It wasn’t all that long ago (summer 2009) that we caught a glimpse of the Batmobile Porsche 911. That car appeared to have a special something hiding under the bonnet – an electric motor and battery. For pictures, see:

http://green.autoblog.com/2009/07/28/spy-shots-is-this-porsche-911-mule-hiding-a-shocking-secret/

As a result ,of those photos, internet forums were set ablaze with speculation of what future iterations of the Porsche icon might include for a powertrain.

Then just weeks ago we heard from Porsche CEO Michael Macht in an interview with AutoCar Magazine that the company had no plans for hybrid technology, but wished to include some technologies including brake regeneration and start-stop. Brake regeneration captures the kenetic energy that occurs under braking conditions and start-stop stops the engine while the car is halted, such as in waiting for a red light at a stop.

In a bluff of some sort, Macht’s company announced earlier in the week the release of the 911 GT3 R Hybrid. Perhaps Macht would argue that a GT3 R is not a road car. Perhaps Porsche is really looking to develop a news sports-oriented technology to repel the charges of batteries adding immense weight to traditional hybrid vehicles. We knows that the company has announced a hybrid Cayenne, and one has to imagine a hybrid Panamera is also being developed. Sports cars, however, must remain light, so the test of this new GT3 is how quick can they make it.

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Volkswagen

VW in an effort to promote the tons of eco-friendlier cars launched at IAA in Frankfurt in September has decided to pursue eco-sales with a new eco-friendly racing series. The company is starting a single-make racing series where all of the cars run on bio-produced compressed natural gas. The model used in the series is the new Scirocco and should reduce racetrack CO2 output by 80 per cent over today’s racing fuels. The 2.0-liter 4-cylinder cars will have 220 horsepower on tap. Not bad for an alt fuel car!

Source: http://www.wired.com/autopia/2009/10/volkswagen-cng/

On other green fronts, VW Group is working with Stanford University in California in a US$5.75 million project to make VW the largest carmaker with R&D in Silicon Valley. Already the two companies have produced autonomous (read self-driving) versions of the VW Passat and now the Audi TT-S. The Audi TT-S will attempt to drive itself up the 14,110-foot Pike’s Peak next year, according Wired.

Source: http://www.wired.com/autopia/2009/10/vw-vail/

Audi’s Johan de Nysschen, critical of the Chevy Volt, took an interview with Time recently to express his views on the state of the luxury auto industry. He stated that Audi’s goal is to be the “top” German luxury manufacturer, but not necessarily in terms of sales. He also reiterated the push for more fuel-efficient vehicles leading to Zero emissions cars in the not so distant future.

Source: http://www.time.com/time/business/article/0,8599,1933906,00.html

Bugatti

Bugatti has unleashed a new concept car the 4-seat, 4-door (can you believe it???) Galibier 16C. Autocar magazine claims the production will start in 2013 at £900,000. We will believe it when we see it! Interestingly, the car’s engine will be the same as in the Veyron but will only sport 800BHP. Apparently, 200 get lost when adding 2 doors.

http://www.autocar.co.uk/News/NewsArticle.aspx?AR=244753

Caterham

Rarely does Caterham make the news, except when they unleash new, wildly fun lightweight roadster, but unfortunately, Caterham’s found Graham Nearn died in late October. Nearn has been selling the then-titled Lotus 7 since its introduction in 1959, and then when the car was discontinued in 1973, Nearn bought the rights and has been producing the car ever since and in more exciting, evolving versions. You can even buy a kit and put a Caterham 7 together yourself. If you are not familiar with this brand, you should be!

Top Gear featured it in a segment awhile back:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cOxHV6QfJkg

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8bhnE2rAWuA

Source: http://www.autocar.co.uk/News/NewsArticle.aspx?AR=244398

Ferrari

Beyond the KM has previously marveled at the sales resiliency of the Ferrari nameplate. But even THIS economy has the prancing stallion kow-towing to the bear market of Wall Street.

Its third quarter results for 2009 showed revenues of 396 million euros (£359m) – down from 450m euros (£408m) in the same period last year. It sold 1454 cars, down 4.3 per cent year on year.

However, Ferrari announced that it has grown its market share in every market it monitors, against a drop in supercar sales of around 40 per cent.

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It is not every day that a car company reinvents the wheel, or in this case, the engine. Lotus thinks it has though with the implication that one engine can now run a variety of fuels with varying energy densities. There should also be fewer parts to break down as it is a mono-block construction eliminating the use of poppets.

Lotus' new Omnivore Engine

From Lotus:

Lotus Engineering, the world-renowned automotive consultancy division of Lotus Cars Limited, unveils its latest research into engine efficiency at the 79th International Geneva Motor Show. The Omnivore engine concept has the potential to significantly increase fuel efficiency for sustainable alcohol based fuels, which increases the prospect of a greater amount of vehicle miles travelled using renewable fuels. On display will be the single cylinder research engine monoblock that demonstrates the novel architecture designed for high thermal efficiency when fuelled on any alcohol based fuel or gasoline.

The Omnivore concept features an innovative variable compression ratio system and uses a two-stroke operating cycle with direct fuel injection. It is ideally suited to flex-fuel operation with a higher degree of optimisation than is possible with existing four stroke engines.

The engine concept features a monoblock construction that blends the cylinder head and block together eliminating the need for a cylinder head gasket, improving durability and reducing weight. In this case, the application of a monoblock is facilitated by the absence of the requirement for poppet valves. A novel charge trapping valve in the exhaust port allows asymmetric timing of exhaust flow and continuous variation of the exhaust opening point.

The variable compression ratio is achieved by the use of a puck at the top of the combustion chamber. This simple, yet effective system moves up and down affecting the change in geometric compression depending on the load demands on the engine.

Mike Kimberley, Chief Executive Officer of Group Lotus plc said: “We are delighted to unveil this major milestone in the development of an engine configuration for a new breed of more efficient multi-fuel engines. The automotive sector is focusing on its environmental obligations to improve efficiency, minimise reliance on fossil fuels and reduce harmful emissions and Lotus continues to be an industry leader through our work on all aspects of future fuels. Sustainable alcohol based fuels have the potential to reduce the overall CO2 footprint of internal combustion engines towards zero and for this reason, need to be embraced as future fuels for road transport.”

In this collaboration with Queen’s University Belfast and Orbital Corporation Limited Australia, with sponsorship from DEFRA/DECC and DOE NI through the Renewables Materials LINK programme, Lotus Engineering is currently in the final stages of commissioning the Omnivore single-cylinder research engine. It uses the Orbital FlexDI™ fuel injection system which produces fine in-cylinder fuel preparation irrespective of fuel type, and together with air pre- mixing allows efficient two-stroke combustion and low-temperature starting, whilst offering singular opportunity for advanced HCCI control.

The Omnivore programme is another development of Lotus’ research into understanding the complex combustion processes involved in running an engine on mixtures of alcohol based fuels and gasoline, which included the Lotus Exige 270E Tri-fuel, unveiled at the International Geneva Motor Show in 2008. This research is vitally important for a successful transition from today’s fuels to the more efficient sustainable fuels of the future.

Geraint Castleton-White, Head of Powertrain at Lotus Engineering said, “The absence of poppet valves in two-stroke engines makes the incorporation of a variable compression ratio system relatively straightforward. Our research into these systems on four-stroke engines has led us to the conclusion that while thermodynamically it is a desirable technology to incorporate, practically it is very difficult, particularly taking into consideration production feasibility. This two-stroke engine could solve these practical difficulties and simultaneously permits a much larger range of compression ratio adjustment, with the potential to perform at a much higher efficiency when running on renewable fuels.”

We will be keeping this list updated with the latest cars that run on Hydrogen fuel. Check back soon!

Are cameras proper enforcement?

Late last month, the BBC’s Rome correspondent Duncan Kennedy wrote an article outlining what is the most egregious violation of traffic enforcement civil liberties to date. 

The BBC reports that over 100 police and law enforcement officers are being investigated in response to a senior officer’s discovered that traffic ticket issuances were suddenly increased from an average of 15 fines per day to over 1000. 

BBC reports that some US$170,000,000 may have been gained by those involved, include the enforcement company, T-Redspeed, which gained the contracts because it employs a technology that allows 3-dimensional photography of potential traffic violators. At least one person has been arrested in connection with the fraud.

That so many benefited from this fraud should make all of the driving public, law enforcement, and public officials seriously call into question the integrity of the photo traffic enforcement process. If the public in a small country as Italy can be defrauded to the tune of US$170million, imagine the amount German, or Britons, or even Americans could be defrauded.

The first step to gaining public confidence is to provide absolute transparency in the enforcement of traffic cameras. Public scrutiny must be upheld.

Source: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7862893.stm

So BMW has been working on hydrogen cars for 40+ years. Kudos to them, but now Honda is fully in the game. Check this out:

If you “loved” BMW’s iDrive system, now 7 year old, then you are going to continue the “love-fest” with BMW’s latest implementation of bizarro technology courtesy of Microsoft’s “Surface” computer. BMW wants to up the ante using this intriguing table-technology to better sell customized cars to its upscale clientele. Find out how here:

For more on surface, see this video:

Earlier in the month, CNET reported that Elon Musk, the CEO of Tesla, announced a deal with Daimler at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit. At the same auto show, Tesla unveiled a higher-end Sport version of its Tesla Roadster electric sports car.

CNET reported as well that a deal has been surfacing for quite some time: In August, Financial Times Germany reported that the supply agreement was for electric Smart cars planned for a pilot to test lithium-ion battery Smart cars and a network of charging stations in Berlin, Germany.

It seems that Daimler is planning to re-position the SMART car as a sort of “larger” G-Wiz. Hopefully the car will not suffer the same problems that plague the G-Wiz, which is little more than a glorified electric golf cart, except smaller, less reliable, slower, and far more expensive.

The deal seems to be for 1000 electric power trains for a limited run of SMARTs. One could assume that if successful, and there is little reason to suspect otherwise given the focus of the SMART car, we could expect electric SMART cars in every dealer, even in the new American market. (more…)

No, it’s not April 1st. BMW’s engineers have done something seen only in Back to the Future: using pollution to fuel a car. Looking nothing like a modified DeLorean, the modified BMW 7 series has the ability to consume pollutants that typically occur in in their Hydrogen 7 model. The Hydrogen 7 model normal creates little pollution because the main resultant is water.
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Ferrari recently announced that all of their models will come with Ceramic disc brakes as standard equipment from 2008. This is great news for Ferrari buyers as a once $10,000 optional extra is now standard. These disc brakes have, for a few years now, been a very expensive add-on, but a very good one as they nearly eliminate brake fade, and very lightweight, and work to reduce stopping distances – critical in preventing auto accidents.
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At the LA Auto Show, Porsche announced an all-new version of the Cayenne SUV. What’s so different about this model? It is battery-powered. But this Cayenne is no Toyota Prius. Instead, this model is more practical, traveling at in excess of 75 KM/hour just on battery power! Revolutionary? Perhaps. Lighter on the the wallet? DEFINITELY!

Enjoy this brief introduction.