TeamsterGrrrl

In Search of an Honest Automaker… Sorry Diogenes, but ethics ain’t improved much during the last couple millenia since you went on a fruitless search for an honest man. In the latest charges against VW in the growing DieselGate scandal, the Attorney Generals of New York and a couple other states allege that the “cheat code” was more than just a hack to get VW past U.S. Emissions standards ’til they could get new models designed around Diesel Exhaust Fluid (DEF) tanks into production and wasn’t just vestigially present but inactive in the rest of VW’s diesels for going on a decade. Turns out that the cheat was on in pretty much every VW TDI diesel sold in the U.S. since late 2008, and maybe longer in the rest of the world. VW is probably the largest volume builder of diesel cars in the world and has a big chunk of the light commercial vehicle biz too… Which means that VW may very well have been the biggest producer of NOX and other emissions for the last decade. Sorry VW, this is no longer an insignificant small market half million car “oops”. Apparently there’s no more honesty to be found in the heavy truck biz…The EU’s antitrust regulators and prosecutors just came down hard on their market’s heavy truck makers, hitting Daimler, IVECO, Paccar, Volkswagon, and Volvo with a few billion in fines for using the tightening emissions standards as an excuse to collude in price fixing. Knowing what the hardware to meet the new standards in 2007 and 2010 in the USA cost, I was somewhat taken aback when the big truck makers uniformly seemed to jack prices by $7500 for the 2007 models and yet another $7500 for the 2010 models. No surprise, given that the guilty parties in the EU are also 3 or the 4 surviving U.S. heavy truck makers. In the corporate world Diogene’s search has been taken over by Ethisphere, a non profit that rates companies and even nonprofits on their ethical behavior or lack of the same. Participation is voluntary, but I would guess every Fortune 500 company with a chance of winnin’ their awards is applying for them… So how come only one automaker, Ford, has made Ethisphere’s awards list for several years now, while Cummins of engine fame has been a regular honoree for over a decade now? No surprise, Ford has given up trying to fool us with a half dozen upmarket variations on the same vehicle and they knew better than too even try to get a diesel car certified in the USA. Cummins is big in natural gas and pays the worlds best architects to design public buildings in their hometown of Columbus, Indiana. The lone truck only maker to merit Ethisphere honors is Oshkosh, who makes mostly military trucks but is known for underbidding Navistar by so much on a lucrative contract that losing Navistar protested that Oshkosh’s prices were too low. Locomotive and just about everything else electrical builder GE earned honors too, as did Deere in the tractor biz. So how come VW didn’t make Ethisphere’s honor roll? And Toyota, GM, Honda, BMW, Daimler, Suburu, Isuzu, Paccar, Fiat Chrysler, ad nauseum? (from the www.gearheadgrrrl.com blog)

I agree that's a great combination, and I'd go for the liftable pusher or tag axle on the F850 too. The unaerodynamic Cargo might have trouble meeting EPA's fuel economy requirements though, and the price will be higher. I was thinking of a 50k miles per year application, for 100k a year the 9 liter lower revving engine would be a better choice.

Given that the "guilty parties" own 3 of the 4 surviving US class 8 truck makers and have licensed engine designs to the 4th, the Justice Department ought be looking into this.

Government is a big chunk of the truck market, and a reliable customer, much more so that contractors and for hire trucking. The intermodal market I'm thinking of is a smart long haul trucking company or private fleet that's adopted intermodal and whose average GCW is 40k pounds and only puts 50k miles a year on a truck, and has income tax liabilities to offset. A 300 HP Ford Powerstroke and Ford automatic does the job for them, and for way less than the $100k plus price of a traditional class 8 tractor. I agree that Cummins power and Eaton transmissions would help sell F750s and bigger, but it's mostly a marketing move, as the Ford Powerstroke has shown itself to be the equal of the Cummins B series. I own stock in both Ford, Eaton, and Cummins so I could care less either way...

A Ford employee who obviously knew what he was talking about and talked too much told me a tandem F series is in the pipeline. As for durability, the 2nd generation Ford built Super Duty has a half million mile B10 rating, and their 6 speed automatic has been standing up well. This is the powertrain that powers the F series with the huge trailers that do the interplant shuttle along Lake Erie on Ohio 2, and with the winds off the lake that's as tough a duty as class 8. The class 8 operators that cover 100,000 miles or more a year and run their trucks for a million miles wouldn't be happy with an F series, and Ford isn't going to build a mega vocational truck with 65k rear axles. But for the operators that just need a day cab tractor for intermodal work or the transportation department that needs a tandem axle dump truck that'll move snow, an F-850 will fit the bill for way less dollars than the competition.

That was back in the day when the Justice Department was full of the kind of "junkyard dogs" we could use today. Instead of mergers, the big manufacturers let the EPA take out their competition- Cat got out of the U.S. truck engine biz in response to the EPA 2010 regulations, and has left the U.S. locomotive market to GE thanks to the EPA's Tier 4 emissions regulations. Perhaps the Justice Department should sue EPA for anticompetitive activity? Fat chance, given that Justice and EPA are together suing VW out of the U.S. diesel market!

Maybe Ford has a new F-550 and above coming for 2018 or later model year? The aluminum cab will give Ford an advantage over Navistar and the GM badged new mediums. Extend the F-Series model range with a tandem and baby 8 tractors and they'll be able to offer the price advantages of a mass produced cab and powertrain to 80% of class eight applications.

Those numbers actually sound low... I suspect a lot of small trucking firms just quit trucking, but continue to exist on paper and computer databases for years, which results in underreporting of closures.

For several months after the 9/11 attack Minneapolis police stopped all trucks entering the downtown area for inspection. This was rather labor intensive, so the police reached an agreement with all the major trucking firms in the area (Postal Service, UPS, etc..) that we would securely lock all doors on our vehicles and use only uniformed drivers in marked trucks. This eliminated the delays we experienced and allowed the police to have more time to check unusual trucks and get back to fighting crime.

Boyer Ford in Minneapolis is one of the old Ford truck only dealers and always stocks lots of work trucks with long beds in plain ol' XL and XLT trim.

Should be instructions in the owners manual, IIRC you adjust it with the cruise control buttons. Been awhile since I've adjusted one...

I suspect a lot of this is due to reduced drilling activity, oil transport shifting from rail to pipeline, the shift from coal moved by rail for power production to natural gas by pipeline and increased production from renewables. The rail line near me used to see several unit trains a day of frack sand, coal, and oil as well as grain. Now I'm seeing maybe one unit trail of oil a day, less than usual coal trains, and most of the frack sand cars are parked MT on seldom used short lines. There has been an increase of "loose car" business with several "merchandise" trains a day with mixed consists of boxcars, tank cars, lumber, and steel and scrap on flatcars and gondolas. I suspect a lot of this "loose car" business was pushed from rail to truck during the U.S. energy boom when oil unit trains darn near monopolized the tracks, and these truckload and carload sized shipments have returned to the rails now that there's less congestion.

Been a few years since I've worked at UPS, but they very much recycle usable parts. Often parts get scrapped because they've already got all they're gonna need... If you've already got more Mack engines, transmissions, axles, etc. then you'll ever need, why take up space with more?

Ford offered the british built 4 cylinder diesels in their step van chassis back in the 60s and 70s.

And if you really want to see wasteful scrapping, look at the pollution settlement the EPA, CARB, etc. just forced on VW. While theoretically VW may be allowed to recall and "fix" the TDI diesel cars, the incentives are slanted towards a buyback and the EPA has rigged it so that the recalled cars will have to meet a higher emissions standard than when they were built for the "fix" to be approved. So a couple hundred thousand 2009-2016 cars will be scrapped, creating such a surplus of recyclable parts that few will be recovered. This is insane! My 2013 is included in the recall, they're offering me almost what I paid for it new if I accept a buyback and only around $7k in "damages" if I let them "fix" it. I want no part of this atrocity and would prefer a fix to scrapping, but they're pretty much bribing me to take a buyback. But the mileage deduction if I keep driving it until the buyback program ends at the end of 2018 is only around 5 cents a mile and I can't beat that for depreciation. So I'm gonna run the wheels off it, got 33k miles on it now and I want to get at least 100k on it before they crush it. Would make more sense to let VW compensate for the excess emissions in other ways if they can't fix these newer cars, but the EPA wants to make an example of VW. Part of the deal is 2 billion in fines VW will have to pay, some of that to be split among the states and tribal nations. Wouldn't it make more sense to donate the bought back cars to low income folks in those tribal nations who desperately need transportation?

I suspect a lot of the usable parts there was any demand for were recycled internally by UPS. And yes, I was tempted by a UPS MH that appears to have escaped whole and reappeared at a skid steer dealer in Dassel, MN. Last time I was by there I didn't see it. The Postal Service was also witnessing the scrapping of some of the old Jeeps, but that was because the frames were so badly rusted.

Read the article and follow the facts- This is a worldwide problem largely caused by lack of education. Even a high school diploma is no guarantee of a good job today, and dropouts are screwed. With there higher dropout rates, minorities in the U.S. are suffering more than whites from this skills gap.

https://gearheadgrrrl.com/2016/06/19/le-mans-ford-does-us-proud/

Performance is selling again... Thousands of the 300+ HP Focus RSs have been pre-ordered even though the price is around $40 and higher with dealers taking advantage of the short supply. Couple years ago my local VW dealer had a Golf R32 sit on the lot for over a year before it sold, this year they got in two Golf Rs and they sold in days.

The tip turbine can probably be used if you can get all the tubing to match up. You need to check and see if the 250 is a Maxidyne or not, if not you may need a transmission with more gears or else transfer the pump and such from the 285 Maxidyne. Might work best to use just the 250 long block and dress it with the 285s pump, turbos, etc.. BTW, is this the Cruiseliner that sat along highway 19 east of Redwood Falls forever?

BYD is one of Berkshire Hathaway's few dumb investments. They showed an electric bus around a couple years ago, but it was overweight in most states and they could never meet the DOT's bus standards and qualify for public funding for transit agencies to purchase them.

And if you really wanna haul stuff, you upgrade to a 3/4 or 1 ton and get a flatbed with stake sides instead of a stupid pickup bed. Add some tool boxes under the flatbed and you've got a much more productive and useful truck.

You'll be going off road and operating in a state with a 129,000 pound weight limit, IIRC. That means it's doubtful if you'll be able to find a truck properly spec'ed for the job in dealer inventory. For those kind of loads you need at least a 14k front axle, 44k rear axle, 5/16" or thicker frame, space to mount a pusher axle, cross as well as inter axle diff locks, and at least 500 HP and deep reduction gearing in the transmission if you're running in the valleys and 600 HP if you're running in the mountains.

There's still the problem of battery costs, for example a modern car like a Tesla needs only 20 horsepower to cruise at 60 MPH, and it needs a near 100 kilowatt battery pack to get a close to 300 mile range. That massive battery pack is most of the cost of a hundred thousand dollar Tesla. An 80,000 pound USAMax tractor trailer rig needs around 200 HP to cruise at 60 MPH, about 10 times the load, and would need 10 times the battery capacity at 10 times the price to move said 80k truck 'til lunch break and a recharge. That megawatt hour sized battery pack would cost around half a million dollars making the truck uncompetitive. You could cut into the size of battery pack required some with a microturbine, but their fuel consumption is pretty bad though they can run on some cheap fuels that internal combustion engines won't tolerate. On road recharging via over overhead catenerary or under road wire loops has been theorized... But once you've hung overhead wires you may as well hang tracks underneath, and high power wireless charging is going to face the mother of all "stray current" problems that have blocked new power lines.

Abusive loading, and as expected, both beds were damaged. So what the hell did they prove? GM is gettin' desperate!