Sean Hannity or Bill O'Reilly time nowadays. Perhaps tw would rather I take Ted Rall as an example of all that is good, speaking of extremists. The guy appeared on Hannity & Colmes once, and I've never seen Sean Hannity so pissed -- and Alan Colmes wasn't saying anything in Rall's defense either, and his left eyebrow was way up in his hairline the whole time. Serious contempt, I'd think.
Hang on... so the reason Classicman doesn't support TW is because he's a virgin?
Poor old Jonas Brothers eh? Bet no-one likes them.
Oh, wait...
I'm a virgin? Since when??
I'm a virgin?
I volunteer to solve that problem.
Uh, thanks but no thanks. That train left the station about 25 years ago.
I volunteer to solve that problem.
I didn't know you swung that way.
Sheldon! Sheldon! I think I found you a date. :D
I didn't know you swung that way.
Anything to promote the concept of innovation. In a great California tradition, I am will to try anything[SIZE=1] maybe.[/SIZE]
Isn't 'virgin' a disease that must be cured? I know many people who would volunteer to cure such diseases. (Isn't that also called safe sex?)
OMG! tw - stick to politics, please.
OMG! tw - stick to politics, please.
Haven't I stuck it enough to George Jr? I'm good at sticking things.
Was it not the cherished student John "Bluto" Blutarsky who lead that famous chant ... "Virgin Virgin Virgin ..." So a party resulted.
lol - Yeh, why don't you get a head start on O8ama
lol - Yeh, why don't you get a head start on O8ama
As usual, the wacko extremist will promote for one whose campaign staff is dominated by George Jr extremists. classicman, your extremist politics makes you so predictable. You again want to turn a thread nasty.
All I was talking about was good clean sex. Oh. Wacko extremists also fear sex?
Sorry - my mind wasn't in the gutter like yours.
BTW - we don't fear sex buddy, we actually have it - - - and with other people too.
You should try it sometime - its pretty nice.
:moon:
It is my considered view that tw is indeed a virgin, one of some seniority, and likely to remain so. If he possesses any attractive traits, the Cellar has not seen them.
Nasty enough?
And Sheldon's a nicer guy than tw. By miles. By leagues, imperial or metric.
And Sheldon's a nicer guy than tw. By miles. By leagues, imperial or metric.
Hedoes not yet know how acidic and extremist you are. That will be obvious once he learns you have never been the brightest bulb on the tree. And that your deserve every insult you get.
UG spent 20 years in the military and never got promoted higher than Corporal. No wonder he can relate to George Jr.
Hmm I try to read this thread but it seems to basically repeat one thing:
"I know you are but what am I!?"[/end child's voice]
I find that I avoid any of the threads in politics as soon as TW or Radar post. Not because of what they post but because of the animosity that follows their posts. I understand that there is a history here, but its a shame that what could be a really interesting and informative read turns into drivel.
Its difficult to have a meaningful interaction with someone who is "always right" and has an opposing view or opinion to others. Once the mind is shut to new ideas or thoughts, the potential for actual interaction ends.
Its difficult to have a meaningful interaction with someone who is "always right"...
There will always be a problem when one posts only after learning the reasons why while another posts facetious personal attacks.
Well, poo-poo on you too.
Facetious attacks have less to do with the issues when ones mind is shut like a rusted old trap. There can be no true discussion when one side maintains a position of assumed knowledge and is not open to expanding their mind or altering their perspective or opinion. Basically if one acts/believes that they are a know-it-all, a discussion will be fruitless.
Basically if one acts/believes that they are a know-it-all, a discussion will be fruitless.
You believe because, well classicman, you only post ridicule. That is the extent of your knowledge. The topic In this thread is GM. When did you post a useful fact here? Never. You only have right wing political biases.
Rush Limbaugh has trained you well. Disparage those who learn before knowing. It works when others overlook that classicman never posts actual knowledge – the whats and whys. classicman instead does exactly what Limbaugh does. Belittle others rather than deal with the topic. classicman simply does this again.
You believe because, well classicman, you only post ridicule. That is the extent of your knowledge. The topic In this thread is GM. When did you post a useful fact here? Never. You only have right wing political biases.
You mustn't assume I was talking about you tw. Please show where my post that you quoted specifically references YOU? Nevermind save yourself the time, It doesn't. You assumed - again. It was actually meant as a general statement. There were no disparaging remarks nor belittling insults levied, unless they were in your emotional imagination - again.
Additionally, I do not have any "right wing political biases." In fact, if you looked at all the political compass tests that I've taken & results posted you will see PROOF that I am leaning far more liberal than anything else.
As far as Rush Limbaugh is concerned... I think he is an asshat with his own political agenda that differs GREATLY from mine. If you happened to notice through my recent posts, I am very torn as far as who to vote for in this election. That in itself displays my moderate stance.
You mustn't assume I was talking about you tw.
Again you demonstrate my point. classicman is again posting without demonstrating knowledge. Somehow he assumed this is about me. classicman routinely has opinions based only on feeling - without demonstrating grasp of facts.
You may feel Rush is an asshat. But you routinely do what Rush also does.
What??? Geez man, you need to relax. I made a joke (note the poo poo) and you got all bent outta shape. I took your post directed at me, you even quoted me, and responded in kind. That's the way a conversation works.
I even went so far as to address your "points" from your last post, no matter how weak they were.
Now please share with the world which facts from the last 8 or 10 posts demonstrate anything at all about GM?
I just have to ask you, tw, one thing -
1) Do you try to be this rude and arrogant or does it come naturally?
Anything to promote the concept of innovation. In a great California tradition, I am will to try anything[SIZE=1] maybe.[/SIZE]
Isn't 'virgin' a disease that must be cured? I know many people who would volunteer to cure such diseases. (Isn't that also called safe sex?)
Haven't I stuck it enough to George Jr? I'm good at sticking things.
Was it not the cherished student John "Bluto" Blutarsky who lead that famous chant ... "Virgin Virgin Virgin ..." So a party resulted.
As usual, the wacko extremist will promote for one whose campaign staff is dominated by George Jr extremists. classicman, your extremist politics makes you so predictable. You again want to turn a thread nasty.
All I was talking about was good clean sex. Oh. Wacko extremists also fear sex?
Hedoes not yet know how acidic and extremist you are. That will be obvious once he learns you have never been the brightest bulb on the tree. And that your deserve every insult you get.
UG spent 20 years in the military and never got promoted higher than Corporal. No wonder he can relate to George Jr.
There will always be a problem when one posts only after learning the reasons why while another posts facetious personal attacks.
Please explain to me which of these posts demonstrate EXACTLY that which you are demeaning and ridiculing me for?
I see nothing in any of them about GM. Please explain to me where I am wrong.
Do you try to be this rude and arrogant or does it come naturally?
Look in the mirror, classicman. My posts to you will routinely be in the tone you set at least one year ago. Strange how you don't like posts that only duplicate your attitude.
You don't see me posting this way to others. Others at least posted supporting facts for their opinion. You post opinions laced in mockery and insult - in the tradition of Rush Limbaugh.
So you in turn are acting exactly the same way that you admonish others for posting. Hmm, seems very hypocritical. And yes you have acted this way to others. Please do not trot that horse out - he will not run this race. :headshake
You also conveniently avoided the reality of post #139
I've been using the ignore feature on UG for a while because his nonsense was getting reactions from me similar to what you merc and ug have whenever tw posts. There has been an unfortunate cost to this. The right wing nuts have ruled the board for quite some time. Reasonable opinions are lost in the smack downs. TW is not always on target but he has a perspective that we need. If you don't want to be considered part of a right wing enforcement squad quit the me too game and post your own opinions.
TW is not always on target but he has a perspective that we need. If you don't want to be considered part of a right wing enforcement squad quit the me too game and post your own opinions.
I happen to agree.
It's also useful to remember what happens when you wrestle with a pig. The recent petty sniping has really turned me off.
That's where my message gets lost - I'm interested in other peoples opinions yet his constant belittling, deservedly so, of the current administration for the last four years has been notably biased. From one who purports to be "unemotional" and simply interested in "facts" the reality is that he is apparently as far left as UG is far right. I even asked twice for his opinions on the liberals and his response said it all. He completely turned it into another conservative bashing - typical with his agenda. It simply amazes me that a guy who seems so intelligent can be so blind at the same time.
I've posted things I should probably not have - I thought I was trying to find some middle ground, but there doesn't seem to be any with him.
As far as your comment "The right wing nuts have ruled the board for quite some time." That is not something I have seen in my years of lurking or since joining the board.
Thanks for the advice though - I appreciate it and I apologize.
That's where my message gets lost - I'm interested in other peoples opinions yet his constant belittling, deservedly so, of the current administration for the last four years has been notably biased.
I simply saw reality before you did. When did you realize that Saddam's WMD claims were myths? (I believe you were not here when tw was so adamant about that.) When did you realize that George Jr would subvert the Oslo Accords? When did you realize that George Jr was making the world less stable by unilaterally canceling international treaties? When did you finally admit we were routinely torturing people - and denying it? When did you finally realize that George Jr's administration had violated most every requirement that justifies war - literally Pearl Harbored another nation? When did you finally realize that "Mission Accomplished" was an American created civil war; not a war against a mythical Al Qaeda in Iraq?
Biased is when another recognized reality before you did? Nonsense. tw identified George Jr early on when it was not popular and when George Jr even tried to restart confrontation with North Korea - literally trashed Carter's solution. What did George Jr eventually do because of pressure from S Korea, China, and others? George Jr finally reimplemented the Carter solution. Who saw this before you did? And that is called bias?
Meanwhile, your replies to these posts were to belittle this author. Your intelligence is now openly questioned because my posts to you are mirror images of what you posted for so long previously.
But again, tw posts “reasons why” in response to another classicman unsubstantiated accusation of bias. When do you post supporting facts for that accusation? But again, classicman posts without any supporting facts.
Biting tongue & smiling politely
Biting tongue & smiling politely
Meanwhile you do the exact same attacks in
If Moore's Law hits a sinkhole... . You even admit you know nothing about Quantum Computing but you post opinions of Radar anyway. That is an attack posted in a discussion you have no business even posting in. You know nothing useful. You admit you don't even know anything about the topic. But classicman again had to post *opinions* anyway.
No I am not smiling politely. I am being blunt honest about how classicman posts. How silly. When classicman gets treated as he treats other, then he complains? Meanwhile, classicman is still doing the same disparaging *opinions* (without any supporting facts) in a discussion about Quantum Computers. In short, classicman routinely belittles others especially when he does not understand the topic. He even admits he has nothing useful to offer – but posts belittlement anyway.
tw, he's trying to back off. Why don't you drop it too?
tw, he's trying to back off. Why don't you drop it too?
Let see. I treated him logically for about one year of his abuse. So maybe in another year, I will back off. Fair is fair. And being more of a hardass conservative then him, he should expect such treatment.
BTW, if he was trying to backoff, then why is he posting same acidic remarks in
If Moore's Law hits a sinkhole... ? Why more acidic posts even in a discussion he admits he knows nothing about? You call that backing off? Hardly.
classicman is but one example of the new posting style openly condoned in the Cellar. Once a published author named Barak hardly said anything, but inflamed others. So he was banned. Once a teenager named April was banned for simply posting as a teenager probably begging for help. Now posts from classicman and Urbane Guerrilla are condoned? When I simply do unto classicman as he does onto others, you would complain?
glatt - your very first post should have questioned why Urbane Guerrilla is routinely condoned. Why the double standard?
Meanwhile, classicman demonstrates no interest in apologizing for posting in the tradition of Rush Limbaugh. Suddenly he does not like it only when one mirrors his posting style. Maybe in about a year, I will change. But as I warned many months ago, this is the new posting standards now acceptable in the Cellar. Get used to it - or start with where these new standards are routinely encouraged - Urbane Guerrilla. I have no problem using classicman as the poster boy for our new posting standards. I don't recall you standing up months ago when this new Cellar standard was criticized by me? Or do you really like it when classicman belittles others?
If you look at the time stamps of the posts, you will see that you guys have been throwing mud at each other all over the Cellar in multiple threads, but classic stopped this morning. You are just now reading those other posts where he threw mud last night, so you think the mud is still flying.
I'm hoping you both stop, because I'm sick of it, but you both have free will, so it's up to you.
To answer your question about Urbane, I give his political posts exactly zero value, so I don't even read them. Maybe newcomers will give his posts weight, and that does disturb me a little, but I don't think any Dwellars who have been around for more than a few months give his posts any weight. He's like a tree falling in the forest with nobody around to witness.
You build your own reputation here with each post.
tw, he's trying to back off. Why don't you drop it too?
Bravo!!!
Seconded!!
It's also useful to remember what happens when you wrestle with a pig.
You get lipstick on it? ;)
Thanks for the advice though - I appreciate it and I apologize.
Cool.
If you look at the time stamps of the posts, you will see that you guys have been throwing mud at each other all over the Cellar in multiple threads, but classic stopped this morning.
Good. If he becomes civil for one year, then I will do same. Only then we are even.
I announced this change months ago. Where were you when I defined what had happened to the Cellar's culture and how I was going to respond? You suddenly have an opinion? Bullshit. Too little, too late, and therefore it has near zero credibility. If glatt was responsible, then glatt would have spoken out those months ago when the problem was clearly defined. If glatt is responsible now, then glatt knows nothing has changed until classicman demonstrates civil behavior for months.
He did not murder anyone today. Therefore he has reformed? Nonsense. He was belittling others for years AND was doing so even yesterday. One day is reform? His apology only begins to have credibility when it is repeated for weeks. Oh. Apology? He did not even post an apology. So you know he has changed? I also have an East River bridge you might be interested in buying. Appreciate the concept - credibility.
Prove you are being sincere, glatt. Go after the worst offender here - Urbane Guerrilla. Otherwise you are wasting bandwidth. I am never politically correct. Are you adult enough to deal with the logic in this post or so childish as to be offended? Yes, your core is being tested. Statements are presented in the only way I know how - blunt and honest - and with no regard for emotionally based perceptions. If you are logical, then your next post viciously condemns the number one offender in the Cellar - Urbane Guerrilla. Otherwise we are simply wasting bandwidth.
When you decide to stop blaming the victims and instead identify the culprit, then I will know you are thinking logically. Again, I was blunt, honest, AND told you (and everyone) what I was going to do. I am also being blunt, honest and sincere here. Do you know anyone that honest? You want me to stop? Then let's see you go after the problem - not the victim.
Defined is what you must do to have credibility with me. Go after the Cellar's number one offender - Urbane Guerilla - in your very next post. Can I, as the victim of over a year of classicman belittlement, be any more honest here? Your only honest reply is, "No". Your choice. Blame the victim or address the Cellar's number one problem - Urbane Guerrilla.
You will observe my posts change only after the problem has been sufficiently solved long enough. Once I go to war, then (as defined in "Art of War") the resulting turmoil must be extreme. The Art of War is quite blunt about this basic principle. A dike has been busted. I resent blaming the victim AND posts that completely ignore the Cellar's number one problem: Urbane Guerrilla. Again, I told everyone what was going to happen. Nothing has yet changed. Don't blame me. Blame the problem.
A sincere glatt will be demanding a solution to the Cellar's number one problem: Urbane Guerrilla. (Nothing from me ever implied that UG should be banned despite distortions posted by others.)
Oh. If you do finally decide to address the Cellar's number one problem, then you will be the first Cellar dweller I have observed doing so.
If you do finally decide to address the Cellar's number one problem, then you will be the first Cellar dweller I have observed doing so.
You must have DanaC on ignore. She's taken UG to task on countless occasions. And let's not forget that time I made fun of him for being a pyramid scheme knife salesman when he mocked the idea of being a professional engineer.
Defined is what you must do to have credibility with me.
And that's it in a nutshell. A person earns credibility here with their posts. Both you and classiman have been throwing your credibility out the window with your childish mudslinging. UG has virtually no credibility with me as a result of his posts. You still have some with me. Classicman still has some as well.
You can choose to do what you will with the remainder of your credibility.
I'm not the Cellar cop. Sorry if that disappoints you. I spoke up this time because I hoped it might stop some of the mudslinging for a bit. I don't have the energy or desire to take on UG, even though he deserves to be taken on. Mostly I don't see the urgent need to take him on because I think nobody takes him seriously.
A person earns credibility here with their posts... You still have some with me. Classicman still has some as well.
You can choose to do what you will with the remainder of your credibility.
Do I have any left?
If so, I'd like to put it in a high interest account for a while, then squander it all one drunken night! Bwahahahahahahaha!
Do I have any left?
If so, I'd like to put it in a high interest account for a while, then squander it all one drunken night! Bwahahahahahahaha!
You could be president of the US with those economic policies!
A person earns credibility here with their posts. Both you and Classicman have been throwing your credibility out the window with your childish mudslinging.
You can choose to do what you will with the remainder of your credibility.
Sorry to all, especially Tom who has borne the brunt of my ire. There are reasons, but none of them mean shit at this point - I'm done.
I am going to make a concerted effort to regain that which I've lost.
And that's it in a nutshell. A person earns credibility here with their posts. Both you and classiman have been throwing your credibility out the window with your childish mudslinging.
Now you are rewriting history. classicman was doing personal attacks without any mudsling response from me for over a year. You only noticed recently and now assume personal atacks from me have always existed? Well, you have lied even to yourself and owe me an apology for that accusation. Return insults started when I said the Cellar has changed and would reply in a new tone that you found previously acceptable. You ignored routine insults until I finally started replying in kind? Yes.
There were no personal attacks from me before then. You have simply ignored that I remained civil in response to a new Cellar where you too could now become the target (because you lied about my reponse to routine classicman personal attacks and you ddd not apologize for your false accusation).
One day of being nice says zero. If you don't like me, then shutup and go away. If being honest, then you know I was the victim here long ago when I formally announced I was changing how I would post. I still have no reason to change strategies and every reason to still maintain personal attacks on those who did so routinely. That new attitide will not change until I am convinced more than just DanaC has spoken out. You, on the other hand, still have said virtually nothing about how Urbane Guerrilla types have so changed the Cellar.
Credibility - I defined the problem months ago and announced a solution. You ignored the problem and then months later blame the victim. What does that say about your credibility when you lie about me posting personal attacks previously? You know exactly when I started posting personal attacks - well over a year after classicman was doing it routinely and you were ignoring it. You even downplay it by calling it mudslinging.
Meanwhile, DanaC apparently has credibility. She (I am informed) has gone after UG elsewhere. You, on the other hand, only took notice after I decided it was time to get your attention. So you blame me? Shame on you for blaming the victim and still not doing what only DanaC has done. Take comfort in doing only what the majority have done if that make you feel safe. This is also about glatt who has no problem blaming the victim and still has not requested a solution to the Cellar's number one problem - Urbane Guerrilla.
You ignored the problem and then months later blame the victim.
Where do I blame you? I don't think I have blamed you. Sorry if it came across that way. I'm just asking you to stop.
You are at your most credible when you post facts/opinions and leave the personal attacks out of it.
You are at your most credible when you post facts/opinions and leave the personal attacks out of it.
I agree. Tw's viewpoint needs to be heard, but it usually just gets drowned out when everyone starts sling poo at each other.
Let see. I treated him logically for about one year of his abuse. So maybe in another year, I will back off. Fair is fair. And being more of a hardass conservative then him, he should expect such treatment.
Classicman joined on 11/26/2007.
Your first post referencing him was 12/5/2007. Your
first post insulting him was 12/9/2007, based on a misreading of his quote and a request by him for clarification. He responded by leaving the thread.
Your next post insulting him was 2/6/2008. He responded with graciousness.
Your next post insulting him was 4/4/2008, in a thread where you claimed that hair dryers have only one heat setting, and he called you on it. Before he responded, others called you deliberately provocative in the thread.
The post where you say "Replies are now in a tone that you understand - personal attack" occurred on 6/15/2008, a little more than three months ago, after he demanded that you offer proof of your claim that Merc lied about his service record.
A review of all these posts, and the threads that led to them, show fairly clearly that c-man generally demands that you unemotionally back up your claims or offer further explanation, or respond to the original question, and you generally respond by questioning his and others' intelligence.
Your first post referencing him was 12/5/2007. Your first post insulting him was 12/9/2007, based on a misreading of his quote and a request by him for clarification. He responded by leaving the thread.
Where is the insult? I remember that discussion without even reading it. You did not hyperlink the entire discussion meaning that important context is ignored. classicman, with mockery, accused me of stating what was instead only a requote. Where is this reply insulting to classicman?
What part of "requoted" don't you understand. Are you really Urbane Guerrilla? The 'requote' and the expression embedded in double quotes ALSO came with a hyperlink so that others could see exactly what was posted. How many times over could it be that simple - and still classicman is confused?
Where is the insult?
In fact, he and I both agreed that Cheney's "Mission Accomplished" claims were delusional. But somehow classicman assumed otherwise, as if I was attributing Cheney's mindset to him. IOW classicman was mistaken by misreading the requote.
classicman's misread was so contrary to what I posted that, at that point, I was seriously wondering if classicman was Urbane Guerilla posting in a new mantra. Somehow UT perverts that into insults? Obviously it is not. UT – is this the best you can do? Well, yes, because tw did not post insults. He posted conclusions with supporting facts. And he posted those conclusions harshly when replying to obvious mockery.
UT's second citation again forgets to include the snippy classicman post that preceded it. UT again forgetting a fact distorts context and create a lie. classicman posted:
Oh please do tell. I need to know this before the election. C'mon -gimme, gimme, gimme.
The tw reply to that snippy post: UT calls it insulting. The statement was made WITH supporting facts in response to obvious mockery. Again, the topic was addressed; classicman was not attacked. The topic was classicman not reading what was posted – and asks why he did not read it.
tw's second post replies with supporting facts for why that conclusion is drawn.
As usual, classicman knows because he was there in 1959. Oh. He need not be there. Extremist conservative bias is enough to know.
…. Classicman's post is a blunt obvious insult. Being a moderate means learning facts before knowing. But classicman knows all about Kennedy because he were there. Did god tell you how to know?
A legitimate question since classicman never posts any reasons supporting his “knowledge” and obviously did not exist then. So classicman tells me I (who was there) did not know what I was posting? Nonsense.
"Oh please do. I need to know this before the election" is classic classicman mockery. UT calls that gracious? Where? Oh. After my post, classicman all but apologized for his snippy reply. UT also ignored that classicman admission.
I was in a rush to post. Now I'm sorry I posted in haste and got nothing more than another indignant response
Indignant. An accurate description and what should be expected from a snippy post that says nothing and reeks of mockery. Not insulting. So indignant as to terminate any more classicman mockery.
See that word, UT? "AFTER". The post you quoted was in response to classicman mockery - and posted with logic and supporting facts. And AFTER that, classicman all but apologized for posting in haste. UT, however, calls an appropriate reply “insulting"? Where? UT, again you are desperate to find insults that do not exist. Even classicman admits his post was in haste and not properly thought out.
As a result of that terse reply, a later classicman post ask questions without mockery or insults:
Why don't you agree? Are your politics morwe in-line with hers? Does she excite you in some fashion? What is it about her that you like?
Since this is the best you can do, well, UT instead proved my point. I did not discuss classicman’s little dic that does thinking for him; until after noting how the Cellar has changed. If posted, now that would be an insult. UT. Where does that sentence provide supporting facts for its conclusion? Why is it relevant? It does neither. Therefore it examples an insult. Find where I posted that at classicman – and good look. UT has no examples of such insult because tw never posted insults. UT’s examples, at best, only display justified indignant; always posted with supporting facts for a logical conclusion.
Your examples only demonstrate that tw only started posting insults after noting the new Cellar - which UT even denies has changed. OK UT. Prove me wrong. Why do you so approve of the so many Urbane Guerrilla personal attacks when neither April nor Barak did anything near that anti-social. You banned those others for far less (obviously I am not even impling a call for banning despite how others will foolishly and have previously assumed).
Where is the insult? I remember that discussion without even reading it. You did not hyperlink the entire discussion meaning that important context is ignored. classicman, with mockery, accused me of stating what was instead only a requote. Where is this reply insulting to classicman? Where is the insult?
http://cellar.org/showthread.php?p=414922#post414922
Read it and please tell me which of his posts are mockery. The posts are numbered, you can just state which numbers.
The numbers of the posts where you insult him are #9, #12 and #14.
UT's second citation again forgets to include the snippy classicman post that preceded it.
http://cellar.org/showthread.php?p=430446#post430446
"Oh please do. I need to know this before the election" is classic classicman mockery. UT calls that gracious? Where? Oh. After my post, classicman all but apologized for his snippy reply.
I didn't write that he was gracious. What I wrote was
"He responded with graciousness." His admission was gracious. He apologized - he complimented you (he actually wanted your input) and regretted the turn of the discussion.
Meanwhile, "Gimme gimme gimme" - that's your big insult? Are you fucking kidding me? If you can't stand "gimme gimme gimme", if that sets you off enough to start some sort of Major Big Dic Cellar Feud, then you really should unplug the Internet and take up a different hobby. Perhaps bowling.
Your examples only demonstrate that tw only started posting insults after noting the new Cellar - which UT even denies has changed. OK UT. Prove me wrong. Why do you so approve of the so many Urbane Guerrilla personal attacks when neither April nor Barak did anything near that anti-social. You banned those others for far less (obviously I am not even impling a call for banning despite how others will foolishly and have previously assumed).
Okay, number 1, your reading comprehension is not strong enough to understand what happened in the Barak / April cases.
But more importantly, there's no rule against personal attacks on the Cellar. The rule is, Don't Be Intolerably Annoying. Of what constitutes that level, someone has to be arbiter, and that's me and the elected moderators. If you don't like what we do, perhaps the Cellar is not the forum for you. There are 100,000 other forums for you to choose from.