Don’t blame the (1970s) engineers

Reading a brief wiki article, I came across the phrase “emissions performance model,” and it reminded me of the Detroit automakers’ attempts in the 1970s to conform to the new emissions standards. In this industry and hobby, people tend to demonize emissions standards much less than they used to, but there was a time when it was all seen as pointless government power-grabbing. In neuropsychobiology, I did have the opportunity to read more about the effects of some of the pollutants we so casually threw into the air back then - lead in particular - and I was much less inclined to say “let’s just take off the cat and tear out these hoses” than some people were. To put it bluntly, all that pollution was killing people, and causing kids to grow up mentally retarded or, at least, not living up to their full potential. The costs of the pollution outweighed the costs of reducing it at that point. 

There’s no doubt that performance went out when emissions standards came in, and that was only partly because they pulled performance engineers into emissions work. The company - and Detroit in general - lost their fascination with performance when it backfired on them. The E-bodies might be acclaimed today, with good reason, but they were most likely a financial disaster; sales were very light considering they had unique chassis and a baffling variety of powertrain options, and the money spent on them, had it gone into customizing a Simca or Rootes car for the American market, may well have saved Chrysler from its flirtation with bankruptcy. While the company survived, what it lost cannot be understated: its European subsidiaries, the highly profitable Simca and the loss leader Rootes Group; a defense division that would have profited immensely from the coming wars, while quite probably saving many billions in taxpayer dollars; all sorts of research that had to be cancelled; substantial holdings in Mitsubishi; and, when it comes down to it, a sense of permanence. (To be fair, the company also put money into full-sized cars just before their sales plummeted; it was most likely the combination that caused the pain rather than one or the other.) 

Chrysler was making a bewildering variety of cars, with hundreds of thousands of possible combinations. Dealers had to contend with models where every single car could be a one-off combination, had everyone colluded to check the appropriate boxes. The assembly plants were overwhelmed with options and vehicles could end up with the wrong trim, mismatching mirrors, and all sorts of more serious problems. With insurance costs shooting up for these cars, the market was drying up; and had it not been for emissions, they would certainly have been killed just two year later by the Arab oil embargo, which made gasoline a scarce commodity and pushed Americans into smaller cars with smaller engines. Chrysler was in the awkward position of having a popular line of high-mileage cars - in France. Not until the Horizon would the company make a serious effort to customize a European vehicle for American use, and that was a runaway success. 

In any case, there came a point when Chrysler realized that they could not go on making a series of customized vehicles for an ever-shrinking market. They dropped the enormously expensive 426 Hemi engine, which required substantial work to vehicles’ other systems as well, and, I would suspect, were never profitable except if you added in their marketing value - which was, and is, substantial. They dropped the Six-Packs, the high-performance 340, and slowly started to detune their vehicles for emissions and gas mileage. 

The engineers were exceptionally talented, but their hands were tied. The company refused to spend more, unlike Japanese and German automakers. Weight reductions were found across the board, but the level of commitment that had been given to performance was never given to economy or emissions reduction. The Feather Duster was as far as they went in economy - unless you count the creation of the new four-cylinder cars. There were certainly ways they could have kept their performance while cutting pollution dramatically - fuel injection being the main one. Unfortunately, those were expensive; fuel injectors added around $100 to the price of the car, over carburetors, according to engineers we’ve spoken to. The executives refused to go that far, maybe because they resented the government intrusion into their business, maybe because they couldn’t justify it when times were tough, maybe … well, there could be any number of reasons. In the end, though, the imports pushed Detroit to use more expensive technology, with terrible results. Had they led the world, as they had done in the past - electronic fuel injection was first used by Chrysler in 1958! - they might well have kept America’s hearts and minds.

Because they were constrained by costs, they came up with a work of genius - the Lean Burn system. Today derided because of its failures, the fact is that the system was incredibly clever. It took the humble carburetor and, denied the sensors used in later years, managed to use cheaper sensors and vacuum signals to convey information to a central spark control computer. The Lean Burn system was a Band-Aid when a transplant was needed, but it was still a work of genius, because it fit into the budget. Perhaps implementation could have been better but Chrysler engineers did learn from it and put easy diagnostics into their fuel injection systems, when they finally arrived. Meanwhile, over at Volkswagen, multiple port fuel injection was built into the Rabbit as early as 1979, where it co-existed with a primitive points-based ignition system, allowing Rabbits to avoid catalytic converters and ace emissions tests.

The Chrysler engineers were quite probably capable of using electronic fuel injection earlier than that, having been the first to mass produce electronic ignition systems, the first to put on-board travel computers into their cars (with the Horizon), and the company that was building the reliable rockets used by NASA. However, it wasn’t until 1981 that the Imperial first got fuel injection, and then there was a long pause until the four-cylinder engines got it. By then the Japanese had established a reputation as the leaders in technology, and Detroit had gotten a reputation for being dinosaurs.

Fortunately, times have changed. Chrysler shot ahead in the 1990s, albeit still under the thumb of relentless blind cost-cutting (hence the Neon head gasket failures); and then after a decade of darkness, the company appears to be ready to race forward again. Yes, heavy cost controls are in place, but in the final years of Daimler control, Dieter Zetsche turned the fist upside down and gave the thumbs up to innovative technology that had been turned down as being too expensive for inferior brands. It’s going to be an exciting time… but our ride on the roller coaster isn’t over.

Sources: Challenger to feature Hill Start Assist

Manual transmission versions of the 2009 Challenger R/T and SRT models will offer a feature that has previously only been available on the Dodge Ram, Jeep Commander, Grand Cherokee and the Liberty, according to reliable sources. The HSA (Hill Start Assist) feature assists the driver when starting a vehicle from a stop on a hill by maintaining the same level of brake pressure the driver applied for a short period of time after the foot has been removed from the brake pedal. The system will release the brake pedal in proportion to the amount of throttle applied. If the throttle is not applied within a short period of time after the foot has been removed from the brake pedal, Hill Start Assist will release brake pressure.

This feature is particularly helpful on cars which use foot-operated emergency brakes (note - we don’t know what kind of emergency brake the Challenger will have), and in particularly hilly areas or with heavier cars. The presence of Hill Start Assist and the name Trak Pak (applied to the combination of manual transmission, gearing, and limited-slip differential used in manual transmission Challengers) indicates that Dodge is going to take the stick-shift market seriously. This is a welcome change from the past; many who take driving seriously prefer manual transmissions. Even when an automatic or sequential shift provides similar acceleration and gas mileage, there are those who like the feel of the clutch and shifter. The Hill Start Assist does not do away with the overall “clutch experience” but does make it a little easier and more convenient to drive with one, especially for those who have gotten used to an automatic or who are just learning.

Taking stick-shift drivers seriously enough to not only make one available with a premium engine, but also to provide Hill Start Assist and a new/old marketing name to them, tells us that Dodge is off on the right foot with the Challenger.

PS: Please don’t just take the text from this page and post it elsewhere; please give credit to allpar.com and, preferably, paste in this link - http://www.allpar.com/weblogs/ or http://allpar.com/news/index.php?action=fullnews&id=1086

Land Rover: the answer to Chrysler’s problems?

As Ford gets closer to a sale of Jaguar and Land Rover, people have started to talk about how it would be a natural fit for Jeep. This is true, but not for the obvious reasons.

Land Rover has two things Chrysler desperately needs: a good four-cylinder engine, and a small diesel.

The four cylinder gas (petrol) engine is really the big item. Cummins can supply diesels to Chrysler, and their new, very modular design, which will be installed in V8 form in various Dodge trucks and presumably Jeeps, can almost certainly spawn a four cylinder for cars. The Cummins is tough, long-lasting, fuel efficient, and endowed with a name beloved by generations of truck owners. A Chrysler diesel could be laughed at by the news media; a Cummins diesel in a Dodge or Chrysler car, on the other hand, would be formidable indeed. On the other hand, the Land Rover 2.2 liter diesel pumps out a respectable 158 horsepower but has lots of low end torque and the usual diesel good mileage; if Cerberus bought Land Rover, it would presumably be able to build them in a present engine factory, preserving jobs (and postponing retirement benefits) and retaining profits.

The big deal, though, is the gas engine. Chrysler has a lousy four cylinder gas engine now; it went from top of the ranks with the 1994 introduction of the 2.0 to near the bottom with the World Engine, a horrific but buzzword compliant powerplant that, while it makes remarkable power with a turbocharger, is an unrewarding drive without said turbo. The horsepower ratings are great; the driving experience is not, because low end torque is lacking. This engine was foisted upon Chrysler by the overlords of Stuttgart at just the wrong time, as the United States started to value gas mileage and Chrysler increased its drive to take over foreign markets. Just about every review of the Caliber, Compass, or Patriot talks about highlights of the cars, in spite of the engine, which is just about universally disdained.

Land Rover makes four cylinder engines, and an industry insider of note described it as being strong and quite desirable. That is very important.

To deal with the World Engine’s deficiencies, we have been told that there are two choices: either make serious redesigns, or start over. Either might cost billions of dollars, and engines take years to develop, test, and tune properly. Sometimes they turn out surprisingly well, and sometimes they are a disappointment. Buying Land Rover provides a new option: simply use the Land Rover design, retooling the Dundee, Michigan plant to build their existing engine. It would have to be modified, but that would be far less serious than re-engineering the World Engine or creating a whole new powerplant.

That alone could make buying Land Rover worthwhile - just as Ford could justify buying Volvo just in the new Taurus platform. But there’s more.

Sharing with Jeep, Land Rover could make huge profits, because duplication of development costs would be largely eliminated. Jeep could leave markets they are not doing well in; Jeep has pretty much lost its prestige in the luxury 4×4 market, but Land Rover and Range Rover have not. In the United States, Jeep could drop the Grand Cherokee and Commander entirely, and stick with its most desirable vehicles - the hard core Wrangler, the Wrangler Unlimited, the Scrambler pickup, and the Cherokee/Liberty. The basic engineering of the latter could be merged with the equivalent Land Rover for foreign sale, and for an upmarket alternative; while the Range Rover line, with costs dramatically reduced and quality dramatically increased by sharing with Jeep, could be sold in the US, at higher prices. Hummer will always get its “I want to intimidate” buyers, but Range Rover, with some assurance of decent reliability and better appointments and chassis, will be able to get more of its genteel, wealthy, upper-crust buyers.

That would be nice, but that’s not the whole point. The whole point is also to get more people to buy the Journey, Caliber, Sebring, and Avenger, and that will only happen if they have decent engines under the hood. If Land Rover can fix that problem, everything else is gravy - and the Compass can easily disappear, since the capacity will be needed for Calibers and Patriots.

Of course, Cerberus could license an engine design from Fiat or Peugeot, or another company that doesn’t compete in the United States. But with Land Rover, Cerberus could get a massive profit-maker that fits right into their current skills and technologies, with a stellar reputation among those who don’t know any better. It’s a great deal.

Alternative Forms of Energy : Part II

I had previously written a blog entitled What Will be Powering Our Cars in the Future? and since them some people have asked me to produce/write a second blog expanding the on the ideas presented in the first blog.  In this particular blog I will discuss in more detail certain aspects presented the previous blog as well as presenting new information like the pros and cons on the use of Ethanol based fuels. 

I would like to note before the discussion begins that I am a physicists and not a chemist, but I do play a bad chemist here at allpar.  Therefore I have asked for the help from jstwe314 (a member here at allpar) who has a degree in physics but has worked as a chemist for many years.  jstwe314 has added a lot (and I mean a lot) of information here on the actual chemistry behind certain reactions that I will be discussing.  And I would also like to personally thank jstwe314 for all of his insight into this particular field. 

This blog will be broken down into five sections; the chemistry behind the reactions of certain hydrocarbons, the pros and cons on the use of Ethanol, the facts about the use of hydrogen as a source of fuel, the physics behind particular alternative forms of energy, and why all of this is not the final answer for energy independence. 

_______The Chemistry behind the Reactions of certain Hydrocarbons_______

In order for us to understand why there is a need for alternative sources of energy or how they actually work, let us first describe to you some basic principles of gasoline. For starters here are some notes about Gasoline.  

Gasoline is is made up almost entirely of hydrocarbons, which are molecules made up of carbon and hydrogen.  Hydrocarbons present in gasoline usually have between 6 and 12 carbon atoms in each molecule. A good average is probably octane, which has eight carbon atoms and 18 hydrogen atoms and is written C8H18. (Note: sugars are hydrocarbons with oxygen….interesting)

When a hydrocarbon is burned (that is, reacted with oxygen), it forms carbon dioxide (CO2) and water (H2O). For our “average” gasoline of C8H18, the reaction is 2 molecules of octane reacting with 25 molecules of oxygen (O2) to form 18 molecules of water (18*H20) and 16 molecules of carbon dioxide (16*CO2).

Of course, this reaction only occurs completely in an ideal world. In the real world, there is usually not quite enough oxygen available or fast enough inside your car’s engine to allow the reaction to occur completely, so there is also some carbon monoxide (CO) formed as well.

In addition, since the oxygen is provided by bringing air into the engine, and since air consists mostly of nitrogen, some oxides of nitrogen (NO#) are formed as well.  Finally, some of the trace elements in the gasoline (such as sulfur) can react to form small amounts of other pollutants, such as SO2 or sulfur dioxide.

In summary gasoline is a mixture of:

1. Natural or straight run gasoline, that is, distillate in the temperature range 40-205 degrees Celsius, C5-C10 and cycloalkanes, like cyclohexane C6H12.
2. Reformate, that is, n-alkanes and maybe olefins rearranged to branched alkanes, methyl- and ethyl- groups on straight chain alkanes.
3. Aromatics, like benzene, C6H6.
4. Oxygenates and octane boosters like MTBE (methyl tertiarybutyl ether) and ethanol.
5. Proprietary additives and detergents for corrosion control and fuel system. 
6. Anti-oxidants, metal deactivators, deposit modifiers, surfactants, freezing point depressants, and corrosion inhibitors.
7. There are over 500 different hydrocarbons present in gasoline.

Question: How is the heat produced in combusting hydrocarbon fuels apportioned between the carbon and the hydrogen present in the fuel?

Answer: It all depends on the fuel.  Let us look at different types of fuels or hydrocarbons. 

For a gasoline (say C7H16) fueled vehicle 39% of the power comes from the hydrogen, and 61% from the carbon.  Gasoline averages 2.3 hydrogen atoms per carbon atom. 

For a diesel (say C12H26) fueled vehicle 38% of the power comes from the hydrogen, and 62% from the carbon.  Diesel fuel averages 2.2 hydrogen atoms per carbon atom.

How are these percentages actually calculated? ***Note*** for the purposes of this website, we have answered this question (percentages) assuming it is an accounting problem.  Take these values with a grain of salt. 

A procedure to calculate the heat released in combustion of an alkane hydrocarbon is to multiply the number of carbon atoms per molecule by 100.7 kcal/mol and multiply the number of hydrogen atoms per molecule by 28.4 kcal/mol and add.

Sample Calculations:

1. Natural gas, methane, CH4: 100.7 + 4(28.4) = 100.7 (energy from the carbon atom) + 113.6 (energy from the hydrogen atoms)= 214 kcal/mol in total from methane.
Percent heat from hydrogen = 113.6/214 = 53%
2. Propane, C3H8: 3(100.7) + 8(28.4) = 529 kcal/mol

Here is a table with the above examples plus more; H. of C. = Heat of Combustion.

For a NGV like the Honda GX, 53% of the power comes from the hydrogen in the natural gas, and 47% from the carbon. So the GX could, just barely, be called a MHFV (mostly hydrogen fueled vehicle). Natural gas is mainly methane (CH4) and there are 4 hydrogen atoms per carbon atom, the largest ratio for any hydrocarbon fuel.

Summary: 

1. For more information on the chemical makeup of gasoline, please visit this website. 
2. Gasoline may be plentiful today, but I think that we can all agree that fossil fuels will not be around forever.  For reasons backing up this statement, see my previous blog. 
3. We as a society should focus our attention for finding new sources of oil and natural gas as well as finding new alternative sources of energy because of the previous statement. 
4. A very hot topic as of late is the use of Ethanol to help run our automobiles.  I will continue with the current topic of this blog and discuss possible pros and cons of Ethanol in the next section. 

_______The Pros and Cons on the Use of Ethanol_______

The Facts: 

Ethanol consists of hydrocarbons with the addition of oxygen or C2H5OH.  Ethanol is also commonly known as ethyl alcohol, alcohol, or grain spirit.  Ethanol is a clean-burning alcohol produced by bacteria that ferment the sugars in corn and cornstalks as well as other products.

Pros:

1. Since ethanol is an alcohol based product, it does not produce hydrocarbons when being burned or during evaporation. This is great since hydrocarbons contribute to the formation of ground level ozone or O3 (a greenhouse gas).
2. Aldehyde emissions from the combustion of ethanol blends are slightly higher than when burning gasoline.  An aldehyde is a compound containing a carbonyl group with at least one hydrogen attached to it. R-C=O where R may be some hydrocarbon or hydrogen atoms.  However, The Royal Society of Canada termed the possibility of negative health effects caused by aldehyde emissions from the use of ethanol blends as being “remote”.
3. By adding ethanol, which contains oxygen, combustion in the engine is more complete and CO is reduced. Research shows that reductions may reach as high as 30% depending on the type and age of the automobile, the emission
   system used, and the atmospheric conditions. Ethanol blends dramatically reduce emissions of hydrocarbons, a major contributor to the depletion of the ozone layer.
4. High-level ethanol blends reduce nitrogen oxide emissions by up to 20%.
5. High-level ethanol blends can reduce emissions of Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs) by 30% or more (VOCs are major sources of ground-level ozone formation).
6. As an octane enhancer, ethanol can cut emissions of cancer-causing benzene and butadiene by more than 50%.
7. Sulphur dioxide and Particulate Matter (PM) emissions are significantly decreased with ethanol.  (Note: Sulphur is found only in gasoline and not from Ethanol itself.)
8. Ethanol has a pleasant smell.

Cons:

1. 1.5 gallons of ethanol has the energy of 1 gallon of gasoline. (Conventional Gasoline = 5.253 MBtu/Barrel and Fuel Ethanol = 3.539 MBtu/Barrel where M = million)
2. It takes 3 units of input energy to make 4 units of ethanol energy.  Therefore, a gallon of ethanol replaces only 2/3 of a gallon of gas, and making it requires the fossil energy in about 1/2 a gallon of gas. In summary one must make 6 gallons of ethanol to save the fossil energy in one gallon of gas. This is expensive using US corn but much cheaper with Brazilian sugar cane or beets.
3. With 15,000 square miles of land devoted to ethanol, we reduce our energy dependence by just over 1/4 of 1%.
4. To achieve independence would require 50% more land than in the US counting Alaska.
5. Ethanol production or the production of corn is not good for the soil; corn uses more nitrogen fertilizer than other crops, which pollutes our waterways.
6. There are other cons related to the refining processes that I am exactly not familiar with.

_______The Facts about the use of Hydrogen as a Source of Fuel_______

I am not going to go into stating whether or not we as a society should place our energy (not a pun) into using or not using Ethanol as a temporary replacement for gasoline.  But I will continue the blog by talking about a possible next generation of fuel, which of course would be hydrogen, another very current hot topic. 

I am also just going to give you some facts about hydrogen like; what it actually is, where it comes from, and how we will begin to use it.

1. Hydrogen must be stored at extremely low temperatures and high pressure. A container capable of withstanding these specifications is larger and more expensive than a standard typical gas tank. Hydrogen storage could be viewed as a problem by consumers.
2. The heat or energy would be obtained from the combination of two hydrogen atoms with one oxygen atom or 4H + O2 -> 2H2O.  The formation of water is in a lower energy state relative to the atoms in an unbounded state therefore this reaction is exothermic and energy is released.
3. Ideally if this could be utilized, using hydrogen as a fuel, this would be a true renewable source of energy.  Hydrogen stored in the car would react with oxygen from the air creating water or H2O.  The water would be released into the environment for us to use again at a later date. 
4. Today, hydrogen is mostly extracted from natural gas, making it a fossil fuel product. The mining of the gas and the hydrogen extraction process are not pollution free, even if fuel cell powered cars essentially are.
5. In order for the hydrogen to be truly “renewable” or “green,” it would have to be produced from water by electrolysis.  Electrolysis requires a large amount of electricity, though, so the source of the electricity would also need to be renewable and clean if the whole process is to be.
6. We must put the same amount of energy into gathering hydrogen as we will get out of it when we use it.  Therefore the entire process has a net efficiency is 0%.
7. The reader should then ask the question:  If we have to burn or use fossil fuels to make hydrogen, what have we really gained?

_______The Physics behind Alternative Forms of Energy_______

Turbines:
The majority of electricity today is produced by burning coal or oil to heat up water.  The water is converted into high temperature and high pressure steam through different stages of boiling and super heating within the confines of the boiler tubes.  This high pressure, high temperature steam then passes through a main steam pipe to the turbine.  A turbine is a rotary engine that extracts energy from fluid flow.   It converts mechanical energy from fluid flow, and for more information on a turbine find it under Wind and Hydro-electric power.

As we discussed in the previous section, we learned that if we were to obtain hydrogen from water, we must then use electrolysis to extract the hydrogen.  This means that we must burn fossil fuels in order to obtain hydrogen from the renewable source of water.  One way for us to get around the use of fossil fuels, in this instance, is to find or use other alternative sources of renewable electricity.  Examples of these include wind, hydro-electric, and solar power. 

Wind and Hydro-electric Power:
Uses Faraday’s law which states that electricity (or moving charges) is produced when the field of a magnetic field is changing in time.
A turbine has magnets connected to its moving parts and as a windmill spins its blades or water moves through a damn, this causes the magnets to move.  The magnets move around some copper wires, say, which generates electricity in the wires. 

Solar Power:
Uses the photo-electric effect that was first discovered by Einstein (he won his Noble prize for this)
A photon hits the metal which releases an electron, the electron moves producing current thus electricity.  This is a completely free, natural, and renewable source of energy.  Drawbacks include: a bad efficiency of current solar panels, the cost in constructing solar panels, the need for huge land areas of solar panels to generate enough energy for them to be productive.

Follow the links provided for more information on the the physics behind each idea presented and Click here for more information on different types of Energy Sources

_______Why all of this is not the Final Answer for Energy Independence_______

Unfortunately the world is not just black and white….there are a lot of shades of grey.  For all of the positive benefits of Ethanol there are equally huge drawbacks in my opinion. 

Hydrogen gas also has its drawbacks in its current form, the fact that we must use natural gas or methane in order for us to gather hydrogen.  If hydrogen is to be obtained from water then a massive amount of electricity must be used.  Currently, electricity is produced from fossil fuels.  It is like a never ending deadly cycle.  We as a society cannot seem to end the cycle of using fossil fuels to run our cars, cool or heat our homes, surf on the internet to listen to some lunatic talk about energy.  It is like there is no end to the cycle or we are just not smart enough to find a break. 

The only way I see it, if we want to reduce our dependency on fossil fuels is the use of Nuclear power.  I am not going to discuss the pros and cons of Nuclear power, we all know what they are; cheap power, wonderful efficiency, harmful by-products with no place to store them, etc.

The other way for us to break the cycle is for us to fund more research into fusion reactors.  Unlike Nuclear (or fission) reactors the by-products of fusion are not harmful, 4 hydrogen atoms are smashed together to get one helium atom.  This technology has been used in bombs (the H-bomb) which have a great destructive power with more output energy relative to the older nuclear (or fission) bombs.  The current problem for us is that we are unable to gather and use the output energy.  Hopefully current researchers and engineers will be able to solve this among other problems with this particular form of energy.

Technology Run Amok? - Part 2

Lubricating oils of both mineral (petroleum) and synthetic types have a quality index known as the SAE viscosity grade (in the US/Canada/Mexico markets). To these oils there are 4 types of additives:

• Vicosity Index Improvers (VI-used to change the viscosity curve under temperature increases)
• Oxidation & Corrosion inhibitors (to reduce the acids and alkalis form the byproducts of combustion and atmospheric conditions)
• Detergents & Dispergents (to “scrub” the dirt off components and disperse them into solution)
• High Pressure Additives (added to increase the shear strength of the oil under loading, abbreviated as “EP”)

Heat as a factor in Lubrication breakdown:

Heat from the engine combustion and friction causes the engine oil to lose viscosity. Synthetic oils are formulated to reduce this effect and widen the flowable temperature range.

Synthetic oils, as a polymer, are formulated to cover a far wider range of viscosities and mineral oils are capable of handling. For example the SAE standard oil viscosities are as follows:

As you can see from this table, there is a point between 15W and 20 weight oil that is a “sweet spot” where the kinimatic viscosity is nearly flat. Synthetic oils (remember this chart is the SAE standard, and as such, was developed for mineral oils, NOT synthetics)
extend this spot to almost their full range, depending on the oil manufacturer. For this reason, Chrysler chose Mobil 1 synthetic for the Viper v10 engine. Under extreme heat, pressure, and shear, Mobil 1 performs more consistently than any other oil tested.

By reducing the friction, fuel used to overcome the friction is also reduced. On average, the difference is small, 1-2.5%, but, when combined with increased longevity and other factors to be discussed, these seemingly insignificant increases will reduce fuel costs.

COMMENTARY:

The costs of such changes are not insignificant to most people, and will be discussed later in this series.

From a personal standpoint, I ran Mobil 1 in my Ford Thunderbird V8 from 1996 through 2000. During this time I accumulated 129,000 miles on the car. By carefully monitoring the oil status, and having regular oil analysis performed at a cost of 19.95 each time, I increased the change
interval to 15,000 miles for the oil. Losses included a filter change every 3000 miles plus at every complete oil change, plus 1 quart of oil burned/leaked every 12,000 miles. At the last engine leakdown test performed at 110,000 miles, there was less than 5% engine compression
leakdown total.

Technology Run Amok? - Part 1

Today, vehicles of all types are coming under attack from “less than informed” (to put it politely) pundits, ranging from the US Congress, to the man on the street, as not being “efficient” and “advanced enough.” “Enough” for what, no one ever specifies-which is symbolic of the average consumer’s ignorance and aversion to true understanding of these complex issues and technologies. Quick fixes, such as hybrids, of any type or functionality, are now paid more lip service as “the solution“, along with E85 (ethanol based alcohol fuel), VVT (variable valve timing), GDI (gasoline direct injection), and other acronyms that are spouted with abandon, and even less understanding.

In this entry, and the following series of weblog entries, I will examine some of these fallacies and their proponents, as well has how the consumer is going to pay for it all in the end.

MAGIC- The “magic” of sound engineering and the costs of ignorance in application.

A few years ago, DCX demonstrated a version of the 4.7L, overhead cam, 2 valve per cylinder, truck engine which had some seemingly innoculous additions and changes to the production design. These changes, none costing more than a few pennies per engine, allowed the experimental engine to attain approximately 12% better fuel economy across its powerband, when compared to the standard 4.7 v8 engine. What happened? Keep reading as I bring some of the detail of what was accomplished to light in less than technical terms….

What causes engine losses? Basically, there are 3 items that affect engine efficency:

• Friction
• Pumping losses
• Uneven fuel burn

FRICTION:Friction is the resulting drag on free movement by material type and finish, lack of lubricant, molecular collision (vicosity of lubricants, as an example), and many other conditions. In a perfect world, a friction free bearing would be a uniform gap between components that move relative to each other that neither increases in size, nor decreases in size. Unfortunately, no possible in the world we live in today. Even a maglev (magnetic levitation) has friction between its non-contacting surfaces.

PUMPING LOSSES:

Volumetric efficiency of an engine is the ability to move air and fuel charge into and out of a combustion chamber of an engine. Unless supercharged by either a positive displacement pump (Rootes type or centrifical that is direct driven) or a turbo-supercharger (original and proper name for a “turbocharger”) a naturally aspirated engine cannot achieve 100% efficiency.

“Volumetric efficiencies can be improved in a number of ways, but most notably the size of the valve openings compared to the volume of the cylinder and streamlining the ports. Engines with higher volumetric efficiency will generally be able to run at higher RPM, and thus power, settings as they will lose less power to moving air in and out of the engine.”

-from http://en.wikipedia.org

UNEVEN FUEL BURN:

Uneven fuel burn can result in several issues with ICEs (Internal Combustion Engine), not the least of which is pre-ignition and detonation. When either occurs in a modern engine as the 4.7 litre, the ECU (Engine Control Unit or “computer”) will dump in more fuel and air to extinguish the explosion in the combustion chamber. NO, fuel/air does NOT normally explode-this is Myth #1 to remove from the public psyche- it burns in an even pattern across the combustion chamber from the spark plug to the farthest reaches of the combustion chamber.

HOW IS FRICTION OVERCOME?

Simply put, friction cannot be overcome 100 percent, but REDUCED to single digit percentages and less, by the careful application of lubricants, material selection, and fit/finish of the components.

Lubricants:

Every moving part has a mate of some type to apply its motion against. For example, a piston on a connecting rod travels in a linear motion within a bored cylinder, pivoting on a wrist pin fitted to the upper end of the connecting rod. The connecting rod lower end encompasses the rod journal of the crankshaft, which is in turn restrained by the main journals of the cylinder block.

The points of friction in this mechanism are:

• Cylinder block bore walls to piston
• Piston rings to cylinder walls
• Piston rings to piston
• Piston to wristpin
• Wristpin to connecting rod
• Connecting rod to crankshaft rod journals
• Crankshaft main journals to cylinder block main journals

9.0L John Deere Diesel Engine Cutaway-courtesy of John Deere & Company

Detrimental effects of Friction:

Lubrication is required to prevent metal to metal contact in the reciprocating and rotary motion components. Friction causes heat, wear, and fatigue in the component, generally speaking (there are other effects, outside the scope of this discussion).

Lack of lubrication will lead to such failures as:

Note galling on ends of pin, which rides in piston bore

(photo courtesy of Tim Gilles)

Worn main bearing half

(photo courtesy Tim Gilles)