How many times must a man retire before he is truly and totally done?
For Bob Lutz—the man most recently known for his leadership on bringing the Chevy Volt to market—the magic number may be “two.” Today he announced he was retiring. Again. A year ago he announced his places to retire as GM’s Vice Chairman of Global Product Development on April 1st, 2009, and stay on as an advisor. Then in July Lutz came back to GM again. Is it for real this time?
Tesla has been making a lot of news lately. First, the spunky electric car maker announced the completion of its 1,000th Roadster. Then they filed papers taking the first steps in an Initial Public Offering to make anyone with the money a part-owner in Tesla. Buried in that paperwork though, it was revealed that Tesla would be ceasing production of its Roadster next year.
That means a lot of hopes are pinned to the Model S, a $50,000 sedan which won’t debut until 2012. But word on the street is that Tesla plans to spin off at least two other models from the S sedan, including a coupe and a crossover. But will it be enough?
When BMW unveiled its awkwardly-named Vision EfficientDynamics concept car, audiences were enthralled. The plug-in hybrid combined sleek, futuristic styling with a lithium-ion battery stack and two electric motors to produce 356 horsepower and 590 ft-lbs of torque. That is a lot of power for a hybrid. But as cool as the concept was, few of us expected it would ever come to production.
But apparently enough positive press and remarkable response from the public has convinced BMW to actually build the Vision EfficientDynamics. It just needs a shorter, better name (BMW VED?).
File this one under over-engineered.
Bayerische Motoren Werke, better known as BMW, has come up with some eyebrow-raising concepts and engine ideas before. But this one is certainly far out. Bimmer has reportedly filed a patent for a hybrid system that features two separate-but-equal petrol powered two-cylinder engines, PLUS an electric motor. Those crazy Germans, always making things so… complicated.
The Detroit Auto Show starts on Monday and runs til the 24th of this month. Along with the EcoXperience returning to the show’s basement, a new display called Electric Avenue will premier. The “avenue” will be an orgy of electric cars ranging from the Nissan LEAF to X Prize alumni.
Toyota will unveil a new dedicated hybrid at the Detroit show on Monday. Pictured above is Toyota’s Hybrid X concept from a few years ago. Rumors say the new model is just a hybrid version of the Yaris, but Toyota claims it’s a brand new model all together.
On the heels of Chevy’s mobile app blitz for the Volt, BMW followed up by showing off their very own iPhone app. Chevy has one leg up on BMW as the Volt app is available for the iPhone, BlackBerry and Android. But there is one flaw, you can’t yet buy a Volt…BMW, FTW!
The BMW M Power Meter Application uses the iPhone’s native accelerometer to measure speed, acceleration and your acceleration to a specific speed. But the best part, you don’t have to own a BMW to use it–and it’s free! How often can you say that about something from BMW? Read the rest of this entry »
In one of Top Gear’s more infamous (and yet informative) vehicle tests, Jeremy Clarkson pitted a Toyota Prius against a BMW M3 to see which car could get better gas mileage. The catch was, the Prius had to drive as fast as it could, while all the M3 had to do was keep up with the hybrid. The end result was the Prius got 17.2 mpg, while the M3 got 19.4 mpg. The point, according to Clarkson, is that it isn’t what you drive, but how you drive.
Now we can debate the merits of the video (posted below) all we want. But the point is, you can get decent mileage if you drive, well, gingerly. It isn’t easy, but Garmin, maker of GPS devices, has come up with a device called the ecoRoute hd. This device plugs into your car and calculates just how green you are driving, no matter what you are driving. It’s pretty cool, in a green, Big Brother sort of way.
You know electric cars are serious when even Rolls Royce is considering ditching fossil fuel for electrons. The maker of luxury cars renowned the world over for their opulence is seriously considering having an electric version of its luxo-bargo Phantom on the road as early as next year… just in time for the 2012 Olympics being held in its native London.
But will an electric Rolls work?
One major obstacle on the road to widespread acceptance of electric cars is reliability. Electric cars are still relatively new ground, and anybody who has ever gotten a cellphone wet or left a laptop in a car during a hot summer day (guilty on both counts) knows that electronics are very sensitive to the elements. Apparently, they are also sensitive to potholes.
One of the “lucky” few who were given an Electric Mini to test out—the founder of GM-Volt.com found out just how sensitive when the Mini came to a dead stop in a construction zone after hitting one such pothole.
BMW’s Simple concept–which kinda looks like a Stealth Bomber with training wheels–is a hybrid trike that gets around 120 mpg.
The Simple (which stands for Sustainable and Innovative Mobility Product for Low Energy consumption) does 60 mph in just under ten seconds and has a top speed of 125 mph. The car weighs just over 900 lbs and has a super low drag coefficient of 0.18. Read the rest of this entry »
I’ve been happy with all the recent efforts by European auto manufacturers to bring fuel-efficient diesels back to the States. From Volkswagen to Mercedes, diesels seem to be the new attempt at pleasing the US “green” crowd with classy, low-emissions fuel-sippers.
Reading that last sentence over, it seems funny to call them a “new attempt” because these high mileage diesels have been available to Europeans for a LONG time — but that’s another story.
So, while it’s debatable whether a gasoline-powered Prius at 40 mpg is more “green” than a diesel-powered Jetta at 40 mpg — it all has to do with how much of each type of fuel comes out of one barrel of oil — It’s a fact that having these new clean diesels as an option is certainly something the US has been lacking for a long time. And I appreciate having that option, I really do.
BMW’s new ActiveHybrid X6 promises to be the world’s most powerful hybrid with 480 hp (358 kW) and 575 lb-ft of torque (780 N·m).
The ActiveHybrid X6 will hit 60 mph in just under 6 seconds all while providing a 20-percent fuel savings according to the EU test-cycle. The EU also gave it a CO2 rating of 231 g/km. EPA numbers aren’t yet available. Read the rest of this entry »
For some reason, gearheads and greenies (that is how I refer to you, deal) don’t really seem to get along. There is this huge gap between people who like to go fast and people who are trying to reduce their carbon footprint. I admit, many vehicles with speed as a primary concern are far from eco-friendly, but more so than ever, individuals are modifying their own cars for their own purposes. Whether that is going fast, or going green, turning a wrench is still turning a wrench.
That is why I love this little luxury item (which incidentally costs more than my house). A 500 horsepower super-quad equipped with BMW’s V12 engine that runs only E-85 fuel.
Designed for the BMW Motorrad Innovation Contest, the Halbo turns saving the planet into an extreme sport.
Conceived by designer Pierre Yohanes Lubis, the electric bike is much more planet friendly than say a petro-based vehicle. But, if the concept were to become popular it’s just unsafe enough to thin the herd. Read the rest of this entry »
I like old stuff. Sure new stuff is nice, and nobody wants to eat moldy old bread. But I am always impressed by the ingenuity and gusto of inventors who didn’t have the benefit of the Internet, telephones, and sometimes couldn’t even read. They just had an idea, and made it work with their own two hands. Now it wouldn’t be fair for me to accuse today’s engineers and inventors of lacking in good ideas, but too often it seems like a new idea means a complicated idea. So I am going to try and keep a weekly column on old ideas that never really took off, but to me still seem like there might be some merit to them.
Thus I present you a brief history of the steam car.
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