Hybrid Pick-up, whaddya think?

I was reading some car mag today and they had an short article on the GM hybrid pick-up truck. they were very impressed with the truck, seemed to work pretty seemlessly and all. I was intrigued. Then I read that they were going all gaga over the 21 mpg combined EPA rating. Now, I know 21 MPG is pretty good for a truck, but my 93 dodge cummins will get 21-22 combined all day long, and it has over 352,000 miles on the clock. They also mentioned about 9 mpg while towing (can't remember the load). I was pulling 11,000 lbs worth of trailer and scrap metal and still got 18 mpg. I know it's gas vs. diesel so it's kinda apples to oranges here but I'm thinking in over 15 years technology should have advanced more than that, right?

Why does no one do an electric assist diesel hybrid?

Instead of using a 5.3L gas engine use a 2.5L 4cyl diesel with a heavy assist electic motor making a combined 400 ft lbs.

With a diesel, you have the power to avoid the battery nonsense and use hydraulics instead.

It's my understanding that those older Cummins engines got freakish fuel economy. Dirty, though.

I do like the idea of an electric assist hybrid truck. Seems to make sense.

If diesels ran cleaner you wouldn't need hybrids. My dad's turbo-Cummins Dodge with extended cab, 4x4, a full cabover camper pulling a 20 foot covered trailer full of motorcycle parts STILL got better mileage than my 4-runner or Dakota.

Volvo just announced that they are going to be doing a diesel hybrid system, might even make it over here, not in a truck but still.....

Volvo makes trucks.

DR Boost you are right ,about technology, not advancing' I owned a 1948 GMC bus with a Detroit diesel 6 cyl inline, manual shift ,it weghed 29000 lbs, and got 10mpg all day long and the owner manual said proper milage should be around 10mpg. go figure after 60yrs you would think tech should advance, almost like some conspirency, in tech R&D.and oil co. like engineers are paid to make sure we dont get better mpg.

by the way Tim Suddard saw the bus in my back yard around 1998, it was a split window model

The other thing with the hybrid trucks is they lose bed capacity. Well, usually they do.

I agree, the mileage claims for the large hybrids is worthlessly low. My T100 and my falther-in-laws Tundra both get about 18 mpg. Not much reduction when towing a few thousand pounds either.

foxtrapper wrote: agree, the mileage claims for the large hybrids is worthlessly low. My T100 and my falther-in-laws Tundra both get about 18 mpg. Not much reduction when towing a few thousand pounds either.

Ah haa haa haaaa! Not with an enclosed trailer, that's for sure. I see 10 mpg on my 2000 Tundra when humping the race car around. Yay. I think I saw 14 when towing the Camaro on an open trailer. 18 mpg empty, sure.

The father in law's big 2006 3500 Dodge Cummins gets 14 mpg all the time. It doesn't care what you do to it, it gets 14 mpg. And if you can figure out how to attach something to it, that something will move. Yeah, I should have bought a diesel...

sounds like the box truck I used to drive. GVWR 32,000 pounds.. it got 11mpg empty and 11 mpg full.. did not make a difference

I agree that the hybrids should get better gas milage than they do, but I think that they do signifigantly reduce GHGs, which is still a worthy cause

Personally I'm not sold on hybrids AT ALL.

For long distance driving, the electic motor is not used, and thus is just extra weight. As we all know, more weight = worse fuel economy.

For short distance stop and go traffic, a fully electric car is far superior: no localized emissions, quiet, and no loss of efficiency when operating under a certain speed. Improvement of emissions for an entire fleet of electric cars is done in one location: your local power plant.

For performance applications... a hybrid could be interesting, actually. Pair it with something like a rotary engine, and use it to make up for the lack of low-end torque.... hrmmmmmmm.

ReverendDexter wrote: For short distance stop and go traffic, a fully electric car is far superior: no localized emissions, quiet, and no loss of efficiency when operating under a certain speed. Improvement of emissions for an entire fleet of electric cars is done in one location: your local power plant.

That only works when you're fleet has down time to recharge. We run our Hybrid buses 16+ hours a day, and after a couple minutes to refuel they can be parked in a normal lot. If they had to be charged we would need to install 4000 outlets. We are able to make the same size bus accelerate faster and smoother with less than half the cubic inches, using less fuel and creating fewer emmisions.

Keith wrote:

Ah haa haa haaaa! Not with an enclosed trailer, that's for sure. I see 10 mpg on my 2000 Tundra when humping the race car around. Yay. I think I saw 14 when towing the Camaro on an open trailer. 18 mpg empty, sure.

Are you serious? I only drop to about 15 mpg when towing Spitfire on the trailer with the T100. The Tundra doesn't even change mileage, it stays at about 171 mpg towing it. Even when towing the other truck on a heavy U-haul trailer it didn't go down to probably 15 mpg either.

MPG will never increase based on some sort of Moore's law principle, and I'm skeptical there's a 'conspiracy' at play. I do think there are some serious improvements to be made however. I worked in gradschool in the Institute's Aerospace Combustion Lab that had a professor who worked with mostly power companies and large industrial burners to improve lean-burn efficiency over the last 40 years. He had pushed for improved injector technology for cars during this time.

I asked him before he left what he saw as the major hurdles to getting this tech in a car to dramatically improve combustion. He said in a nutshell there were 3 major problems. First, the thermo-cycles we use today (not talking about DI gasoline, and soon to come auto-ignition / high compression) are inherently inefficient but the tradeoff is cost, plain and simple. Second, the cost of R&D on injector tech has been ongoing in spurts for 40 years, there was a big push he said 20 years ago, and then it died out. He's worked with an injector tech firm to create injectors that could dramatically improve fuel economy, only downside, you guessed it, cost. The third aspect he said was the environmental laws which strangle automobiles from operating their most efficiently because it is not the most efficient for the environment or politicians, so it can be attributed to social/environmental/political cost.

In the end, the cost aspect is what kills it. If you're a manufacturer and you have all these great technologies but your car costs 5-10k more than the model which is just as nice but gets 20% fuel economy and creates higher NOx emissions, guess which car people tend to buy...

This is why I think CAFE isn't designed so much to strangle car companies but to force them into implementing better technology sitting in an R&D firm on a back shelf. The only problem is the increased cost gets passed on to, you guessed it, YOU!

my opinion?

Diesels > Gas > Hybrid > Electric

look at VW, an acquaintance of mine owns a 99? TDI bug. turns 50mpg

Guys, help me understand something:

A petrol car has a torque curve that lacks in torque until maybe midway in the rev range, like on my Toyota Matrix "peak" (pathetically weak) torque is available at 4200rpm. So, adding an electric motor to supplement the propulsion in the city where i often stay under 4000rpm makes perfect sense for fuel economy and the instant torque of electric motor.

A diesel car however, makes peak torque almost as soon as you can blink; My 1994 Diesel Hilux made peak torque around 1500rpm. Driving in the city was good, teaching my sister to drive on the thing was awesome because the diesel was damn near stall proof. Point I am getting at is: a properly tuned diesel car is perfect for city driving, which is the only time an electric motor would be useful. So i dont see the point of an electric assist diesel

jcanracer wrote: Guys, help me understand something: A diesel car however, makes peak torque almost as soon as you can blink; My 1994 Diesel Hilux made peak torque around 1500rpm.

I think lucky S.O.B that gets a diesel mini truck..

haha, sadly we sold her last christmas. Even sadder; the person we sold it to promptly killed an indestructible engine by driving it for a considerable distance without oil RIP 2.8D

Raze wrote: MPG will never increase based on some sort of Moore's law principle, and I'm skeptical there's a 'conspiracy' at play. I do think there are some serious improvements to be made however. I worked in gradschool in the Institute's Aerospace Combustion Lab that had a professor who worked with mostly power companies and large industrial burners to improve lean-burn efficiency over the last 40 years. He had pushed for improved injector technology for cars during this time. I asked him before he left what he saw as the major hurdles to getting this tech in a car to dramatically improve combustion. He said in a nutshell there were 3 major problems. First, the thermo-cycles we use today (not talking about DI gasoline, and soon to come auto-ignition / high compression) are inherently inefficient but the tradeoff is cost, plain and simple. Second, the cost of R&D on injector tech has been ongoing in spurts for 40 years, there was a big push he said 20 years ago, and then it died out. He's worked with an injector tech firm to create injectors that could dramatically improve fuel economy, only downside, you guessed it, cost. The third aspect he said was the environmental laws which strangle automobiles from operating their most efficiently because it is not the most efficient for the environment or politicians, so it can be attributed to social/environmental/political cost. In the end, the cost aspect is what kills it. If you're a manufacturer and you have all these great technologies but your car costs 5-10k more than the model which is just as nice but gets 20% fuel economy and creates higher NOx emissions, guess which car people tend to buy... This is why I think CAFE isn't designed so much to strangle car companies but to force them into implementing better technology sitting in an R&D firm on a back shelf. The only problem is the increased cost gets passed on to, you guessed it, YOU!

I agree with you.

There is no Moore's law of automotive efficiency improvements. Too bad.:)

The HP wars of the last 10-20 years have been interesting though. Suddenly they were able to almost double the amount of HP and Torque from almost every engine out there. Looks like all the R&D budget went there.

Hopefully the new CAFE standards will force the auto companies to finally make powerful AND efficient motors. While there is a significant cost of R&D into improved technologies like injectors and what not, I would think that the economies of scale and increased sales/market share of a set of technologies would quickly offset that.

Case in point, I was reading about the new VW GTI. VW spent some R&D into decreasing piston ring friction resulting in an increase in fuel economy from 29 mpg to 32 mpg. A few improvements of that nature can quickly make a nice change.

I still don't get it. Hybrids. Trucks with lousy mileage. I've owned GM trucks for years. Runs in the family. Worst fuel mileage truck I've owned was a 2.2L 5spd Sonoma. Couldn't break 24mpg on the highway if you tried. All my fullsize trucks would knock down 24-25mpg all day long.

So why is it people get terrible mileage in a truck? My theory is 2 main reasons. Driving habits and buying the wrong vehicle.

Driving habits are the easiest way to increase economy. BACK OFF the car in front of you, ease back on your speed, plan ahead by not rushing up to a red light/stop sign, being courteous and not cutting off everyone in sight. But all that is counterintuitive to the typical "me first" attitude that our society is afflicted with. If people would learn that A.) they are NOT more important than anyone else and 2.) Everyone else has to wait in line and so can you an I imagine we could dramatically cut our fuel consumption.

THe other factor is buying the wrong vehicle. Does a suburban housewife need a 6.2L V8, 4wd off-road packaged Tahoe to haul her 3 kids around? Nope. She'd never notice the difference between it and a 4.8L 2wd tahoe other than style in the day to day slog. But because "the neighbors have one, you have to have one better mentality" society seems to believe in people are buying evertything they don't need and nothing they do need.

Look through GM/Ford/Chrysler's truck catalog when you get a chance. You can likely build 100 different trucks from each and no 2 would ever be the same. Why buy something that doesn't fit your needs? Being smart with our money and buying what fits our needs is likely the reason we have always had trucks that get mid 20's highway mileage.

foxtrapper wrote: Are you serious? I only drop to about 15 mpg when towing Spitfire on the trailer with the T100. The Tundra doesn't even change mileage, it stays at about 171 mpg towing it. Even when towing the other truck on a heavy U-haul trailer it didn't go down to probably 15 mpg either.

Open trailer, right? Makes a big difference. When we towed out to the Mitty a few months ago, we had a 2000 Tundra with a 7x16 enclosed trailer and a 2004 Tundra with an open trailer. Each loaded with a Miata, although the car in the open trailer was about 400 lbs heavier. The economy difference was pretty staggering - along the lines of nearly 40%, I think. The headwinds all across Kansas and our 75 mph cruising speed didn't help of course :)

I want a motorcycle trailer like a Haulmark Low Hauler to tow the Miata, due to the lower frontal area. But they're all painted black and orange with chrome and are subject to the Harley Tax.

Goodness. I really had no idea the air drag on a box trailer was that significant. I knew it would have some, but I would have thought being behind a truck the truck would have already set it up with its own frontal area.

That's good to know.

the diffrence between my enclosed trail vs the open is about 3 to 4 mpg at the same speed, but alos you have to consider there is about 2000lbs wight diffrence between the 2 aswell. and the biggest reason that newer diesel trucks aren't seeing super great mileage(most cases worse than those of 15 years ago is simple--- emissions, they have had to do so much to make them cleaner its killing miliage and look at the hp diffrence and most people can't help but to use that extra powere all the time witch dosn't help mileage. My 06 dodge with a buch of fun stuf added is right at 600hp and if i cruise at 65 and don't play much i easily get low to mid 20s in a 8500lb truck that sits pretty high for a stock truck. but lets face it its more fun to play with that kinda power and leave alot of poepls mouths open wondering what the hell just happend when i easily pull away from them.