efficiency

Efficiency is a large stumbling block if you're looking for a way to replace gasoline. It's pretty hard to better such an exceptional fuel, and several alternatives show promise but are nagged by inefficiencies or cost, and usually both. Nanotech to the rescue; it may soon be possible to produce ...

Ford is looking for ways to pack their automobiles with innovative technology that achieves the seemingly impossible goal of using smaller, more efficient engines while still delivering the performance wallop customers are demanding. Not only is the Blue Oval seeking more involvement from their ...

Cerberus isn't wasting any time teaching its new elephant to tapdance. Just days after closing the deal, taking over Chrysler and bringing Robert Nardelli on board, Cerberus has earmarked $3 billion for new powertrain facilities, indicating some level of its desire to steward the brand back to ...

It would seem that BMW reads Autoblog. How else would you explain them, at least partially, answering our question about how a conventional automobile would utilize some of the hybrid demon-tweaks?For the first time ever, BMW has equipped a non-hybrid car with a regenerative braking system. There's ...

Hybrids definitely do work -- we're not refuting that -- how well they work is open to debate, however, especially in light of the revisions to EPA mileage numbers. So, let's examine the Prius. Amazingly engineered vehicle, that's for sure. The way they got all those different systems to work as a ...

Just a decade ago, engine management was a relatively simple affair. Spark advance and fuel injection quantities were the key parameters, and the determination of both was a relatively simple matter of determining engine speed and load and using those values to index a lookup table. Nowadays, ...

Toyota Motor is methodically going about the task of increasing the efficiency (and lowering the cost) of automotive manufacturing, with its most visible project: a massive upgrade to its 660,000 units a year Takaoka assembly plant.Toyota CEO Katusuaki Watanabe predicts that the upgrades will make ...