This just in…VW now admits that their “cheating software” was installed on ~11 million cars sold worldwide, and that they intend to fix all of them and will attempt to regain consumer confidence in the company. Just be glad if you don’t own any VW stock.
Other diesel makers seem to have met the spec without cheating, using urea injection. VW tried to keep their cars cheaper to buy. They made a HUGE mistake.
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…and that huge mistake has now cost their CEO his job.
I can’t find the quote, but there was a post elsewhere from a GM emissions engineer that described how many people were involved in programming the emissions system, how it interacted with all the engine controls, and how LOTS of VW personnel had to be fully aware of what was going on.
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Without question, this was not the work of one or two rogue employees.
Rather, this had to be a calculated corporate strategy involving a lot of people in more than one department.
#texases I agree there had to be a lot of people involved. But Germans “follow orders” and as Harry Truman’s sign on his desk said: “The buck stops here”!.
A whistle blower might have lost his or her job by squealing.
All in all, I did not expect this from a company that prides itself on “Vorsprung durch Technik”.
So then…I have a fairly big question for the next level.
Where did this software come from ?
Did VW design it and keep it for themselves ?
OR…
Is this software out there in millions of other brand vehicles, both gas and diesel, for the same purpose…to change the parameters during testing.?
Is this just the tip of the iceberg ?
You know, it kind of disturbs me when I see EPA regulations described as “onerous.”
The climate is on its way to changing such that life as we know it today will be vastly more difficult to come by. Low-lying coastal areas will disappear, storms will be much more destructive, droughts, higher temperatures, and storms will contribute to a decline in global food supply, etc etc. Now, I’m bumping up against 40, so I may not live long enough to see the full effects of this disaster, but people younger than I am will.
Considering the amount of pollution that is still being belched into the atmosphere (and yes, I acknowledge that cars are not the only source, but this does not mean that cars should be ignored), I would say our pollution control regulations are not onerous enough.
These regs are not impossible to comply with - they just mean the car doesn’t go as fast. Well, if you’re buying a freaking diesel, you’re not looking for Ferrari performance in the first place. You getting up to 60 half a second faster is not worth continuing to contribute to the destruction of the environment.
We can either impose these “onerous” regulations now and stave off or perhaps prevent the worst impact of climate change, or we can call them onerous, refuse to do anything about the problem, and then have even more onerous consequences imposed upon us by forces beyond our control. It’s up to us.
@VDCdriver, Winterkorn has not lost his job yet according to the article you referenced. There are a few rumors that he is gone, but they were denied. You might be right, but it hasn’t happened yet.
@teaxases, that looks more like a “natural” gas system to me.
I never meant that the rules were too strict(please go back and reread post) you may think I 'm crazy,but I have been wondering why VW diesels smelled different.
But according to this one cat I listened to,we are about to go in a “solar minimum” period and the earth is due to get cooler,but please note this guy is not a climate change denier,He pointed out a very scary scenario,everytime these solar minimums occur,there are one or two very severe earthquakes and no one knows why.Clean air and rainbow stew for everyone!
Kind of related, christian prophets were predicting doom and gloom in sept as punishment for gay marriage etc., then polygimous mormon town gets wiped out by flood, ps many cars got water damage (for cqdilla)
The NOx standard for US is .05 g/m, the UK NOx standard is roughly about three times higher, which is still far less then the 10 to 40 times more than these cars are putting out. So its safe to say VW is in BIG trouble not only in the US, but in other countries as well.
http://delphi.com/docs/default-source/catalogs/delphi-worldwide-emissions-standards-pc-ldv-15-16.pdf?sfvrsn=2
@americar because they willfully cheated! Standards were put in place, for good reason, I think.
Shadow, I wholeheartedly disagree. But we’ve already had that debate. More than once.
VW knowingly and intentionally put a whole lot of expertise, design, and money into intentionally and illegally violating U.S. standards, and they should pay a heavy price.
The emissions standards are measured using the Federal Test Protocol, I believe FTP-75 is the current standard. It uses a set drive cycle and I would think it would be easy for a software engineering team to design software to behave differently during this drive pattern. What will be interesting is what the fix will be.
I wonder if the emissions equipment on the car has the capability to actually meet the standards its supposed to. It will be a huge cost if DEF systems have to be retrofitted to the vehicles to meet standards. I doubt a simple software update will be able to reduce emissions to where they are supposed to be, without hurting performance or mileage. This is going to very interesting to see what VW does to fix the issue and how CARB and the EPA will react.
Makes a person wonder if VW is the only manufacturer doing this? It seems like the nature of market competition being what it is, I wouldn’t be overly surprised to hear that other car companies are engaged in similar emissions-software deceit. I wonder how the EPA discovered it in the first place, and if there’s a systematic procedure they use to discover manufacturers trying to pull the wool over the EPA tester’s eyes.
EPA didn’t discover it. A researcher did trying to show the EU that VW could meet US diesel specs, so they should be able to in Europe, too. What he found was that VW was cheating the specs with the non-urea TDI engines. Tests on BMWs came out OK.
The nice letter the EPA sent to VW, page 3 & 4 describe how VW manipulated the software. http://www.eenews.net/assets/2015/09/21/document_cw_01.pdf
I keep thinking this is a software issue, and as such is there an underground of hackers that could manipulate the driving functions to behave when on odb sensors and then otherwise on the open range? I certainly think so. If the IRS and my security clearance data can get hacked, an automobile computer system would be a piece of cake I think. for $20 better efficiency and longer life and still pass emissions test, I bet you get an email soon!