Automakers toil to drop a few pounds
Just as Americans continue to get fatter, so do our cars. According to the EPA, the average weight of a new vehicle in 2006 is a whopping 4,142 lbs - that's up a quarter-ton from ten years ago, and is the heaviest yet since the EPA began tracking the statistic in 1975. Not only does weight hurt fuel economy, but it also drags down performance. Adding additional horsepower is easy nowadays, but that of course hits economy a second time. The end result is that fuel economy improvements have stalled in the last decade, despite vastly improved engine technology.
This has prompted automakers to consider a variety of diet plans. The supplier of trim moldings for Buick's Lucerne managed to cut a whopping five pounds out of that vehicle's plastic and rubber trim, while the aluminum hood and deck of Chrysler's LX vehicles are said to shave 15-20 lbs. Such improvements seem minor, but when repeated several times throughout the vehicle, substantial gains can be had.
Of course, like any weight-loss program, it's much easier to put the weight on than it is to take it off, so the situation is unlikely to improve substantially until buyers accept a compromise in power, features, safety, size, or price. The likelihood of that, even at over $3/gallon, seems quite low at this time.
[Source: Autoweek/Automotive News]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
Tim UF 1:30PM (8/07/2006)
I'd imagine that some of the issue is the higher number of Ute's being bought. But cars have grown as well. As I've said before: Todays Corolla is bigger than 1990's Camry. (Same goes for honda and the old Accord and new Civic). how a compact car (like the corolla or civic) still qualifies as a compact is beyond me... considering that 18 years ago, these would likely qualify as mid o even large cars, especially if based on interior volume.
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Cervus 1:46PM (8/07/2006)
The other day I drove behind a 1985 Honda Accord. That car is smaller than my 2005 Corolla. It seems that with every redesign cars get a little bigger and heavier.
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gbh 1:48PM (8/07/2006)
Between safety and customer-driven NVH and power demands, it is kinda nuts, isn't it?
Remember when it was pretty simple?
small: 2000#
midsize: 3000#
big/luxury: 3800-4500#
The bright part of the future comes from composites - as they become more mainstream, there will be a huge loss in weight, with no compromise of safety or NVH.
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Jeff the Baptist 1:48PM (8/07/2006)
Part of it is regular car growth, more features and more power means more size. The other is that car makers are pulled in multiple dimensions at once and the laws of physics are rather inflexible. You can't get something for nothing no matter how loudly Congress calls for it.
The major offender in this area is probably crash standards. Try building a little car that can take an impact with a Suburban or 18 wheeler. Good luck.
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Jose Lara 2:08PM (8/07/2006)
a great exaple (in SUVs) are the Toyota 4runner (87 model) compared to the new one!!! (i think the rav4 is a little bigger now than the 87 model) and also the original pathfinder and the current one (it look huge!!!) and i think xterra is about the same siz if not bigger. and yeah that also mean a lotta weight!
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Karl 2:11PM (8/07/2006)
Federal regulation may play a small part in overweight cars, but there's more the manufacturers can do.
My second car was almost all fiberglass and aluminum forward of the passenger compartment.
Most of the cars are still a large part steel. Aluminum is expensive, so is fiberglass.
So like most things, it's a comprimise. Keep costs down, weight goes up, fuel economy goes down, horsepower goes up (even though most people don't use their V8 to it's potential). Plus, a fiberglass repair is going to be huge compared to steel for minor fenderbenders, so the insurance industry also has a say in the matter.
Pay a little more now, or pay a lot later.
Good, fast, cheap. Pick two out of three.
Personally, I'll take good and fast, then pay up front. Since auto loans are getting longer and longer, most people opt to pay twice over time than 1/3rd more up front.
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Alvin 2:27PM (8/07/2006)
Yet people refuse to believe me when I tell them my 1976 Plymouth Duster was lighter than most modern "economy" cars, and that with its 6 cylinder and overdrive, it got pretty damn good gas mileage too. I don't remember the weight exactly, but I think it was in the 3400lb range. Hell, my 76 Plymouth Belvedere - a sedan - weighed in around 3800lb title weight.
In comparison - I had a 1985 Dodge Charger that weighed 2300lbs title weight. Ran like a (*insert politically correct phrase for "really fast" here*) with only 110 hp due to the low weight. When I later bought a 1994 Dodge Shadow, it had the benefit of fuel injection and 9 years of technology, but was much slower due to a 3400lb curb weight! It weighed 1100 lbs more than an equivalent car of 9 years before, and had the same engine. Needless to say, fuel economy suffered.
The car with the best fuel economy I ever owned was a 1992 Toyota Tercel. 1.5 litre 4-cylinder with 83 hp, I have no idea how much it weighed. Couldn't have been much. On the highway it would get 34mpg easy. However, driving around town it only got 20mpg. Why? Well I'm a bit of a leadfoot you see. With 83hp, it couldn't move itself out of its own way, so I was constantly putting the pedal to the floor to keep cars behind me from getting pissed off. Oddly enough, my 1976 Duster - with a cast iron engine designed in 1960 - got 20mpg in city driving. And, in the Duster, if I put the pedal to the floor, it moved PDQ. It didn't have a problem getting out of the way.
My experience is that sometimes small is too small. But combine small with a decently powerful engine, and you have the sweet spot. But modern cars are forgoing the "small". Oftimes, the engines they package in these behemoths aren't powerful enough to move them, so drivers have to push them hard, cutting gas milage. Don't make them so damn heavy!
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Stphane Dumas 2:54PM (8/07/2006)
#7 Alvin, the 1976 Plymouth Duster was available with a package called "Feather Duster" here an exterpt from this link http://www.valiant.org/duster.html
"The Feather Dusters were made in 1976, with an aluminum inner hood, trunk bracing, bumper brackets, and intake manifold; economy carb and distributor calibration; large exhaust system; tall rear axle ratio; and either 3 speed auto or 4 speed overdrive manual trans.
Their gas mileage was great for their day, and even for the present, given their size: 24 city, 36 highway. Few modern cars of that size can claim this. With an automatic, gas mileage slipped considerably, to 22 city/31 highway - still comparable to modern cars. Very few were sold, partly because they had to compete with the new Aspen and Volare, which were in the same price class; and because the tall rear axle ratio took a serious hit on performance."
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Tim UF 3:04PM (8/07/2006)
from the edmunds write up on the new yaris S sedan:
"21st-century Corolla
Despite its subcompact label, the Yaris is longer, wider and heavier than the Echo it replaces and about the same size as that best-selling Corolla from a decade ago."
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Araemo 3:14PM (8/07/2006)
I do wish more companies would put some effort into weight reduction. I think a lot of companies look at it as a last-step trimming-down to improve economy/performance(and maybe even cost, since hollow/lighter plastic parts might be cheaper since they use less raw materials?).
If they designed for low weight from the beginning, I think they'd have better luck.
My current car weighs 2750lbs and frankly, it's too heavy for what it is. It's still lighter than a lot of modern cars, and for that I give Nissan props, but they should have given the SE-R version more of a diet compared to the base Sentra.
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HardwareGuy 3:53PM (8/07/2006)
I think it's unfair to compare cars from the 70's to cars from today, weight-wise. Safety features alone probably account for most of the added weight. Would you rather get in an accident in a 70's car or a 00's car?
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UH2L 3:54PM (8/07/2006)
Cars are getting heavier due to increased safety and luxury content and higher safety standards but also because we as drivers and occupants keep getting taller and wider. It's that simple.
The whole VW/Audi lines seem to be really heavy. Even the compact Jetta can weigh close to 3,300 lbs!
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Bob Schindler 3:55PM (8/07/2006)
The Toyota Corolla FX-16 was Toyota's answer to the VW GTI. Its wheelbase is 95.7 inches, body is a 3-door hatchback, engine is a 1587 cc four cylinder twin cam 16 valve, HP is 110 at 6600 rpm, WEIGHT is 2365 pounds,EPA rating is 25/29 mpg. Performance is 0 to 60 in 8.3 seconds. My 1987 has over 100,000 miles on it and continues to be a blast. The New VW GTI isn't much faster or more eccomomical and it it has a supercharger. Is that progress?
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Tim UF 4:10PM (8/07/2006)
UH2L: I dont know if we are getting taller, really, but we (americans at least) are definately getting wider, thank you coca-cola nad mcdonalds! I think i read a while back that honda had to redesign the seats in USDM vehicles to accomodate out backsides even.
at 5'6" and 175, being able to fit in a car is not one of my considerations... though, seeing beyond the hood in some cases is... ie any of the 'high beltline' cars.
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doglet 4:39PM (8/07/2006)
I was recently in europe for business and i noticed how all audis bmws ect had great seats. proper sports seats with tall side bolsters. very few of these seats are even optional on the same models in the US. were not all fat asses, make the good seats available.
cars today are all to heavy. a 67 shelby gt350 weighed about 2750 lbs. a modern mustang with its computer designed unibody, aluminum hood and aluminum engine weighs over 3500 lbs. does an mp3 player really weigh all that much? can you imagine if they could maintain the weights of the 60s cars with the capability of today?
what has happened is this, heavy cars make small light weight cars dangerious so the smallest car you could sell steadly rose as the ford extinction got bigger and bigger. the lightest a car can be and still be legal to sell in the US mass produced is abou 2400 lbs. add 2 more doors and thats 2600 lbs. now you need a 2.2 liter so and another 30 lbs. now the brakes arent up to the job so you need bigger ones. now you need bigger wheels and tires all around. add some features and your up to 3000 lbs, about the average weight for a small four door in the us.
i blame federal crash regulations for making small cars illegal.
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RDL 5:38PM (8/07/2006)
"My experience is that sometimes small is too small. But combine small with a decently powerful engine, and you have the sweet spot. But modern cars are forgoing the "small". Oftimes, the engines they package in these behemoths aren't powerful enough to move them, so drivers have to push them hard, cutting gas milage. Don't make them so damn heavy!
Posted at 2:27PM on Aug 7th 2006 by Alvin"
Bingo!
OT, my ideal lightweight car:
- 2.0 liter Inline-4 (~250HP) with:
- LPT (1)
- GDI (2)
- High compression ratio
- 8,000+ RPM redline
- gobs of torque from 2,000 RPM till redline
- 195/50-15 wheels/tires
- RWD (AWD too heavy)
- *MANUAL* six-speed
- *NO MORE THAN* 2,000 pounds (~ 900 KG)
- *NO MORE THAN* USD$20,000
A man can dream...
(1) http://www.autozine.org/technical_school/engine/tech_engine_3.htm#LPT
(2) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gasoline_Direct_Injection
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MarkWeb 5:46PM (8/07/2006)
I still don't understand exactly why the VW Rabbit and Chevy Cobalt weight significantly more than the Ford Focus, Toyota Corolla, and Honda Civic. Although my 2006 Cobalt is delivering 33-35 mpg even with its heavier weight and larger engine(with a stick shift and easy freeway commute) quite regularly.
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Richard Warren 5:52PM (8/07/2006)
"According to the EPA, the average weight of a new vehicle in 2006 is a whopping 4,142 lbs - that's up a quarter-ton from ten years ago, and is the heaviest yet since the EPA began tracking the statistic in 1975."
Key word: AVERAGE
Next key word (not spoken) % of vehicles that are large SUV's and Trucks. Pretty simple, do the math, what's popular? SUV's, what's not, small cars. How much does all that extra room for one weigh in at? A lot.
How many SUV's were on the road in 1975?
The AVERAGE just went up.
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naggs 6:14PM (8/07/2006)
not only the average has gone up but look at every model car. every generation is bigger and heavier than the one before. a gen 2 GTI weighed in at a little over 2000 lbs. a new one is over 50% heavier! it is now illegal to mass produce cars that weigh less than about 2500 lbs, its just impossible for a really small car to pass crash testing. the problem is getting worse and worse. it wont be long before you cant buy a civic that weighs less than 3000 lbs.
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naggs 6:18PM (8/07/2006)
"OT, my ideal lightweight car:
- 2.0 liter Inline-4 (~250HP) with:
- LPT (1)
- GDI (2)
- High compression ratio
- 8,000+ RPM redline
- gobs of torque from 2,000 RPM till redline
- 195/50-15 wheels/tires
- RWD (AWD too heavy)
- *MANUAL* six-speed
- *NO MORE THAN* 2,000 pounds (~ 900 KG)
- *NO MORE THAN* USD$20,000"
its not possible to sell this car in the us, its just too small. at this point i will settle for a 2700 lb car with RWD. maybe a kappa car could loose a couple hundred pounds if they added a roof? such a car might never be made again.
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