Gas 2.0 |
- Ford Wayne Assembly Plant Getting Green Makeover
- Lotus Announces In-house Engine Program … Again
- GreenGT’s Reveals Upgraded Racing Prototype
| Ford Wayne Assembly Plant Getting Green Makeover Posted: 16 Dec 2010 12:27 PM PST
The Blue Oval has commited a sizable chunk o' change towards upgrading and greening the Wayne, Michigan Assembly Plant where the three electrified Focus's will be built. Ford is planning to add the largest solar panel installation in Michigan to the Wayne Plant, coming in at 500 kilowatts. The stamping plant next door runs on landfill gas, and Ford just recently leased ten electric heavy-duty yard tractors and is installing charging stations for the behemoths. This is a huge turnaround from just a few years ago, when this factory was responsible for cranking out the gas-guzzling SUV's and full-size trucks. It will now be devoted to the Focus, Focus electric, plug-in hybrid and conventional hybrid systems not unlike the one now found in the Fusion Hybrid. The Wayne plant is now Ford's highest-volume and most modern plant, with reprogrammable toolsets, standardized paint equipment, and a common-build sequence during final assembly. Basically, it can make a lot of different cars based on a similar platform (in this case, the Ford Focus). Aside from the Focus and its electrified variants, a Lincoln compact, C-Max mini-van, and other such cars will likely be built at the Wayne Plant in the future, which I’m betting will only get greener. Amazing how quickly these changes can happen, and the solar panels and electric tractors will save Ford a lot of money in the long run. A shame they didn't think to do it sooner, but late is better than never. I wonder how much more it will take to get the factory completely off the grid? Source: Detroit News Chris DeMorro is a writer and gearhead who loves all things automotive, from hybrids to Hemis. You can follow his slow descent into madness at Sublime Burnout. |
| Lotus Announces In-house Engine Program … Again Posted: 16 Dec 2010 11:05 AM PST
At this year’s Paris Auto show, the relatively-newly-appointed CEO of Lotus Cars embarked on a $1.2 billion rebranding of Lotus, hoping to transform the small engineering firm that happens to make cars into a credible automaker that happens to be really good at math. That CEO would be Dany “I’m not a car guy” Bahar, who – yesterday – announced that Lotus would be stepping away from its current engine supplier, Toyota, and take steps towards developing its own, “all Lotus” sportscar engine … … again. Why again? ”Again”, because this isn’t really news, and Lotus has probably been – quietly – developing sportscar engines for years.
 Lotus Type 918 Turbo V8 Back in 1996 (when Lotus was owned by Bugatti) the company revealed a new engine. Calling it the type 918, it was a small, twin-turbo V8 that was so compact and space-efficient it fit in the same space as the 2.0 L Renault-based four-cylinder the copany had been using for over a decade. According to the July 1996 issue of Motor Trend, the capacity of the adjacent cargo area had actually increased as a result of the swapping the twin-turbo V8 into the space of the old 4, causing MT editor Bob Nagy to proclaim that “Lotus’ engineers have mastered the space-time continuum.” In addition to being space-efficient, the then-new type 918 Lotus V8 was also thermally efficient to the point that its twin Garret-derived T3/60 turbos ran effectively without the use of intercoolers – something practically unheard of in a high-performance, mid-engined exotic.
 As Paris would say: that's hot. The 918 engine’s architecture was designed with an eye towards modular construction, such that the engine could be manufactured as a twin-tubo V8, a single-turbo inline-4, a supercharged V6, or even a naturally-aspirated V10 … this “modularity” is a well-practiced black-art at Lotus, which uses the same basic modular chassis to produce two generations of the Elise and Exige sportscars, as well as the GT1 Elise, the Opel Speedster, the 211 track-day special, the Europa, the Evora, the Hennessey Venom, and – last but not least – the Tesla Roadster. At the time, Lotus had hoped to provide the 918, in various guises, to other small-volume manufacturers. Those hopes were dashed, however, by the sale of Lotus to the Malaysian company Proton, which imposed enough real “business-sense” into the engineering-driven Lotus culture to essentially save the marque. Part of Proton’s “Lotus Survival Strategy” was, of course, to partner with a much larger firm who could absorb R&D costs for new powertrains, which – in the late 90′s – also included new, tougher emissions regulations in the US and Europe (Lotus’ core markets). The Lotus Esprit – the only model to make use of the innovative 918 – was discontinued for sound business reasons. The 918 was shelved in favor of cheaper/more profitable Toyota-sourced engines, until a time came when Lotus (and, indeed, the world) might again need a dimensionally compact, efficient, and powerful turbocharged V8 again. Fast forward 15 years to 2011. There is a huge new demand for small, thermally-efficient, turbocharged engines. Racing series all over the world are switching to small, turbocharged 4-cylinders. Proton has injected over a billion dollars into Lotus and the company is set to launch a new chassis, which will form the basis for several new Lotus models. Lotus is moving upmarket, and has developed its own, unique hybrid-drive systems … … in other words: Lotus doesn’t need Toyota anymore. You’ve got to hand it to Bahar. He’s not a car guy, but he seems to have a good business head on his shoulders, and he may be the guy who finally turns the world’s best engineers into the world’s smartest car company. Sources: Autocar, Wired, a long and sad series of lonely Saturday nights in college spent reading Motor Trend.
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| GreenGT’s Reveals Upgraded Racing Prototype Posted: 16 Dec 2010 09:28 AM PST
Last year Swiss company GreenGT unveiled its Twenty-4 electric race car. With 100kW of power from each of the two electric motors, the original Twenty-4 had a peak output of around 270 horsepower. The major upgrade to the new Twenty-4 is, quite simply, more power. With 300 kW, or over 400 horsepower, the new GreenGT race car is simply superior to the predecessor. It also has new torque vectoring software to dole out the power on an as-needed basis in the corners, and a more powerful liquid-cooled battery. The Twenty-4 is so named because the hope of GreenGT is to build an electric car that can run in the famed 24 Hours of Le Mans, pretty much the ultimate car race. Figuring out (or creating) a class for the Twenty-4 to compete in could be a problem, as vehicles are divided up by a number of parameters, including production model, engine size, so on and so forth. Another problem, obviously, is that its an electric vehicle with limited range and a long recharge time. The winning Audi team from 2010's 24 Hours of Le Mans was in the pits for just 20 minutes total throughout the entire 24 hour race. There isn't time to recharge an electric car, so obviously they'd need some kind of quick battery-swap system. It can, and will be done one day. Whether GreenGT's dreams ever move beyond the prototype phase or not, electric cars will take to the 24 Hours of Le Mans in our lifetime. Who knows, maybe they'll even win. Source: AutoBlogGreen / GreenGT Chris DeMorro is a writer and gearhead who loves all things automotive, from hybrids to Hemis. You can follow his slow descent into madness at Sublime Burnout. |
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