Nissan GT-R: Launch Control is Dead, Long Live VDC
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In a letter sent to its dealers earlier this week, Nissan USA outlined changes it is making to the 2010 Nissan GT-R and the remaining stock of 2009 models. These changes affect all GT-Rs sold globally and are designed to specifically address the controversy surrounding Godzilla's much-hyped transmission issues. What are these changes? We spoke to our sources inside Nissan for clarification and here is what they told us: essentially, "launch control" is no more -- though you'd never hear Nissan put it that way. From the beginning, it has never formally recognized the term, preferring instead the more inscrutable "VDC Off" terminology.  Nissan claims to have performed a software update to the transmission control module (TCM) with the goal of removing any real or perceived performance advantage gained by turning Vehicle Dynamics Control (VDC) off. In its place, Nissan says the update will allow the GT-R to shift smoother and accelerate faster in "normal" (VDC on) mode. As far as Nissan USA is concerned, the changes are aimed at improving the car's overall performance and boosting customer satisfaction.  With the software changes, you can expect to find the maximum performance of the updated GT-R approaching what the first batch of cars could do with its VDC off. Nissan claims the retuned GT-R will be quicker than the old version in day-to-day situations such as flat-footing it from a stoplight.  If you're a prospective GT-R buyer, your 2009 or 2010 GT-R will ship with the update so no action will be required on your end. |
Pony Tail: Inside the Coolest Turn Signals Since the '60s
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Hey Washington Beltway bellyachers, check out this Detroit-Three innovation: Signal to turn in a new 2010 Mustang, and the tail lamps illuminate sequentially to point the way the car is turning, one-two-three from the inside to the outside. Oh, I know most of you are plenty old enough to remember the Thelma-n-Louise T-bird that launched this idea in 1965, and the '67 Mercury Cougar, '68 Shelby Mustang, and '69 Imperial that followed. But unlike those 1965-1968 versions, these involve no motors, rotating contacts, or moving parts to wear out. And get this, greenies: These new ones save fuel.
Okay, the sequential blinking doesn't save anything noticeable, but the LED lamps that are flashing (and serving tail-lamp and brake-light duty) consume 87 percent less power than the incandescent bulbs they replace. This helps save 10.5 gallons of gas per year in the typical Mustang, according to Osram, the folks who produce the system and that pioneered myriad other lighting innovations on earlier Ford/Lincoln-Mercury products. More good news: Unlike most LED signal and tail lamps you're aware of, which position an array of LEDs behind some sort of lens in a custom fitting for a particular car, the Mustang's LEDs work very much like a traditional incandescent bulb.
They're bulb-shaped, so they fit into a traditional lens and reflector housing with a push-and-turn base, drastically reducing the replacement cost of the tail lamp after crash damage (costing about half as much). They typically last the life of a vehicle and are unaffected by shock and vibration, so they're ideal in extreme applications (Pratt & Miller has used Joule lamps for three seasons of Corvette endurance racing without a failure).These so-called Joule lamps incorporate the LEDs, the thermal management (that ring sitting just behind the reflector housing), and the control circuitry (which resides in the connector).
Joule lamps cannot replace incandescent bulbs in existing applications (at least not yet), but this plug-n-play approach allows manufacturers to work LEDs into their product lines for vastly less investment cost than all those custom applications you see out there, which is why Chevy can afford to have an LED fitment on only the LTZ model of the Malibu. Joule lamps are also in use on the Ford Taurus X and the Mercury Mountaineer and Sable.
The Mustang's other Osram lighting flourish is found inside, where the MyColor dash gauge backlight color is now keyed with the rest of the interior ambient lighting, so that when you dial up ghoulish green or whorehouse red on the dash, the footwells, cupholders, etc. all glow with the flow.
Ford Gets Phased -- Using Free Energy
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Variable valve timing is ancient history. You already know that twiddling the intake and exhaust valve timing and overlap helps broaden an engine's torque curve and that most engines do this by inserting a gizmo in between the camshaft and the pulley for the timing chain or belt. And as you well know, this widget uses engine oil pressure to advance or retard the cam relative to its pulley.
What you may not know is that relying on engine oil pressure limits the performance of these "cam phasers" at engine start-up, when the oil is cold and thick, and at low engine speeds when the pump isn't producing much pressure. Well the clever engineers at Ford noticed the oil pressure in the chambers that move the cam one way or the other experiences a little wiggle before and after each cam lobe opens its valve. That's because the high pressure of the valve spring wants to slow the lobe down just before it pushes the valve fully open, and then tries to speed it up when the valve starts closing. Instead of fighting this back-and-forth wiggling, Ford decided to harness it, using these little pressure pulses to advance or retard the cam.
The system is elegantly simple. Engine oil pressure is fed to the cam phaser, but very little or no oil flows to it or through it. Instead, the pressure needed to move in one direction is supplied by the pressure spikes from the opposite chamber and vice versa. A simple three-position spool valve allows oil to flow in either direction or not at all. The system works a bit like a ratchet wrench.
This Cam-Torque Actuated variable valve timing system reportedly reduces oil-pump flow requirements by 25% relative to conventional VVT systems, for a claimed fuel-economy boost of 0.4% on Ford's 3.0L Duratec V-6-powered Fusion (CTA's first application). But the real benefit is that the system can start rotating the cam about 350 rpm earlier than oil-pump-pressure systems and can ramp up much faster, achieving the full 47 deg (crankshaft angle) advance by 1500 rpm -- that's 40 deg more advance at that point than the old system. The overall net result (other engine improvements include tweaks to the cylinder head and intake for better breathing, 10.3:1 compression, and flex-fuel capability) is an extra 19 hp and 23 lb-ft of torque with improved fuel economy (thanks largely to the new six-speed automatic). Expect this elegantly simple and cost-effective system to migrate throughout Ford's VVT engine lineup.
Smart Intersections: A solution to dumb drivers?
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We've covered the idea of cars talking to each other and to the roadside infrastructure before, back when GM pitched us the idea in February 2006. But those so-called vehicle-to-vehicle networks don't become really useful until thousands of vehicles are equipped with the two-way communicators. Ford reckons that so-called "Smart Intersections" might be able to start whittling away at the accident-related injuries that currently occur in intersections, as well as the estimated three billion gallons of gas we waste in congestion related to intersection accidents.
Research indicates that 40 percent of all traffic accidents and 20 percent of crash-related fatalities occur in intersections today. It's unknown just how many of those are attributable to driver distraction, but whatever that statistic, it's bound to be increasing. Ford and a consortium involving GM, Daimler AG, Honda, and Toyota believe electronics can serve as "a vigilant passenger" to help warn a distracted or generally inattentive driver of impending danger.
The Smart Intersections initiative envisions a black box equipped with a 5.9 GHz (WiFi type) Dedicated Short Range Communications (DSRC) radio transmitter, a GPS unit (many newer intersections already use GPS for signal-timing purposes), a high-definition map of the local area, and a Siemens controller. As a vehicle equipped with this DSRC hardware approaches such an intersection, it downloads the high-res map so the car can interpret exactly which lane it is in (typical nav systems can't do this), and info about what color the light is and when the next change will occur.
If the vehicle is approaching a red light too quickly to stop, or approaching an impending yellow at a speed that might pose a problem stopping, a bright-red warning light on the dash and/or voice command draw the driver's attention to the windshield, thereby (it's hoped) preventing an accident. The map data downloaded also can include high-res maps to enable warning of stop-sign intersections, too (these intersections would generally be "dumb" otherwise).
Cost is said to represent only a modest upgrade from a current state-of-the-art electronically controlled intersection and to represent a savings relative to the installation and maintenance costs of traffic-sensor loops and optical traffic recognition gear, but those may still be needed until a critical mass of cars is equipped. The vehicle only needs another antenna that can likely be integrated with other on-board antennas, and some signal conditioning gear. Ford envisions fully upgradable units that can incorporate future vehicle-to-vehicle warnings that promise to prevent crashes outside of intersections as well. Ford also envisions kits to retrofit some older cars with nav systems to recognize smart intersections as well. We say, the sooner the better!
Toyota announces natural-gas Camry hybrid
The first alternative-fuel car of the 2008 Los Angeles Auto Show has already been announced; Toyota will combine natural-gas and hybrid power in its CNG (compressed natural gas) Camry hybrid concept. (Camry SE shown.)
While natural-gas cars get roughly equivalent fuel economy as those powered by gasoline, the key difference is that emissions are cleaner. Plus, natural gas is clean-burning and in abundant supply in North America. However, tanks to hold natural gas are very large and hold relatively little fuel. Thus CNG-fueled cars tend to have a fairly modest driving range. And with only about 500 CNG stations nationwide open to consumers, the short range is a big problem. The hybrid system helps alleviate that somewhat. Our gasoline-powered Camry Hybrid had a range of 600 miles, so if the CNG version has conservatively half the range (roughly the same relationship of the Honda Civic Hybrid compared to the Civic CNG), it would be close to that in most gasoline cars.
In our testing of a gasoline-powered Camry Hybrid, we noted its relatively small trunk, worsened by constrained access resulting from the hybrid-battery cooling systems. With a large CNG tank, the trunk may be tiny. We’ll keep you posted when we see the car next month at the L.A. Auto Show.
For now, the CNG Camry Hybrid is a concept car; Toyota announced no plans to build more of them.
Look for live, daily coverage of the Los Angeles Auto Show starting November 19th.Blinded by the Light? Comparing New LED Headlamps with HID/Xenon, Halogen
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Be prepared to encounter a new kind of bright headlamps coming at you on the road. I recently ventured out to GM's Milford, Michigan, Proving Ground to try out the Cadillac Escalade Platinum's spanking new LED low- and high-beam headlights. Cadillac is the first to offer light-emitting diodes for low- and high-beam lights and turn signals in the U.S. (Audi's European R8 also offers them, and the Lexus LS 600h uses LED for its low-beams only).
LEDs promise daylight-bright illumination with low current draw and unprecedented packaging and styling flexibility. They're little silicon computer chips, so they're relatively slim by nature and they can conform to unusual shapes, though they still need to shine through a lens of some sort. Cadillac has adopted them for its ne-plus-ultra flagship model, arranging the LEDs in a narrow vertical stack to match the vertical taillamps that have become a signature design motif (they're also LEDs).
Each Cadillac headlamp includes five LED arrays and lenses to cover the low-beam pattern and two for high-beam, with each of the seven units dedicated to lighting up a particular area of the road. LEDs throw little or no infrared heat forward (stick your hand in front of most any headlight and it'll feel warm -- not the LEDs), but the chips generate heat that has to be removed, so they have finned heat-sinks like many computers use, with a fan that circulates cooling air (in the winter, this helps defog and de-ice the headlamps). Further development will reduce the heat generated, resulting in lower energy consumption than High-Intensity Discharge (aka Xenon), but for now they draw just a bit less than Halogen bulbs.
We got the chance to compare the Platinum's LED headlamps against the Escalade's standard HIDs and against a Yukon Denali's halogen compound-reflector lamps. From the driver's seat the illumination is amazing. The "color temperature" of the light is about 6000 Kelvin (10,340 *** which is whiter than daylight (5600K). HID lamps, the ones that look bluer, are 4500K. At the bottom of the scale is the yellower looking light of your halogen headlight bulbs (3200K) and plain incandescent foglamps (2800K).
The light reflected back from roadside signs seems much brighter with LED than HID. The HID lamps illuminate the sides of the road more brightly and their high-beam pattern is like a huge cone of light reaching quite high. This is in part because each lamp produces more lumens of light -- about 2500 to the LED's 2000 total, though the total light perceived on the road is roughly equivalent. That means the LEDs must focus their light right where it's needed, so there's less sideways scatter and the high-beam pattern appears maybe twice the vehicle's height and four-lanes wide at a quarter-mile distance. The upper cut-off of the low-beam light pattern seems sharper on the HIDs, because there is a sort of "eyelid" cutting it off until you turn on the high beams. LEDs light up the same pattern on the road, but the edge of the light is less sharply defined. By comparison, the halogen beams appear dangerously inadequate -- a pool of yellow light right in front of the truck with far less reflection coming back from road signs, less side illumination, weaker high-beams, etc.
Cost is the big unknown. All anyone is saying is that it's "considerably more" than HID at the moment, though with time and volume production LEDs should achieve parity or become cheaper. The Platinum model costs $10,705 more than an Escalade optioned as close as possible to the Platinum's equipment level. Along with the LED lamps, that premium pays for unique front-end styling that apes the CTS's, a four-screen rear-seat entertainment system that can play something different on each screen, heated and cooled cupholders, a special overhead console, spectacular two-tone inlaid wood and handsewn leather trim on the dash and door panels, plus glove-soft aniline leather seating surfaces. The LED chips are expected to last the life of the vehicle and the cooling fans are replaceable if they fail, in which case the light dims by 20% to prevent damage if the temperature tops 300 F. If the chips fail or the unit suffers crash damage, a replacement lamp assembly part will cost about $1500 (which may or may not be subsidized).
How do they look to opposing traffic? Utterly blinding in high-beam mode, though not much worse than HID high-beams. The low beams don't look blue and there isn't too much glare, but the unusually tall stack of lights is sure to be perceived by oncoming motorists as high-beams. One flash of the Platinum's REAL brights will set lamp-flashers straight, pronto. I expect LEDs to propagate slowly through the market. Within three to five years, the light output per energy input should improve by 50%, which will make LED a fuel-savings feature. In the more distant future, LED lighting can provide adaptive illumination with no motors or moving parts, turning different LEDs on and off to provide cornering illumination and to alter the light pattern and prevent glare in approaching vehicles or even in the rearview mirrors of a car ahead (no Escalades currently offer adaptive front lighting to illuminate the direction the vehicle is turning). And I'm hopeful that by then, affordable LED-powered replacements for sealed-beam headlights will bring high-performance illumination to old-car hobbyists like me.
