New CAFE standard has 'loopholes big enough to drive an SUV through'

[a_Username]

Originally Posted by Camaro_Corvette

What the>.....??? Government drives me

Lmao! I'd love to see the "experts" behind their math!

[BigDan]

How else are you suppose to tow the boat/ camper and get the wife kids and dogs in style to the lake or camp site. The Surburban has been around since the 50's, there will always be a niche for full size body on frame SUV's. The baby Duramax would be great for such a vehicle.

[Synerbee]

Originally Posted by All-Or-Nothing

There will ALWAYS be Pony and Muscle cars.

However I think Ford is going to be leaving the "big torque down low engines" to trucks and the Mustang will start moving towards higher revving engines that make their torque higher in the RPM range but still make lots of HP.

Oh that sucks I don't really care about quarter mile time if on a "closed course" I can hit gas and take off

Originally Posted by DGthe3

Yup. V8's won't die for a long time to come.

The CAFE score for a car is close to its highway fuel economy number. And there are allowances for E85 (I think it doubles the CAFE rating of each car sold). Then there are also allowances for a vehicles footprint (wheelbase x track width) where bigger cars get their score bumped up a bit, and small cars get a penalty (to discourage automakers from killing large sedans in favour of Smart ForTwo's). I forget what the others loopholes are.

So, if GM were to sell a full size car, with a Voltec drivetrain, thats E85 capable, it could easily be rated at 300 mpg. A handful could offset every Camaro SS, Corvette, CTS-V, Impala/Caprice SS, and any other car GM wants to put a V8 in.

Thats good I hate to get a job and be able to afford a nice car like a Camaro and have 4 banger under the hood

[DGthe3]

Originally Posted by BigDan

How else are you suppose to tow the boat/ camper and get the wife kids and dogs in style to the lake or camp site. The Surburban has been around since the 50's, there will always be a niche for full size body on frame SUV's. The baby Duramax would be great for such a vehicle.

ummm .... yes, but I don't really understand where that came from. This is about CAFE not being as bad as some people thought it would be (and most of the posts are over a year old). Even then, nobody mentioned taking away SUV's.

[BigDan]

^ I know SUV's are here to stay its just they get a real bad rap by the green police lately. There are some of us that need them and dont like being picked on by every hippie that looks at it. It sucks that the EPA doesn't regulate diesel mpg standards as mpg has gone down drastically in the past 10 years. Its time to make smaller more fuel efficient diesels for the light truck and SUV market. The new Explorer Ecoboost uni-body looks really promising and can hopefully stimulate SUV sales.

[Berean]

So, CAFE MPG ratings are a lie?

[DGthe3]

Originally Posted by Berean

So, CAFE MPG ratings are a lie?

The first thing that you have to understand about CAFE is that it was first enacted 30 years ago now, during the oil crisis in the 1970s. At the time, I think it matched the EPA fuel economy numbers. If not, they were very close. Since then the EPA has changed their testing procedures twice because buyers were complaining that they got nowhere near the EPA estimates. Nothing was changed for CAFE calculations because its between the industry and the government. A CAFE score is a manufactured number anyway, since its the average economy of all the cars or trucks that a company sells. The end result is that the window sticker (EPA) number is now completely different from the CAFE score for a car.

[CaniacFan]

Originally Posted by All-Or-Nothing

There will ALWAYS be Pony and Muscle cars.

However I think Ford is going to be leaving the "big torque down low engines" to trucks and the Mustang will start moving towards higher revving engines that make their torque higher in the RPM range but still make lots of HP.

Yup, There is just too much demand for the Pony/Muscle cars to "make them just go away". We'll get hit with some new tax though. What else is new.