BMW morkeshing makes me sick

CJhaughey

The current BMW ad on the radio BMW has developed a system where the engine turns itself off at traffic lights and only starts again when you push the clutch in....
Are BMW serious? The VW golf from the mid eighties had this system! Did BMW have to wait for the Patent to expire before they copied it?
Jebus this takes the P1ss

colm_mcm

Ia this system standard, or do you have to pay for it? would the extra cost be met by reduced fuel consumption, I doubt it.

mike65

Yep, a 90s Golf diesel had that feature and no-one liked it. I imagine its a bit more refined these days. Not sure I'd trust such a device myself. The last thing you need is a non-starter in gridlock
traffic.

http://www.autoblog.com/2007/03/26/bosch-stop-start-system-available-on-new-bmw-1-series/

Mike.

crosstownk

Yes, I remember the Golf Eco which had this system back in the early 90s. IIRC, the Mayor of Dublin had one.

I also note the BMW ad that informs us that they have some sort of alternator that uses the kinetic energy of the wheels to charge the battery when the driver has his/her foot off the throttle minimising the load on the engine thus saving fuel. Yes - it will save fuel, but really will it make a massive difference?

That said, at least they are thinking in the right direction, but nothing dramatic really. But I suppose they are using the premise that if you 'look after the pennies the pounds will look after themselves'.

colm_mcm

crosstownk wrote:

I suppose they are using the premise that if you 'look after the pennies the pounds will look after themselves'.

oh yes, that old BMW ideal.

CJhaughey

CJhaughey wrote:

The current BMW ad on the radio BMW has developed a system where the engine turns itself off at traffic lights and only starts again when you push the clutch in....
Are BMW serious? The VW golf from the mid eighties had this system! Did BMW have to wait for the Patent to expire before they copied it?
Jebus this takes the P1ss

Thats why they said they "developed" it not created it:p

unkel

crosstownk wrote:

I also note the BMW ad that informs us that they have some sort of alternator that uses the kinetic energy of the wheels to charge the battery when the driver has his/her foot off the throttle minimising the load on the engine thus saving fuel. Yes - it will save fuel, but really will it make a massive difference?

No it won't make much difference. Anyone telling you that it does, is lying, be it BMW or the Green Party. It's even worse with the Toyota and Honda petrol hybrids. In fairness their batteries will last for a long time, but the energy used to produce such vehicles will never be offset by the saving on fuel consumption over their lifetime. And they aren't even diesel to start with so the catching up to do would be double hard!

crosstownk

colm_mcm wrote:

oh yes, that old BMW ideal.

And then they pitch their product in the upper end of the market. Way to save a few €. But damn fine cars to drive.

crosstownk

unkel wrote:

No it won't make much difference. Anyone telling you that it does, is lying, be it BMW or the Green Party. It's even worse with the Toyota and Honda petrol hybrids. In fairness their batteries will last for a long time, but the energy used to produce such vehicles will never be offset by the saving on fuel consumption over their lifetime. And they aren't even diesel to start with so the catching up to do would be double hard!

Agreed - the real step forward (sorry Bertie!) is fuel cell technology but its far from refined. I believe Boeing are working with it at the moment. Like a lot of motor vehicle technology, we have to wait for the aviation industry to perfect it because thats where the big R&D money is.

Stephen

Its probably slightly more attractive in the German market where, at least in cities that I've been in, drivers are obliged to turn off their engines at the many rail crossings and the like.

maidhc

I thought it was just me thought the ads were stupid.

Last year they were running ads about how their cars were like jets and had drive-by-wire throttles. I suppose saying their cars had technology that was in bread and butter cars like the Mk1 Avensis wouldn't sound so sexy!

colm_mcm

unkel wrote:

It's even worse with the Toyota and Honda petrol hybrids. In fairness their batteries will last for a long time, but the energy used to produce such vehicles will never be offset by the saving on fuel consumption over their lifetime.

this has been proven?

maidhc

colm_mcm wrote:

this has been proven?

In fairness, whether one agrees with them or not, the Hybrids were a genuine feat of engineering. The BMW stuff is only nonsense.

galwaytt

let's not forget the Fiat Punto Mk1 had this too, iirc...........

fletch

colm_mcm wrote:

Ia this system standard, or do you have to pay for it? would the extra cost be met by reduced fuel consumption, I doubt it.

"As a result of these new features, the 118d now has a combined economy figure of 60.1mpg and CO2 emissions of only 123g/km - that's 10mpg and 27g/km better than the outgoing engine" - source
That's pretty impressive economy if you ask me.
Last week I drove an '07 320d coupe with the same system and it worked flawlessly, there's also a button you can use to turn it off if you're in stop-start traffic as yes it could get quite annoying.

Owen

maidhc wrote:

In fairness, whether one agrees with them or not, the Hybrids were a genuine feat of engineering. The BMW stuff is only nonsense.

Not jumping on the bandwagon here, but the new MINI Cooper 1.6 Turbo Diesel, with that stop start tech, will do 68.9 Mpg on a combined cycle (And 54 when being trashed in the real world, as I found out last weekend) ... so the technology must be contributing to economy, right? I mean, that Diesel MINI is returning hybrid consumption figures, without the headache of what to do with a battery bank in 10 years time after it's expired.

BMW have also built on demand oil, and water pumping into the new Engines, cutting down on additional consumption when they're not needed. It should also be noted, that BMW and MINI just won 7 awards for 4 engines in the Engine of the year 2007 awards, and won overall Engine of the Year :

http://motoringfile.com/2007/05/09/bmw-mini-win-engine-of-the-year/

JHMEG

unkel wrote:

It's even worse with the Toyota and Honda petrol hybrids. In fairness their batteries will last for a long time, but the energy used to produce such vehicles will never be offset by the saving on fuel consumption over their lifetime.

Source?

mike65

Speaking of BMW ads, what about the one selling the idiot light feature to tell you when to change gear? I take it that feature is optional on autobox models.

Mike.

Seth Brundle

mike65 wrote:

Speaking of BMW ads, what about the one selling the idiot light feature to tell you when to change gear? I take it that feature is optional on autobox models.

Mike.

Excluding what may be a biased view, I thought it was a good idea as most people who drive - can't!
telling them to change gear earlier when the engine is cold is therefore a good idea to help save fuel and the engine!

fletch

kbannon wrote:

Excluding what may be a biased view, I thought it was a good idea as most people who drive - can't!
telling them to change gear earlier when the engine is cold is therefore a good idea to help save fuel and the engine!

Yeh and tellin them to use a few of the revs too. I don't think my mate has ever gone over 2.5k revs and constantly labours the poor engine as he thinks that the quicker he gets in a higher gear, the quicker he starts saving on fuel :rolleyes:

oilsheik

mike65 wrote:

Speaking of BMW ads, what about the one selling the idiot light feature to tell you when to change gear? I take it that feature is optional on autobox models.

Mike.

I think the Toyota Auris has this feature as well.

astraboy

JHMEG wrote:

Source?

It was in the sunday times a few months back. The entire carbon footprint of a Prius, from manufacture to disposal at end of life, is higher then a range rover. Obviously this can flucate depending on use. Plus those hybrids have a large cache of batteries to be disposed of and the fuel consumption is not amazing.

unkel

colm_mcm wrote:

this has been proven?

It's not science, Colm. More a matter of bean counting. Very thorough bean counting :eek:

JHMEG wrote:

Source?

Here in 458 pages or a brief summary like in Ned78's post above that a modern diesel pollutes less and uses less fuel than an equivalent hybrid and then there's the production and disposal of the batteries used

unkel

Ah, astraboy beat me to it there. Note it is not the carbon footprint, but the total energy used during the lifetime of a car

The main point is that there is a lot more to it than MPG

Owen

fletch wrote:

Yeh and tellin them to use a few of the revs too. I don't think my mate has ever gone over 2.5k revs and constantly labours the poor engine as he thinks that the quicker he gets in a higher gear, the quicker he starts saving on fuel :rolleyes:

My Mother's like that. She also believes it's bad for an engine to put the car in first even if it's rolling 1mph. Unless it's stopped Ned she says, it stays in second ... with the whole car clanking, crying, and rattling begged to be put into first. And she wonders why she's gone through 3 clutches.

On the upside though, I'm a dab hand at fitting a Clutch into a Starlet at this stage.

Type 17

mike65 wrote:

Speaking of BMW ads, what about the one selling the idiot light feature to tell you when to change gear?

Whatever you think of the ads and the feature itself, it is is in no way new or innovative - it was used in Mk1 Golf Formel E models in the early 80's, and continued to be fitted on GTI models until at least '84 (end of Mk1 production).

It is useful, but really primitive - a vacuum tube from the inlet manifold triggers the light when the vacuum (and therefore engine load) reaches a given threshold...

maidhc

ned78 wrote:

Not jumping on the bandwagon here, but the new MINI Cooper 1.6 Turbo Diesel, with that stop start tech, will do 68.9 Mpg on a combined cycle (And 54 when being trashed in the real world, as I found out last weekend) ... so the technology must be contributing to economy, right? I mean, that Diesel MINI is returning hybrid consumption figures, without the headache of what to do with a battery bank in 10 years time after it's expired.

I agree. I get a comfortable 54 MPG from my Ford Focus TDCI, and have hit an average of almost 60mpg over a full tank on more than one occasion.

The Peugeot engine in the MINI is a fine powerplant! Bet "powered by Pug" isn't on the tailgate though!

I still think stop start is silly. I wonder how long the starter will last!

Type 17

I remember reading about the Golf Ecomatic in '93 and the answers to the FAQs were along the lines of:

It doesn't begin cutting out and restarting until the engine is sufficiently warmed up, so no problems with engine-wear from lots of cold-starts.

The battery is much bigger, so lots of stop/starting without a long run won't be an issue.

Starters don't wear out much from lots of start-cycles, it's overheating a starter by lots of continuous cranking that kills it. A hot diesel engine starts fast, so that's not an issue either.

ninty9er

mike65 wrote:

Speaking of BMW ads, what about the one selling the idiot light feature to tell you when to change gear? I take it that feature is optional on autobox models.

Mike.

I think the point Mike is making is more the fact that they're using that feature to sell the car.

This was in the Carina E from 96 on and is in the Auris and Corolla

Type 17

ninty9er wrote:

I think the point Mike is making is more the fact that they're using that feature to sell the car.

This was in the Carina E from 96 on and is in the Auris and Corolla

That's what makes the ad annoying - the angle of the ad implies that the feature is new and innovative, when in fact it's neither.

Johnny Storm

Whatever about the merits or otherwise of the alleged "feature" I find the tone of smug condescension used in the advert really gets on my tits.