hybrid cars vs flex fuel (loooong rant post)

[jonnymopar]

Sound off time kiddies. My engineering mind has taken me over for a while.

Ok, maybe I'm making an ass out of myself by posting this, or maybe not. Either way, I was having a discussion with one of the engineers that I work with. I look up to him as one of the brightest people I'm sure I'll meet in my lifetime. He agrees with my view on the subject, but I'd like to discuss this.

Does anybody else here think hybrid cars are a joke?

My Neon gets 36mpg on the highway. Toyota claims that the Prius gets 55mpg highway. Odd how all the car magazines I've read came up with mid 40's highway mpg AT BEST. Why the over-estimation? Does Toyota really want to press this technology on people so bad that they'll lie about it?? I'm not going to deny that, in the city, the Prius gets twice the gas mileage of my Neon, but damn dude, my Neon still pulls high 20's! In other words, it's costing me approximately $2.50 to go nearly 30 miles in the city. That is still by far the cheapest transportation there is in the city, other than riding a bicycle.

Also, if the Neon was still in production and followed the price increase trend that it saw in, say, the most recent 5 years of its production, a hybrid car with comparable features and options would cost approximately $9,000 more. I'm so stunned by that... I'm speechless.

Plus, are people with big trucks going out and saying "You know, I get 13mpg in my Silverado. That's bad for the earth. I'm buying a hybrid?" NO, that's not it at all!! Most of the people that drive these hybrid cars already had small cars and were accustomed to them! For the most part, people that drive big trucks have a reason to do so (not everybody), and will continue to, regardless of gas mileage. SUVs might be a different story, but I'm gonna take a wild-ass guess that people with 2 or more kids aren't gonna trade in their Ford Expedition for a hybrid so they can shoe-horn their kids in the back seat. Well, what about a hybrid SUV? They're out there... getting the same gas mileage as a car... and they're $15,000 more than a car. Riiiiight.

And now, with all that said... the main underlying reason that I'm sounding off about this right now: from the information that I gather, hybrid cars, in the war we have going against gas prices and petroleum energy, solve absolutely nothing. Nothing at all. As a whole, we're only using slightly less gasoline. It doesn't change the fact that it's gasoline, or change the fact that gasoline is a non-renewable source of energy. So... what is the plan for solving this problem? Diesel and flex fuel!

The government just passed a law to make super-clean diesel fuel. I'm really hoping that this is a foreshadow of where we're moving toward. Volkswagen 1.9L TDI = 51 PROVEN miles per gallon highway. Sorry hybrids, haven't seen that from you yet. Keep blowing money, you might get there.

What about ethanol? E85! Sweet, now we're all the way down to 15% gasoline. No, it doesn't eliminate the need for gasoline, but that's a much bigger improvement than buying a hybrid car. How? Simple:

Take a Honda Civic vs. Honda Civic hybrid. Say the regular Civic is made to be a flex fuel car. I know it isn't, but if you took two identical cars and equipped one properly to handle flex fuel (E85 or E95), the gas mileage on the flex fuel car while using gasoline would be the same as the regular gasoline only car, right? The regular Civic gets 38mpg highway. Hmm... not bad. Now, make it a flex fuel car. Rule of thumb is that on most FFV's, there's roughly a 15% loss in fuel economy with E85 when compared with gasoline mpg. So, on E85, that puts us at 32.3mpg instead of 38. The Civic Hybrid is rated at 51mpg highway.

Drive both cars 1000 highway miles. Civic Hybrid did it in 19.61 gallons of gasoline. That's very good. However, the Civic FFV did it in 4.64 gallons of gasoline. Wait... wha?? It took 30.96 gallons of E85 to drive 1000 miles @ 32.3mpg, right? E85 is only 15% gasoline, remember?! The rest of it is refined corn and some other renewable sources of energy. THAT is progress (or it would be. The Civic is not available as a FFV since apparently Japan thinks hybrids are so great). In this particular case, the FFV used less than 25% of the gasoline that the hybrid used.

Here's another one that will surprise you. Again, these are just simple calculations that I've made with readily available information. This one has to do with the whole bullshit mindset that purchasing a hybrid car is "making a statement about your concern for the environment"... and here's why it's horse shit. In 2006, there were 107,000 Toyota Priuses sold in the United States. Average MSRP on one of these beauties is $22,500. Well, what else is on Toyota's lineup that could be comparable to the Prius, size-wise and feature-wise, but not hybrid? The Corolla or the Yaris. I'll take the Corolla since it actually looks like a car, rather than the 4-wheeled potato-looking Yaris. Plus, with the Corolla being slightly less fuel-efficient than the Yaris, it will help my argument even more.

Ok, Corolla MSRP is $14,500. That's a whopping 8 grand less than the Prius. 8 grand less, and yet, there were still 107,000 people "trying to make a statement about their concern for the environment". If you're so concerned about the environment, then try this on for size: If those 107,000 people would have bought the Corolla (still very fuel efficient) instead of the Prius, and then donated the price difference to alternative fuel research, $856,000,000 would have gone toward drastically reducing America's dependence on non-renewable energy. That's right!! 856 MILLION dollars were wasted "making a statement"!! Keep in mind, that's only for one year! Imagine if they all bought the Yaris and did the same? Now, you're around a billion.



There's my piece. What does everybody else think?

[hansken_yo]

I think the hybrids on the bigger vehicles is a great idea just b/c they currently get shit for gas mileage. people, and I'll quote a friend, want SUVs because they'll "survive an accident better than a car." I have my own personal rant about this issue, which I won't get into.

I do agree that we need to get off of gasoline and onto something that is better for the environment and renewable, there are many issues that tie to this that a renewable and available alternate feul could possibly solve

[MoxHair]

Been saying it for years.

[boostinss]

we already have a renewable source...but government and all there knowledge wont let it happen because oil is nothing then.

[fixitmattman]

Hybrids really don't do much on the highway. They're more for the stop and go city crowd. Ethanol consumes more energy to make then you get out of it. They're cleaning up road diesel, but all the sulphur and crap they take out of it they put in off highway (construction and agriculture) diesel.

Most of the so called 'solutions' don't solve anything, they just move the problem.

Hydrogen (HCE's or fuel cells) will be the future once the storage systems are figured out. IIRC the solar power available from 10mi² of Arizona desert would produce enough hydrogen for the US.

[bone-yard-racing]

I dont feeling like typing much but
1.) Just about all fuels take more than they are worth to make/transport except electricty
2.) Johnny you are right. I agree 100%
3.) Hydrogen is BS the first problem is that it is not a fuel its an enegry carrier (big 1000psi battery) an inefficent one at that. Something interesting about the whole "the only emmission is water" thing think of this L.A. freeway at rush hour 1,000+ cars spewing water onto the roadway.

[glasswars]

You make good points and show the truth of our world in terms of fuel. I think hybrid sales will drop dramatically as soon as we get over the "0o0o0o0o hybridzzz" thing.

[Chibits12]

I certainly agree. Hybrid cars are nothing more but hype. The fact that people are getting tax credits by buying a "hybrid" car certainly isn't going to help our situation.

The truth is big oil companies are here to stay and they'll never go away, especially in the United States. How come Saudi Arabia wasn't as scrutinized when the attacks of 9/11 occured when, obviously, at least 75% of the hijackers were from Saudi Arabia? Simple: Saudi Arabia has the largest oil reserve in the world and their butts would continue to be kissed as long as they have oil.

Why can't we follow what Brazil did, in which they've become completely self-reliant on energy by using sugar cane? Brazil now uses a miniscule amount of foreign oil and they now rely on their own supply of sugarcanes to extract biofuel for their flex fuel cars. Most, if not all the cars in Brazil are flex fuel engines. It's such a great concept: renewable, cheap resources with little or no reliance on foreign oil. I saw it on CNN and GM is even supplying them these flex fuel cars...

That's my rant for today, lol. It'll take us a long time to be independent from oil, period. Just the fact China is now also being built on oil itself and with Cuba may be extracting their own oil off the coast, close to our territories is just making the world an even more unfriendly place.

[03blackrt]

I don't feel like ranting, but...


The discovery channel just aired a series "FutureCar" about, well, the futrure of cars. Last week was the "future fuel". This weekend concluds the series with the showing of all four (i think four) shows in the series. It's kinda interesting.

[rOniN]

Hybrids cost more than you save...waste of money when my 98 gets average 35 on highway and max of 41. 500 dollar car vs. 30k car. I win.

As for the fuel. Whichever type you see the oil/gas companies will be the fuel of the future. Once they get into the game everything seems to go their way.

As for the hippy stuff...the US using cleaner fuel wont do jack when the rest of the world is industrializing. China, India, and some afrian nations are polluting 2 to 3 times as much as we are.

[fixitmattman]

I dont feeling like typing much but
1.) Just about all fuels take more than they are worth to make/transport except electricty

3.) Hydrogen is BS the first problem is that it is not a fuel its an enegry carrier (big 1000psi battery) an inefficent one at that. Something interesting about the whole "the only emmission is water" thing think of this L.A. freeway at rush hour 1,000+ cars spewing water onto the roadway.

You forget where that electricity comes from. Most power generation plants are only around 40% efficient at converting their fuel (coal, gas, nuclear) to electricity. Not only that, but the cost to produce gasoline from crude to tank is way cheaper than any biomass fuel.

Hydrogen can be used a fuel. Look into Hydrogen Combustion Engines (Ford model U for example). As for the water emission thing, to wit: The perfect combustion of any fuel will provide CO2 and water. Your engine and exhaust right now even with imperfect combustion currently produce water, more than likely on a similar scale as any hydrogen fueled vehicle. The water exists as vapour, it doesn't come pouring out of the exhaust.

The big problem with hydrogen and electric is the storage of energy. Once those get figured out they will be the two best sources of energy in the future IMO.

Hybrids aren't all they're cracked up to be, but right now they're the groundwork for the cars of the future.

[racer12306]

I'm going to try and keep this short, but I don't know how well I will do at that.

Hybrids

When you stick the typical driver into a hybrid, a hybrid is nothing but hype. Most americans drive too fast for a hybrid to provide any kind of advange. Stick a person that drives in the ideal speed range and then you will get a hybrid that gets great fuel economy. I don't think that Toyota lied about the numbers, its just that americans drive too fast to realize these numbers. However, I do agree that their city mileage is excellant. Don't get me wrong. I am not a fan of hybrid cars at all, I thought they were a joke from shortly after the beginning. Sure I thought, thats cool when they first came out, but after I started reading about them my opinion of them changed for the worse. The other problem with them is the repair costs. The techs that work on these things have to be highly trained so they don't kill themselves doing a simple part replacement.

Diesel

I think diesel is one of the ways to go. It is hard to make a diesel gulp fuel, even driving like we americans do. My dads 05 Ram with a cummins (325hp/610ft-lbs), auto, 4x4, QC, long bed, etc. will get 18 or 19 mpg on the highway. That may not seem great but think about it this way. That truck weighs 8500lbs!!! and has all the power you will ever want/need, along with a good ride.

Translate that into smaller vehicles. I believe Dodge is planning on a v-6 and a v-8 cummins (yes a V oriented cummins, sounds pretty weird) diesel for the 2009 model year for the Durango and half ton Ram (maybe the dakota too, but i cant remember). You are talking about trucks and suv's that will get ~30mpg, and have good power, and since it will be a cummins engine after they get the bugs worked out it will be very reliable.

Now take it another step further and stick a diesel into a Stratus and a Caliber and we are talking about cars that will get 45+mpg easy. VW has been doing diesels for years and they have always got incredible fuel economy. I think the old rabbits got 70mpg (someone correct me if I'm wrong), but they had no power. Personally, I would sacrifice a some economy to gain some power so that it wouldn't feel like a chore to drive a car.

I know a lot of people associate diesels with being dirty, smelly, have no power and such. You are probably not going to get around the smell when you fill up the tank. But diesels now are immencly cleaner than they used to be. The particulate filters that are being required now, the Ultra Low Sulfer Diesel (ULSD) is helping too. We are in the process of converting from Low Sulfer Diesel (LSD) which had 500ppm sulfer in it to the ULSD which has 15ppm. If anyone says that diesels don't have any power, they need to step behind the wheel of anyone of the Big 3's diesel truck offerings and put it to the floor. It is amazing before you remember that you are driving a 7500+lb vehicle, after you remember that you think, holy shit this thing is fast.

But with diesel we still have that oil dependancy thing. I'm still not completely convinced that oil is a non-renewable source. But, we will see how that works out. I'm also not the biggest fan of E85 yet. Maybe when there are more stations that offer it, I will like it better. The idea of E85 is good, plus it allows people to run more compression or more boost with "pump gas."

All the Other Alternative Fuels
It will be interesting to see what they come up with. But I do think that they will need to be able to get up and go. I don't think that americans will give up that much power to have one of these cars. These cars will also have to be nice, and more luxury means more weight.

The reason I think this is because look at the evolution of cars since the early 90s. If we didn't care that much about power or luxury we would all be driving early 90s type Civic's, CRX's, Metro's, and Corolla's.

[jonnymopar]

Man this is great. This is exactly what I was hoping would come out of this thread. Keep the ideas and views rolling!

[dinetuner]

e85 is a bandaid solution... just like continuing to use foriegn oil...my vote would be to use e85 at least its a bandaid sulotion that doesnt make us dependent on certian nations

[Mr Josh Zombie]

My main concern with hybrids, and the whole "being concerned about your enviroment shit" is, hey those things are equipped with how many batteries? and what happens to those batteries 90% of the time when they die?

They get thrown into a landfil, or sit in your garage and leak battery acid everywhere.

Yea, that's REAL enviromently friendly.


When we FINALLY run out of out gasoline resources, that's when the government will actually release an efficient fuel... and then they'll charge 10x more than what it takes to make it, and we'll once again go through this whole circle. It's one of those never ending cycles really.

[Diablo0]

My main concern with hybrids, and the whole "being concerned about your enviroment shit" is, hey those things are equipped with how many batteries? and what happens to those batteries 90% of the time when they die?

They get thrown into a landfil, or sit in your garage and leak battery acid everywhere.

Yea, that's REAL enviromently friendly.

That was always my concern and you know those batterys aren't going to last forever and I can't imagine how much it'd cost to replace them when they don't hold a charge anymore.

[racer12306]

Yeah, those batteries are not cheap. But, they do carry a long warranty on the, 10 years or something like that.

[Mr Josh Zombie]

Still, reguadless of if they covered under warrenty, the WILL die eventually, you WILL need to replace them, and what are you going to do with thousands of dead batteries lying around?

[racer12306]

I agree Josh.

I wonder if they can recycle them, even if they can Im sure there will still be a good bit of waste.

[kc2005ptgt]

Wow - I just watched something abou tthis on Discovery/TLC, whatever... I will say this - we need to do one of two things, or both, as far as cars are conocerned...

1- We need to go to a renewable resource, such as: Hydrogen, Air (yes, oxygen), Ethanol, or Solar
2- We need to STOP trying to combine use of oil with one of the above

The funny thing is, we keep talking about dumping money into R&D, but why not just start building these cars that use renewable resources like hydrogen, and just build em... In norway (I think it is) they a;ready have 400 miles of road set up for use of hydrogen fueled auto's - meaning stops along the way for refilling, etc...

When the auto was first invented it wasn't perfect, completely safe, had a gas station on every corner, and hell, even roads weren't around! So why not just do it? Offer these cars at comparable and affordable prices and let the rest follow - we need to get them on the road!

I dunno, but ethanol and hydrogen sound like the two best alternatives. A hydrogen vehicle can even be used to power your home - which you end up selling back to the power company, which in turn your car not only makes water, but it makes you money! Why wouldn't they want to make a car like that?!? I believe it is not a government conspiracy, but a corporate conspiracy - what kind of company selling oil and other power sources would want 50 million cars on the road that are powered by water (which is over 70% of the earth), create no pollution, are just as safe as current cars, and in turn will power our homes which the power companies have to buy back from us - everyone of them looses money.

Ah well, I give up - I do not blame the government, I blame the huge corporations.

[Canada]

Yeah, those batteries are not cheap. But, they do carry a long warranty on the, 10 years or something like that.

They are warrantied for 8 years. However, how many times have we heard of people being screwed out of warranty for rediculous reasons??

I imagine they would find any reason possible to deny warranty claims much like Honda has been doing with their (now discontinued) Hybrid.

So the amount of hazardous waste generated by all these cars every time the batteries get friend and need to be replaced is huge.

Not to mention the cost (out of warranty) to replace the battery packs is upwards of $8-9k to replace. (Plus labour)

[graf AXEL]

Wow - I just watched something abou tthis on Discovery/TLC, whatever...

i watch every episode of future car, if thats what you're talking about. i dont have much to comment on with this topic... but ive thought about making a bio-diesel one of these days

[racer12306]

Bio diesel is an interesting topic. It would be pretty cool to make your own diesel fuel. But it would be hard to regulate it so that it would be safe to run in a vehicle.

My dad was going to make his own bio a while ago. bought an old rabbit and was looking for a water heater. then desided that it probably wasnt the best idea because of the cost of all these electronics in todays diesel vehicles.

i know some stations sell 10% or so bio diesel, but i would think that diesel would have better quality control compared to what someone can do in their garage.

[Mr Josh Zombie]

I was watching an episode of Dirty Jobs, and there's this guy that spent thousands of dollars in machines, chemicals, things like that... and just goes kitchen to kitchen, collecting grease, and turning it into 100% safe to use fuel in there 3 or 4 diesal vechicles.

After everything is said and done, the cost to make a gallon of his bio-diesel is 56 cents, and his exhaust smells like french fries.

[bone-yard-racing]

Electric car batteries in large part do not use any liquid in the cell at all there are 3 types of batterys

Most common and cheapest: SLA (sealed lead acid) they have 2 dangerious elements lead and acid they dont last very long (life or charge) and have little power. Uesd in 1gn EV1 and most home builts.

Best all around: NiMH( ovaniac) No liquid at all. Decent power and life. Relivlaity cheap but they run hot and need cooling. Used in 2gn EV1, some home builts 100% recycilable. EXXON-Mobile bought pattaend from GM/Ovinac in 2000 after GM killed the EV program.

Best performance: LiON(Lithium Ion) Huge ammount of power and long life. Expensive but run cooler. 100%recycalble. Uded in tesla and T-Zero

[racer12306]

EXXON-Mobile bought pattaend from GM/Ovinac in 2000 after GM killed the EV program.

what a surprise an oil company bought the patent to an item that could put a damper on their profits

[dinetuner]

what a surprise an oil company bought the patent to an item that could put a damper on their profits

not really there trying to stay ahead of the curve... say EV becomes the greatest thing and oil is left behind they now own a patent and are ready to jump into it and not left behind.....

[bone-yard-racing]

No they have stopped any devlopement/work on the Ovanic style battery which differs slightly from the standard NiMH battery. If EV do go back mainstreem most likely they will use a LiON battery.

[dinetuner]

so your saying they bought the patent for the sole purpose to stop develpment?!?!? dumb ass's

[jonnymopar]

so your saying they bought the patent for the sole purpose to stop develpment?!?!? dumb ass's

Why else? . Friggin companies.