Chevy 50 MPG Diesel coming in 2013

Keebler145 · Nov 2, 2011

That hand GM has is still all sorts of wishy washy though! I'm talking about the the chevy designs that inevitably came from here, US (which hasn't been for a long time I know). Not cars that were made else where that GM mixed with other company's designs. Most of what GM does (as do most companies) is just mix platforms and rebadge/rebody old platforms or other models.

Which was my point in defense that the cruze really isn't that bad of a car... mainly being what you just said (part fiat motor, part opel, which is european platform, with Daewoo Engineering). The car really isn't an "American" car, it just is built here, so no need to base it on the previous cars (although they probably were no better than the cruze in the design respect either heh).

Going to go troll your sig now instead of studying for my accounting test tomorrow, thanks tooefr! -_- haha

kjclow · Nov 2, 2011

manual_tranny said:
If you want to really save the world, tell your friends about Smyth Performance. It could potentially team up with an auto-builder to put more of our unemployed to work recycling cars.

Think about it.

What's the most beneficial to the environment: good MPG? kinda.

How about the expenses of energy to create a car? There's the mining of the iron ore, the transportation, smelting, refining, finishing, forming, assembly/coating/painting of the metals. There's the use of oil in the plastics throughout the entire car. Plastics are not cheap for no reason. They are made from oil.... SUBSIDIZED OIL!!!

If you want to start saving the world with an automobile purchase, and you are dedicated to saving the world's oil and dedicated to being "green", there is one clear easy choice: Tell people to send their money to Local Motors requesting a recycled car. They could start producing Smyth Performance kit cars, and in the near-future the Smyth Performance kit trucks. If my dreams come true, people who have bought Priuses and TDIs like F8L and me are going to move up to another plane of thinking in this country. America is generally kind of slow to repsond, but at some point we're all going to GET IT. Recycled cars will be the "norm" because we don't need to spend a ton of energy on something that just needs a couple days of some professional rebuilding. We can't be a disposable country forever, it has to end. And all of us have the choice to start ending it, NOW, with a decision as fun as buying a unique automobile. With a warranty. Professionally set-up engine internals specific to the vehicle/consumer goals. 45-50mpg TDI trucks, brand new on a rebuild Jetta/Golf chassis? Your money, your demand makes that happen. Even the rebuilt 2.slow vehicles are a net gain because there isn't any more energy being used to make them.

The only thing they need is YOUR DEMAND.

Do you want to burn enough fuel to drive 50,000-200,000mi before AND after you buy your car, or just after?

Most of the cars made today use some level of recycled materials; steel, glass, plastic, insulating materials, fabrics - carpets, head liners, seats, trunk lining....

Remember cash for clunkers? All of those cars had to be crushed and recycled into something.

kjclow · Nov 2, 2011

Oberkanone said:
http://www.railroad.net/positive-results-for-amtrak-tests-on-beef-powered-train-361.html

Chevy should offer a tallow fuel option for the Cruze.

Although you would not anticipate it, beef tallow is quite expensive and in limited supply. We use it in a few products and have issues getting enough to keep up with our demands.

bhtooefr · Nov 2, 2011

Keebler145 said:
Which was my point in defense that the cruze really isn't that bad of a car... mainly being what you just said (part fiat motor, part opel, which is european platform, with Daewoo Engineering). The car really isn't an "American" car, it just is built here, so no need to base it on the previous cars (although they probably were no better than the cruze in the design respect either heh).

I'll note that Delta II (the Cruze's platform) is the successor to the original Delta platform, which hosted such amazing vehicles as the Saturn Ion, Chevy Cobalt (admittedly, the SS was a quite good performer), and the HHR. Both being Opel platforms intended for Astras, although the Cruze actually got this one first in its Korean trim as the Daewoo Lacetti.

Also, this engine appears to have been initially designed in 1998 or so - its first application was the 1999 Hyundai Trajet, it appears.

So, ready for a mind screw?

VM Motori was owned wholly by Detroit Diesel at the time.

Of course, Detroit was independent at that time, so...

German_1er_diesel · Nov 2, 2011

bhtooefr said:
Also, this engine appears to have been initially designed in 1998 or so - its first application was the 1999 Hyundai Trajet, it appears.

Hyundai stopped using this engine a few years ago, going with their own 1.6 and 1.7 engines instead. GM seems to be OK with offering their Chevy customers a mildly re-worked 1998 engine.
Opels don't come with this engine, BTW - they use the modern 2.0 Fiat engine instead.

bhtooefr · Nov 3, 2011

Well, to be fair, the lower end of the current 4-cylinder VW TDIs is a heavily reworked 1977 engine, and a barely reworked at all 1996 or so engine...

(The top end is another story, though. That appears to be a 2008 design. But, VW used the same top end design (with only the addition of hydraulic lifters) from 1974 to 2001 or so on gassers, 1976 to 1999 or so on diesels, and then a barely reworked at all version from 1996 to 2003 on diesels or 1996 to today on gassers.)

German_1er_diesel · Nov 3, 2011

bhtooefr said:
Well, to be fair, the lower end of the current 4-cylinder VW TDIs is a heavily reworked 1977 engine, and a barely reworked at all 1996 or so engine...

But it is "heavily reworked" and gets good fuel economy, good NVH...

The Cruze diesel on the other hand:

To illustrate how ridiculous a 6.3 l/100km combined rating for a diesel compact is, here's the spec sheet for the 313hp, 465 lb-ft, AWD BMW 535d xDrive:

("innerorts" = urban, "außerorts" = extra-urban, "kombiniert" = combined, European fuel economy ratings are more optimistic than EPA ones)

bhtooefr · Nov 3, 2011

So, the US-spec car should do a little better in actual fuel economy than the Euro car is, as it'll be sold as an Eco model, which means 0.298 Cd instead of 0.33, and long gearing. (Eco basically being Chevy's equivalent to BlueMotion.)

Also, you are comparing the slushbox to the DSG, not the most fair of comparisons (admittedly, a relevant one, but slushboxes tend to be competitive on the EPA cycle, whereas they're not on the ECE cycle).

Manual vs. manual, it's a bit different:

Jetta: 6.1/4.8/4.1
Cruze: 7.3/5.4/4.2

Still bad, but only 19.7/12.5/2.4 percent worse than the Jetta, instead of 29.9/18.9/11.1 percent worse. And, the 50 mpg will be a highway number, and GM hasn't had a problem with making the fuel efficient models manual-only loss-leaders to get people on the dealer lots before (Cobalt XFE, anyone?)

I still say there'll be some cheating to get 50 out of it, though.

German_1er_diesel · Nov 3, 2011

Yea... and to be fair, the horrible city numbers for the Cruze are mostly because of the weight disadvantage and the missing start/stop system. The Eco changes should help a little.
Still... 50 mpg would be 8 mpg better than the Jetta... Volkswagen should know the same tricks as GM regarding the EPA cycle and how to beat it.

kjclow · Nov 3, 2011

VW knows but doesn't seem to want to play the same game. From what I can tell, VW (and some others) wants the sticker to reflect what most people should be able to get out of the car. The big three have decided to tune the cars to get a number that very few drivers will ever see in real world driving.

bhtooefr · Nov 3, 2011

VW tunes for real-world efficiency, and damn the EPA tests, which is why it's so easy to beat EPA in many VWs.

Some GM stuff has real-world efficiency, but a lot of it uses tricks to just squeeze past the EPA tests. It's designed to get good efficiency if you're driving it on the EPA cycle, but if you're driving it normally, you won't get that. They'll do things like the cylinder deactivation that, when you ask for even a little power, activates all the cylinders to avoid customer complaints... but in the EPA cycle, it just stays deactivated. In some of the V8 stuff, a forced 1-4 shift unless you're at WOT, or clip the wire to the solenoid that blocks 2nd gear off.

Grievous Angel · Nov 3, 2011

manual_tranny said:
You didn't read what I wrote correctly. The bigger vehicles need to be charged more PER GALLON because it does more damage to the road, PER GALLON.

That would be true if we all went the same distance per gallon.

If a Semi gets 10mpg, and we get 40mpg, then, over the same distance of road they will pay 4 times the taxes.

The right figure is "damage per mile," right?

supton · Nov 3, 2011

The semi does more than 4x damage though, if I understand the issue. A big rig doens't have the same emissions requirements (so no mpg losses for smog equipment--at least that was true in the past, and may still be partially true today); plus, there is a this odd thing with efficency. It tends to scale with size. A larger item can be more efficent on a per-ton basis. What is that those huge tanker ships get? BSFC per gallon consumed/hp/something. Something better than everything else. Similarly, despite getting a fourth of the mpg of our cars, the semi moves far more than 4x the weight. Despite all those tires spreading out the weight, each one still has a higher amount of weight (per square inch) hitting the road.

Too bad they can't just make "trucker fuel". If I understand correctly, the trucking industry has never wanted cetane levels past 40. Too bad we couldn't let them have the low cetane stuff, but with higher taxes; and then 50 cetane for auto fuel. Probably wouldn't work out--if the cost difference wasn't high enough, then truckers would burn auto fuel, avoiding the tax. And fuel stations would complain about yet another tank, and refiners about another blend... But I'm not sure that a hike in registration cost would work, as that "fines" low milage truckers more than high milage truckers (and likewise doesn't address road damage) -- at least not unless the registration cost was tied to actual miles traveled...

Was this a thread about Chevy's... ? Ooops...

bhtooefr · Nov 3, 2011

They actually do make 40 cetane "trucker fuel" and 45-50 cetane car fuel... problem is, the car stuff is very, very hard to find, and it's taxed at the trucker rate. (Then again, the truckers are actually being subsidized by the gasser drivers - their tax rate doesn't even come close to making up for the damage to the roads.)

That said, registration cost needs to be tied to vehicle weight and actual miles traveled, IMO.

manual_tranny · Nov 3, 2011

Grievous Angel said:
That would be true if we all went the same distance per gallon.
If a Semi gets 10mpg, and we get 40mpg, then, over the same distance of road they will pay 4 times the taxes.
The right figure is "damage per mile," right?

supton said:
The semi does more than 4x damage though, if I understand the issue. A big rig doens't have the same emissions requirements (so no mpg losses for smog equipment--at least that was true in the past, and may still be partially true today); plus, there is a this odd thing with efficency. It tends to scale with size. A larger item can be more efficent on a per-ton basis. What is that those huge tanker ships get? BSFC per gallon consumed/hp/something. Something better than everything else. Similarly, despite getting a fourth of the mpg of our cars, the semi moves far more than 4x the weight. Despite all those tires spreading out the weight, each one still has a higher amount of weight (per square inch) hitting the road.

Exactly, thanks for saving me the time and energy of saying this!

MrMopar · Nov 3, 2011

bhtooefr said:
Then again, the truckers are actually being subsidized by the gasser drivers - their tax rate doesn't even come close to making up for the damage to the roads.

If you tax trucks more you will just end up paying for it in the retail price of goods. If you leave it as it is you pay a higher motor fuel tax or higher income taxes. What does it matter to you what way you pay? Unless you are trying to game the system to where YOU PERSONALLY pay less; if so, I am with you.

bhtooefr · Nov 4, 2011

Good, I'd rather pay for it in the retail price of goods.

Then, retail goods will be more likely to come by train, which is an altogether more efficient way of doing things.

kjclow · Nov 4, 2011

When was the last time you saw a train unloading at your local grocery store?

As a company that ships both by truck and rail, it is not feesible to ship products by rail with a limited shelf life. It takes us approximately six weeks to ship product from Pittsburgh to LA by rail. IIRC, we have to switch rail lines four times. We can get it there within two days by truck using driving teams. Imagine how your California avacados will be after sitting in the rail car for six weeks. Or worse, your milk.

manual_tranny · Nov 4, 2011

Yeah, but have you been on a major interstate to see what is on these trucks? Refrigerated trucks are the exception to the rule.

It's not just trucks full of bananas and milk... it's a whole lot of stuff that could easily sit around for weeks before it got to where it was going.

Barges are even more efficient than trains. The only reason our country hasn't optimized the distribution of goods to be energy efficient is that we are dedicated to employing more people as drivers. (Even if that means paying higher taxes to fix our heavily burdened roads, and "share" these roads with convoys of extremely dangerous vehicles driven by amphetamine addicts...)

Additionally, if we invested the money we waste on repairing over-used interstates into updated rail systems: those rail systems would last longer and become more efficient.

bhtooefr · Nov 4, 2011

Truck is great for the last mile due to its flexibility, and I'm not saying to not use trucks for that.

Not to mention, products that are out of season or area, and are expensive to transport should be expensive. If I'm buying California avocados in Ohio, I should expect to pay a price premium due to transportation costs.

Milk can be sourced locally just about everywhere.

kjclow · Nov 4, 2011

Learned years ago that the cheapest way to ship anything was through pipeline. Barge was next but again you have to have a navigable water source.

Not saying that trucks are good or bad but they are a necessary evil. Can't argue with old Chicago building the tunnels for the trains to deliver all of the daily neccesities inside the loop.

manual_tranny · Nov 4, 2011

kjclow said:
Most of the cars made today use some level of recycled materials; steel, glass, plastic, insulating materials, fabrics - carpets, head liners, seats, trunk lining....
Remember cash for clunkers? All of those cars had to be crushed and recycled into something.

How much energy does it take to melt iron? With a typical carbon content you're looking at heating the iron roughly 1500 degrees Celsius assuming that the iron starts out around near 100 deg F. Might that be a lot of energy?

Sure, plastics used in today's manufacturing processes are 100% recyclable... but that doesn't mean that old car plastics are compatible with the new plastic systems. There's a good chance that much of the cash for clunkers escapade ended up in our country's dumps.

Not only is this a waste of capital, but it's a waste of future resources. Old chassis can be re-engineered, reinforced, improved, and re-used. We don't need to melt thousands of pounds of metal every time we make a new car. A couple hundred pounds of new metal can suffice.

Every one of our ecologically-based government "services" is hell-bent on conserving the atmosphere they don't even understand, while they ignore our limited physical resources like it's 1956.

Meanwhile, our proud American Chrysler is producing 6.4L sedans and 8.4L "super/sports cars" producing a thoroughly underwhelming 71.4hp/L with pitiful fuel consumption.

It'll be 2012 soon.

I don't want to live on this planet anymore.

supton · Nov 7, 2011

manual_tranny said:
Meanwhile, our proud American Chrysler is producing 6.4L sedans and 8.4L "super/sports cars" producing a thoroughly underwhelming 71.4hp/L with pitiful fuel consumption.

Just how many Chryslers are getting sold with those big Hemi's? I doubt they are sales leaders. Besides--who buys Chryslers these days?

tdi90hp · Nov 7, 2011

supton said:
Just how many Chryslers are getting sold with those big Hemi's? I doubt they are sales leaders. Besides--who buys Chryslers these days?

better read up your sales charts...Chrysler sales are UP in Canada and usa. All their models are doing pretty well except for the caliber which is being replaced. New Charger is a beauty. New Jeeps have that good new V6. Ram trucks are strong, well designed with unique features and basically bulletproof....and they have a new car coming ...the Hornet I believe (small car)....We employ lots of Canadians at Chrysler plants so I am all for chrysler staying a solid competitive brand.

kjclow · Nov 7, 2011

manual_tranny said:
How much energy does it take to melt iron? With a typical carbon content you're looking at heating the iron roughly 1500 degrees Celsius assuming that the iron starts out around near 100 deg F. Might that be a lot of energy?

It takes a lot less energy to melt used iron than to smelt it from scratch. The numbers bouncing around in my head seems to say that we use 10% of the energy to recycle aluminum into new products than to produce from scratch. Similar numbers with glass. Plastic may not end up in the same products it started as but you see many new uses these days: decking, siding, shutters, fence rails.....

MrMopar · Nov 8, 2011

kjclow said:
Can't argue with old Chicago building the tunnels for the trains to deliver all of the daily neccesities inside the loop.

I can. Trucks were more flexible, cheaper, and the reason the Chicago Tunnel Company went out of business. Why bring freight via truck to an above-ground depot where it could be taken underground and delivered to a building when the truck can go right to the delivery dock at the building?

Before the 1940s the tunnels were used to deliver coal to downtown buildings, and to remove ash or clinkers. Trucks began to siphon off significant amounts of business, however, and by the late 1940s, customers began to switch from coal to natural gas to heat their buildings. The ones that kept burning coal switched to delivery by truck because unloading from the surface was easier, and a complex conveyor system was not required.

McBrew · Nov 9, 2011

manual_tranny said:
producing a thoroughly underwhelming 71.4hp/L with pitiful fuel consumption.

Dang... and I thought my 68hp/liter was pretty decent. At least it's better than my dad's 1995 Chevy diesel van with 24hp/liter.

bhtooefr · Nov 9, 2011

Keep in mind that your 68 hp/L is in a mass market family car, not a high-end sports car.

manual_tranny · Nov 9, 2011

bhtooefr said:
Keep in mind that your 68 hp/L is in a mass market family car, not a high-end sports car.

McBrew said:
Dang... and I thought my 68hp/liter was pretty decent. At least it's better than my dad's 1995 Chevy diesel van with 24hp/liter.

I get it guys... but my complaint is more about the lack of technology rather than the lack of power. The power output is impressive.

I just think that in 2011-2012 that VGTs should be cheap. A VGT doesn't necessarily add power, it adds a faster spool up and therefore a wider torque curve. But y'all know that.

There are probably dozens of reasons why they aren't cheap.

McBrew, you're talking to someone who still has his Grandmother's 1975 240D. That's a very heavy 4-door sedan with a 2.4 liter NA diesel with 52-62bhp (couldn't verify, Wiki says 52 but my memory says 62)

Even 62hp is only 25hp/L and I love it. I'm just pointing out that it's not 1975 anymore.

bhtooefr · Nov 9, 2011

The trick is, as you add boost, components start to get more highly stressed, and longevity goes down.

There are plenty of examples out there of unkillable, low power output engines... that as soon as you try to get more power out of them, they come apart.

Chevy 50 MPG Diesel coming in 2013

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