Suppliers that fail to be ahead of regulations, standards, and consumer requirements can suffer in bringing up new automotive technologies to market.
In early days of auto industry, latest technologies tend to introduce in random manner, at times based on inventor’s whim or possibly even dream tinkerer had night before. Great Bentley brought in aluminum pistons in automobiles due to decorative piston shaped paperweight that he had seen! To men and women functioning in this area, vagaries that enclose successful new automotive technology introductions most likely seem wide open. For each technology that embraces, over 10 potential fresh ones are been discarded. Steam cooled engines, talking dashboards, plastic cylinder blocks, as well as high-temperature electric batteries are some of ideas, which sounds good at some point, however finished up on the industry’s discard pile.
In order understand forces at work — and huge investments that they make — means knowing four main drivers of the automotive technology achievement and failure. Those 4 drivers are:
The robustness of technology platform: Accurately, is a technology market ready? Obstructions to robustness comprise lack of resources possessing properties needed, insufficient control plans to make thing work in a field, short of infrastructure to hold up invention, unproven construction processes as well as faulty and under-optimized product & process designs.
Many of obstacles to market readiness for new technology is related to lack of required control and pointer systems. The anti-lock brakes were foiled for years unless necessary sensor patterns and cheaply obtainable digital power caught up. Original ABS systems that was introduced by Hayes & Bendix in 1960s utlized analog PC systems, which had important performance, cost & dependability drawbacks — in some other words, they did not work very well! Ever more, robustness comprises of ability to net with industry wide standards when they evolve.
One more key “gating feature” for automotive technology is materials performance. Some designs developed in early days of automobile might succeed if materials were available with necessary performance properties. Key to Ford Model success and indestructibility need to do with the apply of molybdenum steel that was hardly at limits of the commercial feasibility until obsessed Ford drove the producers to build necessary developments.
Lack of transportation also constricts technology’s marketplace readiness. The major obstacles facing today’s substitute fuel technologies is a lack of fueling and charging stations for the natural gas and electric cars. Lastly, less than optimal basic pattern solutions have harshly inhibited latest technology robustness, in spite of soundness of an underlying pattern.
Entertainment & Convenience. The satellite radios allow drivers listen to favorite music and radio programming continuous across all over the country. Some also straight connect Mp3 player in stereo system. Some cars feature the DVD systems in order to keep the passengers calm. Moveable GPS systems are used in whatsoever car you are driving and phones can give maps as well as driving directions.
There is so many more technological advances that will happen in the future. Keep up to date with items as mentioned above by checking your local paper or even the Internet. Technology is a great thing.
By: Tom Tessin
Archive for November, 2009
Learning About Automotive Technology
November 25th, 2009Saab Provides Flex-fuel Technology for Entire 9-3 Range
November 20th, 2009The entire global community is now being confronted with the quite heated global warming issue. That is the reason why car makers are doing their share so as to reduce the amount of greenhouse gases that are being released from their vehicles. Alternative fuels are being studied to be a substitute for fossil fuels.
Saab is one of the major players in the auto industry which have taken a step in the promotion of green cars. This is evident in the fact that Saab has introduced the new 1.8t BioPower engine which will be employed by all the models in the 9-3 range.
The automaker becomes the first and only auto manufacturer to offer flex-fuel engines for every model in its lineup. The engine will be available to the 9-3 Sport Saloon, 9-3 Sport Wagon, and the 9-3 Convertible. These vehicles will be sporting an alternative fuel powered engine in the near future which means that the amount of greenhouse gases from Saab vehicles will be substantially reduced.
Vehicles employing the 1.8t engine emit 50-70 percent less carbon dioxide, which is a known greenhouse gas, compared to the 1.8t gasoline powered engine. Although the vehicle will produce less greenhouse gases, the engine will provide 17 percent more power and ten percent greater torque over the gasoline engine. The engine will also run on E85 which is fuel that is a combination of gasoline and bio-ethanol. The E85 is composed of 85 percent bio-ethanol and 15 percent gasoline hence its name.
The 1.8t BioPower engine will be the third flex-fuel engine that will come from Saab. Saab originally equipped two of their 9-5 models with flex-fuel engines. Both shows reduced emissions and better performance than gasoline engines.
Jan ?ke Jonsson, Saab Automobile’s Managing Director, has this to say about the launch of the BioPower engines: “The success of the 9-5 BioPower has encouraged us to extend this concept to the 9-3 range. This means we can now offer BioPower variants throughout our core lineup”.
Currently, Saab is the largest seller of flex-fuel vehicles in Europe. And with the use of the 1.8t BioPower engine on the whole range of the 9-3 would only increase their popularity as the premiere producer of green cars in Europe.
The Saab 1.8t BioPower engine provides more power than the 1.8t gasoline engine. While the gasoline engine produces 150 horsepower, the flex-fuel engine can deliver as much as 175 horsepower. In terms of torque, the gasoline engine can produce 240Nm while the BioPower engine can produce 265 Nm. The increase in torque gives the flex-fuel vehicles with faster acceleration than gasoline engine equipped 9-3 vehicles. The better performance of the flex-fuel vehicles can be complemented with a set of high performance brake parts from Active Brakes Direct.
By: Anthony Fontanelle
