In Gear offers a fresh look at the world of cars – its technology, economics, and future – through the eyes of Monitor staffers and other automobile writers from around the world.
The Nissan Leaf electric car is displayed for media in Tokyo, in this November 2012 file photo. Globally, Nissan Leaf electric car drivers have driven 113.7 million miles, while Chevy Volt drivers have covered 106.8 million miles, Voelcker writes. (Junji Kurokawa/AP/File)
Nissan Leaf electric car drivers hit 100 million miles mark
Two weeks ago, we noted that drivers of theChevrolet Volt had covered 100 million electric miles.
What we neglected to note at the time was thatNissan Leaf drivers are keeping pace, having covered more than 100 million electric miles as well.
And it's appropriate to note that total today, just one day after the two-year anniversary of the first Nissan Leaf delivery to take place in the U.S.
As of today, in fact, both cars are comfortably over 100 million electric miles.
The actual number is 113.7 million for Leaf drivers globally, and 106.8 million for drivers of the Chevy Volt range-extended electric car. ( Continue… )
A Coda Electric Sedan is pictured in this undated photo courtesy of Coda Automotive. The electric vehicle maker has refused to release any sales figures since it put its car into production in March, Voelcker writes. (Coda Automotive)
Electric vehicle maker Coda lays off 15 percent of staff
If you're a couple of years late launching your car, and it gets only tepid reviews, and then its frontal crash safety is rated at just two stars out of five, it might be safe to say your company has a few challenges.
That's the situation for Coda Automotive, which yesterday confirmed that it had laid off about 50 people, or 15 percent of its 330-person staff.
The company's senior vice president of government relations and external affairs, Forrest Beanum, issued a statement saying:
Coda has released approximately 50 employees or 15% of our workforce across all functions to streamline our operations and right-size the Company. The Company is taking this action to better position our business going forward. We remain committed to the continued development and distribution of our products.
The quality and safety of our products is of paramount importance. Coda vehicles meet all applicable U.S. Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards (FMVSS) and achieved an overall 4-star rating in National Highway Transportation Safety Administration (NHTSA) testing. ( Continue… )
A Honda logo is seen on a steering wheel of a car at the company showroom in Tokyo in this April 2012 file photo. Honda will recall 871,000 vehicles that could roll away after the ignition key has been removed, including 807,000 in the United States, the company said on December 12, 2012. (Kim Kyung-Hoon/Reuters/File)
Honda recall: 870,000 minvans and SUVs for ignition defect
Honda will recall approximately 807,000 vehicles in the United States and approximately 63,000 in other countries due to a problem with the key ignition.
The recall involves about 318,000 Honda Odyssey minivans and 259,000 Pilot SUVs from the 2003 and 2004 model years, as well as approximately 230,000 Acura MDX vehicles from the 2003-2006 model years.
The problem is a potential malfunction with the ignition interlock feature, which keep keys locked into the ignition when a car is not in park. Without it, a key can be removed when the vehicle is in drive, neutral, or reverse, and the car could move when it shouldn’t.
“The ignition interlock mechanism can be damaged or worn during use,” Honda America’s statement on the recall reads. “If this happens, it may become possible to remove the ignition key when the automatic transmission shift lever is not in Park. If the transmission is not in Park and the parking brake is not set, the vehicle could roll away, and a crash could occur.”
Honda has received several customer complaints about the problem, and says in its statement that it knows of two incidents that may have resulted in minor injuries.
Honda will notify vehicle owners by mail this coming February. At that time, customers affected by the recall can take their vehicles to Honda dealerships for a repair at no charge.
Also in early February, Honda owners will be able to determine if their vehicles need a repair by visiting the Honda and Acura recall websites, www.recalls.honda.com and www.recalls.acura.com, or by calling (800) 999-1009 for Honda owners or (800) 382-2238 for Acura owners, and selecting option 4.
This isn’t the first recall for Honda involving the ignition interlock issue. Some 384,000 Honda Accords from the 2003 model year were recalled for the same problem in August 2010. In 2003, Honda recalled 583,000 Hondas and Acuras for the ignition defect, and another 483,000 in 2005. In an investigation of the problem, the National Highway Traffic and Safety Administration received 42 complaints from drivers whose vehicles had rolled away. Sixteen vehicles came to a stop only after hitting something.
Aside from the ignition interlock issue, Honda has wrestled with other recalls this year. The company has had to issue major recalls on things ranging from faulty overhead electrical wiring to leaky power steering to power window switches that pose a fire risk, as the Monitor reported in October.
According to Honda, the current recall is unrelated to the previous ones.
The Ford Focus Electric car is displayed next to a home charging station at the LA Auto Show in Los Angeles, in this November 2012 file photo. The best way to make people aware that electric cars are now a viable option is to let them get in the cars and drive them, Voelcker writes. (Jae C. Hong/AP/File)
Electric vehicle awareness: the key to boosting sales
You might not know it from general media coverage, but plug-in electric-car sales are actually doing pretty well.
Still, people get impatient, and electric-car and environmental advocates want more, faster.
So what are the best ways to boost adoption of plug-in cars?
Education and awareness are the two key factors, said Brian Wynne, president of the Electric Drive Trade Association, on a conference call today.
And it turns out the best way to make people aware that electric cars are now a viable option is to let them get in the cars and drive them.
That's what the industry sometimes calls "getting butts into seats." ( Continue… )
This May 2010 file photo shows Volvo's corporate logo pictured on the rear hatch of a Volvo C30 in a showroom near the Volvo Car Corporation Headquarters in Gothenburg, Sweden. Volvo, which is facing shrinking sales in established markets such as Europe and North America, will focus its attention on new markets, especially on China, Vijayenthiran writes. (Bob Strong/Reuters/File )
Volvo to license technology to Chinese parent company
Volvo will license some of its older technology to its Chinese parent Geely under a new deal signed by the two companies recently.
The technology, which Volvo plans to phase out over the coming years, includes a mid-size vehicle platform, several safety systems and cabin filter technology.
Volvo, of course, is set to introduce a new modular platform dubbed SPA that will spawn most of its future lineup.
According to Reuters, Geely will provide Volvo with its knowledge of the Chinese market and lower-cost production in return for the technology. ( Continue… )
The Ford logo is seen at Ford car plant in Craiova, 143 miles west of Bucharest, Romania, in this October 2012 file photo. The EPA will audit the fuel efficiency claims of the 2013 Ford Fusion Hybrid and 2013 Ford C-Max, Read writes. (Bogdan Cristel/Reuters/File)
EPA to review 2013 Ford Fusion, C-Max fuel economy claims
Two weeks ago, we mentioned that the Hyundai/Kia fuel-economy fiasco was turning heads in Congress and suggested that this could cause the Environmental Protection Agency to take a closer look at other vehicles.
That's now happening.
According to AutoNews, the EPA will review complaints about the 2013 Ford Fusion Hybrid and 2013 Ford C-Max hybrid, both of which are advertised as earning a combined fuel economy of 47 mpg.
As our colleagues at Green Car Reports noted, auto critics and consumers began contesting the C-Max's fuel economy claims some time ago. In test drives, GCR averaged around 40 mpg, which is roughly what C-Max owners have received over longer periods of driving.
Shortly thereafter, numbers for the 2013 Ford Fusion Hybrid began rolling in, and they were even lower -- generally in the range of 35 - 37mpg. ( Continue… )
In this August 2009 file photo, an A123 Systems Inc. high power Nanophospate Lithium Ion Cell for Hybrid Electric Vehicles battery is displayed in Livonia, Mich. Chinese auto parts maker Wanxiang Group Corp. fought off a joint bid from US parts company Johnson Controls Inc. and Japan's NEC Corp, to buy A123. (AP Photo/Paul Sancya, File)
Wanxiang buys bankrupt battery maker A123
A123 Systems, the bankrupt battery maker which supplies Fisker Automotive and others, has finally found a buyer.
Chinese auto parts maker Wanxiang Group Corp. fought off a joint bid from U.S. parts company Johnson Controls Inc. and Japan's NEC Corp, with a bid of $256.6 million.
Reuters reports that A123's government business arm, which works with the U.S. Defense Department, has been separately sold to Navitas Systems for $2.25 million.
The sale to Wanxiang must now be approved by Delaware Bankruptcy Court judge Kevin Carey, at a hearing on Tuesday. ( Continue… )
This file photo taken last week shows the Ford Fusion at the LA Auto Show in Los Angeles. Ford's hybrid models aren't living up to their mpg ratings, according to a new release from Consumer Reports. (Jae C. Hong/AP/FIle)
Ford hybrids fail to meet gas mileage ratings, Consumer Reports says
it's always nice when the big boys say, "You're right."
We reported three weeks ago that Ford's new 2013 hybrids were not achieving their 47-mpg EPA gas mileage rating in real-world usage.
Now Consumer Reports has confirmed that finding, based on its own testing, in videos and a blog post published yesterday.
The consumer magazine achieved real-world mileage of 39 mpg combined in the 2013 Ford Fusion Hybrid it tested, and 37 mpg in its 2013 Ford C-Max.
Both vehicles are rated at 47 mpg combined by the EPA.
As the magazine's post says, "These two vehicles have the largest discrepancy between our overall-mpg results and the estimates published by the EPA that we've seen among any current models."
That's a pretty damning statement.
Consumer Reports goes on to note that the test results are fully 20 percent lower than the EPA rating, while, "Our overall-mpg results are usually pretty close to the EPA's combined-mpg estimate."
The post containing the comments includes a chart of the differences between CR's test results and the EPA ratings for 18 different cars it has tested recently. The two Ford hybrids top the list with the greatest difference.
At the other end are the 2013 Chevrolet Malibu Eco, which equaled its 29-mpg rating exactly, and the Honda CR-Z hybrid hatchback, in which CR's test drivers actually bettered its combined 34-mpg rating by 1 mpg.
(We would have preferred Consumer Reports to rank the differences by percent, rather than by the non-linear MPG scale, but the Fords would still have been at the top.)
Other outlets have reported similar results.AutoGuide, for instance, achieved just 40 mpg in a brief test of a Fusion Hybrid.
Earlier, Jason Harper, testing the 2013 Fusion Hybrid for Bloomberg, got 36.9 mpg.
And Gary Gastelu, writing for Fox News, said of his Fusion Hybrid, "It took a lot of work to get it anywhere near 40 mpg, let alone that magic 47 mpg mark."
While Green Car Reports hasn't yet had a 2013 Ford Fusion Hybrid to test, we've now driven the C-Max Hybrid twice.
At Ford's media drive, it delivered 37 mpg over 50 miles of mixed freeway and urban driving.
And during an abbreviated weekend test route, we got 40 mpg over 240 miles, mostly at freeway speeds.
The Ford hybrid situation could be especially awkward given that recent gas-mileage ratings errors by Hyundai and Kia have now gotten the attention of Congress.
In those cases, the carmakers had to re-rate their cars; apologize profusely to the public, to officials, and to their buyers; and issue refunds to buyers of the affected cars for the increased gasoline costs over the cars' lifetimes.
Will Ford be forced to take similar action? Stay tuned; there's clearly more to come on this story.
This 2011 file photo shows a totaled Ford in Holden, Mass. The White House has approved regulations requiring auto manufacturers include event data recorders, better known as "black boxes," in all new cars and light trucks. Data collected by the recorders is increasingly showing up in lawsuits, criminal cases and high-profile accidents. (Tom Retting/The Telegram & Gazette/AP/File)
New cars will have black boxes, White House says
The White House Office of Management has approved a request from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) to mandate event data recorders, commonly referred to as “black boxes,” in 100-percent of new vehicles sold.
In the very near future, then, the car you drive may monitor your every action behind the wheel, from speed to steering angle to brake pressure to whether or not you and your front seat passengers are buckled up.
If that makes you paranoid, this won’t help much: if you drive a newer car, chances are there’s already some kind of black box logging your actions, something that most consumers are blissfully unaware of. Today, The Detroit News tells us, 91.6 percent of light-duty autos utilize black boxes, so the latest directive would merely take that to 100 percent.
Black boxes in automobiles are really nothing new. General Motors began capturing data as far back as 1990, and event data recorders became standard in GM products during the 1995 model year.Ford uses them, as do Toyota, Tesla and Mazda, but standardization of the data captured won’t occur until the 2013 model year.
Beginning with 2013 vehicles, the black boxes will measure 15 specific values in a common format, making it easier for first responders and crash investigators to access and interpret the data. Therein lies the concern of critics who oppose capturing such data: if it exists, what’s to stop insurance companies from subpoenaing the information to deny accident claims?
Expect ownership of the data to become a point of concern once the new regulations take effect. While we may be safe from law enforcement wirelessly accessing data from black boxes (for the near future, anyway), we know one thing for certain: insurance companies aren’t in the business of losing money, and if such data can be used to pad profits, chances are good insurers will find a way to do so.
A Mercedes electric smart compact car is charged at a charging station during the International Motor Show in Frankfurt, in this September 2011 file photo. Electric motors are incredibly simple in operation whereas internal combustion engines can be made up of hundreds or thousands of parts, Ingram writes. (Kai Pfaffenbach/Reuters/File)
Are electric cars cheaper to maintain than gas vehicles?
Driving an electric car has plenty of advantages, but many owners also like the simplicity of their vehicles.
An electric motor is incredibly simple in operation. In contrast, internal combustion engines can be made up of hundreds of parts--even thousands, in particularly advanced engines.
That's why it's perhaps unsurprising to hear that new research suggests electric cars could cost 35 percent less to maintain than their combustion counterparts (via TheGreenCarWebsite).
A study conducted at the Institute for Automotive Research (IFA) at the Nürtingen-Geislingen University in southern Germany, concluded that anEV's simplicity pays dividends over longer ownership periods.
While the initial cost of electric cars is still high, they're not only cheaper to "fuel", but are expected to chew through consumable items much more slowly. ( Continue… )
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