Quote:
Originally Posted by turboguy327
There are many things that could have been done years ago to improve milage. Diesel fuel the use of turbochargers. Any high performance turbo car can prove it. I can make over 800 hp and still get almost 30 mpg. I would love to see a n/a engine do that. And how many american cars are turbo?? Not many. My cummins gets 24 mpg on the highway unloaded. What more proof does anybody need that manufactures have been holding alot back in terms of fuel economy.
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Its the diesel fuel and sky high compression that give your truck its fuel economy, not the turbo charger. I'd explain why, but its not terribly important
Quote:
Originally Posted by PQ
Well, that's what I'm kinda talking about.
Surely these global car companies knew what the rest of the world knew that gas prices, like everything else, would go up. And on these big engines, had they had the sense of urgency sooner, they would have made these gains way sooner.
We bought them, sure, but I can remember them advertizing gas mileage and people talking about gas mileage since I can remember. And I'm 40 years old.
To me, it's a big fat fail for them to have gained their sense of urgency so late in the game because I believe they could have had these engines way sooner. Even the V6s.
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If I understand you correctly, you are saying that automakers should have invested billions of dollars worth of R&D into fuel economy because ... umm ... why would they be doing it?
I guess they probably could have made the progress curve a bit steeper by investing more into it. But doing that would take away from other things, like quality, performance, safety, and improving in-demand vehicles (like SUV's). They only have so much in the coffers. They invest the R&D money into the areas that appear to have the greatest payout. If the pay out is low, whats the point is putting a ton of effort into it? That holds true in every segment of every market for every product (or service) around the world.
As an analogy ... lets think of Hooters. The customers probably wouldn't mind if the waitresses had a masters degree ... but that sits pretty low on their priority list. They're more concerned about the girls being attractive and personable. If she is smart enough to not screw up the order, they're happy. It wouldn't make sense for Hooters management to sacrifice qualities important to the customer in favour of something they hardly care about. I don't think many would like it if all of a sudden they've got a homely looking girl who is socially awkward serving them, and they'd really be upset if the price of their food has just gone up specifically to pay her salary. They'd walk out and find some other place that gives them what they want.