Fuel economy myths

Either you are very tall, or you have not sat in many GM products. All of
mine would easily seat me too far back for my 5'8" frame. All very
comfortably seat 4, and some actually did well with 5. Others - not so good
with 5, but those should never have had a 5th seat belt anyway.

 

Yes, it was. I drove one for several years.

Even with the seat all the way back, my knees would often hit the steering
wheel and the dashboard.

I can't remember how many times I hit my head while trying to squeeze down
into that car.

Sad. Huh?

 

Wont affect anyone anyway - in the uk we pay the equiv of 7.70 a US
gallon - people here are still happily ploughing around in 20mpg cars
(me included).

 

AFAIK, the entire racing season uses about 216,000 gallons of fuel per
year.

This is in comparison to the 139,988,554,000 gallons used by all vehicles in
2005. (According to the DOT.)

HTH!

Not much.

The shuttles use hydrogen and oxygen in liquid forms. No gas at all.

 

And, 5 mpg is a small price to pay for the comfort and utility.

 

The classification he cited for any particular model is not the point.
People that buy SUV are doing so because they perceive function and utility
that does not exist in other kinds of car. They have to weigh for
themselves, the cost to have the utility vs the savings to give it up. They
take the utility. If they could measure the utility of a Surburban that
delivers 15 mpg vs an Excursion that gives 20, then more Excursions would be
sold. As it stands today, the Excursion gives such poor numbers, Ford can
barely sell them. This only shows that people that buy large still compare
relative economy when they make their choice.

Not only do they consider fuel mileage, but they also consider stuff like
ergonomics -- placement of knobs and switches -- preceived quality -- fit
and finish -- comfort and style. Give all of this stuff in a package that
also delivers relative economy, and they will not be able to buiild them
fast enough. Deliver economy that is absent this stuff, and nobody will want
it. The real market is somewhere in the middle.

PS
I don't know nor care what the sales figures are for the Excursion and the
Suburban, I was only illustrating that people buy large and compare apples
to apples, where the apple basket is filled with the kinds of things that
they think is important to them.

 

Try living in Canada. We send oil to the States to be refined into gas, and
then we end up paying a hell of a lot more for it then they do over there.
Our price is usually in the high 90 cents a liter. You may be getting
screwed over by your prices (no offence intended), but so are we, just on a
different level.
As for people paying, I think you are mostly correct. No matter how high
the gas prices go, if people can afford to pay that price, they will. If
not enough people can pay the high price, the gas companies will have to
lower it as they would loose too much money. I agree with your earlier
statement. We need to start using anti-matter. An ounce of that stuff
would probably run our cars for years <G>

 

Most of my friends' small aircraft burn less fuel per mile than their
cars. Once they are off the ground, anyway. Getting "up" does take a
bit extra.

 

That may be true - but it still was NOT a compact. It was sold as a
midsize - and Nissan's largest at that.

 

What about Al Gore's private jet? Oh wait - he has carbon credits. LOL!

Bill Putney
(To reply by e-mail, replace the last letter of the alphabet in my
address with the letter 'x')

 

Or in some cases, Viagra™.

Bill Putney
(To reply by e-mail, replace the last letter of the alphabet in my
address with the letter 'x')

 

I've had 13 (I think) GM's, and the seat was never far enough back for
me. Japanese cars seem to use the internal space better, I have no other
explanation.

b

 

3,000 x 40 = 120,000
80,000 x 4 = 320,000
2,000 x 20 = 40,000

 

Oh i'm not arguing with you.

I'm just stating the payloads...

I hear ya on the railroad... 3 engines pulling 150-200 cars, which is
the equivalent of anywhere from 400-600 maybe more trucks on the road...
thing is, the rail is expensive too.. and you have to get it on the
rail... then the rail moves it, then get it back off the rail... all the
handling costs money too... its often cheaper (depending on distance of
course) to use a truck.

 

Trains *CAN* be difficult to steer too!

Bill Putney
(To reply by e-mail, replace the last letter of the alphabet in my
address with the letter 'x')

 

Not only that, forcing people to conserve will cause the cost of gas to
plummet. At least that's what happened last time. The alternative, huge
gasoline taxes, will drive the price sky-high. You pick which one you want.

Anybody can say what they want, but you can't change history. The last time
we did this, the price of oil fell until it was the lowest it had ever been.
A lot of people with strong opinions won't even bother to look at the result
from last time. After that, people stropped driving cars and bought trucks
instead. When enough people got their gas mileage down to 13 or 14, the
price went back up.

It's very simple, but the simple fact seem to elude a lot of Americans.

 

slowing down to 55 will do the most to conserve fuel
i just read a study about mileage and cars,suv's are at the most
efficient at 55mph regardless of what brand they are. between 30 mph and
50 the cars consume more as well as over 60 to 90 mph seems 55 is the
sweet spot so it's no mistake that mileage is rated at that speed
detroit will never become competitive until the million dollar bonuses
stop for the executives and that money is reinvested back into the
companies

 

I've found that to be true on my own cars that have the instant readout for
mileage. Repeated runs over the same piece of road at different speeds on
my way to work.

Problem is, you can't do it voluntarily by yourself. It is downright
dangerous to drive at 55 while everyone else is doing 70 or above. Nor can
I drive a car at 55 on the open road when both the car and highway are built
to sustain much higher speeds.

 

That wouldn't work because battery packs degrade over time and the
big Surburban EV driver with 10 brand-new discharged battery packs
does not want to exchange his packs for 10, 4 year old charged battery
packs. Batteries also self-discharge and the self-discharge rate over time
gets worse.

Your not understanding it I can see. For starters there is such a thing.
It's called a Leyden Jar, AKA high-power capacitor. The small
electric RC racers use these.

The problem is that if you have an electric car that can drive, for
example 5 hours continuiously, using 400 watts of power an hour
out of a battery pack, to recharge that in 1 hour means you have to
put in 2,000 watts of power in that hour. If you want to shorten that
to 10 minutes, we are talking 12,000 watts of power in 10 minutes.
If you want to shorten that to 1 minute then that is 120,000 watts
of power in 1 minute to get the battery pack fully recharged.

Your electric stove probably dissapates about 200-300 watts of power
on a surface burner when the burner is turned on high.

If they can save money then yes, they will go for it if the savings is
high enough.

There are a lot of people also clamoring for plug-in hybrids. You need
to read up on the history of the General Motors EV1. Espically read
testimonials - available many places online - from people who actually
leased one.

What is needed in battery technology is higher storage capacities
and cheaper prices.

Ted

 

NOT true of all vehicles.
I have driven vehicles that were more efficient at 70 than 55 (1975
Celica GT) It depends a lot on the gearing and the co-efficient of
drag.

My current TransSport seams to be best aroung 65 or so (115 - 120Kph).
Extra weight is a killer too. I leave the rear seats at home most of
the time as I don't need them. SHould leave the middle ones too and
half the crap I always carry with me.