EPA says Volkswagen cheated on emissions with 482,000 diesel cars

BigEejit

Tea 1000 wrote: »

Ya, but there's no point in saying "Ah what's the point, China are still polluting..."
Someone has to start somewhere, and the fact is that Europe and America are first world, and we really can afford it compared to the likes of China, so we must step up. If we don't lead, they won't follow.
And while what you say is true, we still need to enforce the rules to send the message that what VW did was wrong, and there will be severe penalties for it.
The whole thing is flawed to the nth degree, but we have to start somewhere in order to improve.

I don't mean we should slack off reducing CO2, I dont think we should be screwed with high tax if we dont have the latest and greatest low CO2 producing motor.
If i was still in Ireland the taxman would be screwing me for owning a pre 2008 car when they dont do that in most places in the world, including the most polluting ones. Barely helps the environment, the money just goes into the bottomless pit of the Irish governments expenses and debts.

Fiskar

BoatMad wrote: »

I'm surprised if this will be fixed with a software upgrade only

Wouldn't say that would go down well with regulators, software can be over-ridden

Regulators will want the Urea tank fitted and interlocked in ROM.

dr.fuzzenstein

Fiskar wrote: »

Wouldn't say that would go down well with regulators, software can be over-ridden

Regulators will want the Urea tank fitted and interlocked in ROM.

Interesting idea, but I don't think locked down ROM chips will happen. Otherwise regular software upgrades will become near impossible, since instead of downloading new software, thousands new chips would have to be manufactured and fitted.

FortySeven

Tea 1000 wrote: »

Some will, most like what they like too much.
This will blow over, and no one really cares.

Pretty sure the almost 600,000 VW employees care about their jobs. Pretty sure the almost 11 million new car buyers in 2014 care about the potential depreciation. Fairly sure there are a large bunch of fee hunting lawyers rubbing their hands together with glee. Environmentalists might have a slight interest. Revenue department probably cares. As a hater of diesel, I care.

Can we have less of the rubbish 'nobody cares' argument. Quite clearly, lots of people do.

BoatMad

FortySeven wrote: »

Pretty sure the almost 600,000 VW employees care about their jobs. Pretty sure the almost 11 million new car buyers in 2014 care about the potential depreciation. Fairly sure there are a large bunch of fee hunting lawyers rubbing their hands together with glee. Environmentalists might have a slight interest. Revenue department probably cares. As a hater of diesel, I care.

Can we have less of the rubbish 'nobody cares' argument. Quite clearly, lots of people do.

The employees only care about their jobs not NOX emissions

Depreciation. Is not going to be of any significance. No appreciable additional depreciation will occur , certainly in Europe

Lawyers are lawyers. Unless they can establish loss to their clients , sueing will not be easy. Anyway that will go on for years in the background

Environmentalists don't really count , they have always been shouting

Revenue doesn't care , in the main nothing is going to change

As for you haters will always hate

Sorry , it will blow over. The average car user doesn't care what's comes out the tailpipe .

John T Carroll

BoatMad wrote: »

The employees only care about their jobs not NOX emissions

Depreciation. Is not going to be of any significance. No appreciable additional depreciation will occur , certainly in Europe

Lawyers are lawyers. Unless they can establish loss to their clients , sueing will not be easy. Anyway that will go on for years in the background

Environmentalists don't really count , they have always been shouting

Revenue doesn't care , in the main nothing is going to change

As for you haters will always hate

Sorry , it will blow over. The average car user doesn't care what's comes out the tailpipe .

In general I would agree with the above points but as a long time owner of VW cars for over 50 years I have to say that I do feel very very disappointed with the current "goings on". I can honestly say that I have "sold" dozens of VWs purely based on what people saw in my cars and in conversations with me in which I always gave the pros and cons. To me anyway, its like a betrayal of my trust in VW and even though everyone knows, only too well, that self regulation is no regulation, it still saddens me.

BoatMad

John T Carroll wrote: »

In general I would agree with the above points but as a long time owner of VW cars for over 50 years I have to say that I do feel very very disappointed with the current "goings on". I can honestly say that I have "sold" dozens of VWs purely based on what people saw in my cars and in conversations with me in which I always gave the pros and cons. To me anyway, its like a betrayal of my trust in VW and even though everyone knows, only too well, that self regulation is no regulation, it still saddens me.

Your Vw today is no different then if was 2 weeks ago. It's a car not a sentient being FFS.

Self regulation.??? The euro tests are not self regulation what do you mean. The car passed its emissions tests in Europe , because such tests are a good bit lower in standards then California.

People are making this stuff up to suit their pre-disposition.

The most recent iccct report shows almost all cars are upto 40 % in real life driving then test results suggest, Mercedes being one of the worst offenders , , whose cheating who

I own a nissan !

EndaHonesty

BoatMad wrote: »

The employees only care about their jobs not NOX emissions

Depreciation. Is not going to be of any significance. No appreciable additional depreciation will occur , certainly in Europe

Lawyers are lawyers. Unless they can establish loss to their clients , sueing will not be easy. Anyway that will go on for years in the background

Environmentalists don't really count , they have always been shouting

Revenue doesn't care , in the main nothing is going to change

As for you haters will always hate

Sorry , it will blow over. The average car user doesn't care what's comes out the tailpipe .

+1

Let's talk about facts...


I can't link coz new user but if you Google it you'll find the US's own figures show that "transportation" (all vehicles) only account for 5% of all Nox emissions. 5 fcuking per cent!!!

Agriculture accounts for 74% of all the Nox emissions.

All this OUTRAGE is bullsh1t. Manufacturers have done their part. Vehicles are cleaner than ever before. Motorists (transportation) is now the easy touch. They've (we've) been assimilated.

You only have to see the number of "enlightened" people on here advocating more tax on fuel!

Resistance is futile...

John T Carroll

BoatMad wrote: »

Your Vw today is no different then if was 2 weeks ago. It's a car not a sentient being FFS.

Self regulation.??? The euro tests are not self regulation what do you mean. The car passed its emissions tests in Europe , because such tests are a good bit lower in standards then California.

People are making this stuff up to suit their pre-disposition.

The most recent iccct report shows almost all cars are upto 40 % in real life driving then test results suggest, Mercedes being one of the worst offenders , , whose cheating who

I own a nissan !

So the emissions defeat "device" is only part of the furniture in Europe and of course would never be used?

John T Carroll

EndaHonesty wrote: »

+1

Let's talk about facts...


I can't link coz new user but if you Google it you'll find the US's own figures show that "transportation" (all vehicles) only account for 5% of all Nox emissions. 5 fcuking per cent!!!

Agriculture accounts for 74% of all the Nox emissions.

All this OUTRAGE is bullsh1t. Manufacturers have done their part. Vehicles are cleaner than ever before. Motorists (transportation) is now the easy touch. They've (we've) been assimilated.

You only have to see the number of "enlightened" people on here advocating more tax on fuel!

Resistance is futile...

If "manufacturers are doing their part" why are they flogging the log?.

BoatMad

John T Carroll wrote: »

So the emissions defeat "device" is only part of the furniture in Europe and of course would never be used?

There's no emissions defeat device ( ax if you can call a software programme " a device " ) in Europe because there is no need for one.

The situation in the US particularly California is different , in essence Vw can't build small diesels that meet such standards , but such engines will pass Europe's less stringent tests. VW has a choice. Withdraw,fit in larger engines ( mostly with AdBlue ) or cheat the tests. We know which one it took.

Again , what the car emits under normal driving is irrelevant , in Europe it merely has to pass the certification tests once. NCT style tests are considerably less stringent.

I suspect Vw cheated in the USA , because it had to. In Europe , there is no need, it's engines pass. They are no more cheating in that regard , in Europe, then every other car company.

The problem is how do you maintain a car " in class" and how to enforce that.

John T Carroll

BoatMad wrote: »

There's no emissions defeat device ( ax if you can call a software programme " a device " ) in Europe because there is no need for one.

The situation in the US particularly California is different , in essence Vw can't build small diesels that meet such standards , but such engines will pass Europe's less stringent tests. VW has a choice. Withdraw,fit in larger engines ( mostly with AdBlue ) or cheat the tests. We know which one it took.

Again , what the car emits under normal driving is irrelevant , in Europe it merely has to pass the certification tests once. NCT style tests are considerably less stringent.

I suspect Vw cheated in the USA , because it had to. In Europe , there is no need, it's engines pass. They are no more cheating in that regard , in Europe, then every other car company.

The problem is how do you maintain a car " in class" and how to enforce that.

A bit confused now, why are they recalling European cars if they have already passed?

BoatMad

John T Carroll wrote: »

A bit confused now, why are they recalling European cars if they have already passed?

Vw have admitted that the same software is present in some European modeis. Governments are saying Vw will have to recall those to remove that software.

The same is actually probably true of any small diesel.

But there is a difference , in thevzuS the test is done via the ODB. Connector so the software provides false data.

In Europe the tests are tailpipe tests.

As yet no one has actually properly retested any European cars to see of they ACTUALLY. Cheated the test in Europe. Vw have merely admitted the same software is present.

We have to be careful not mixing up engineering issues with tabloid journalism

dr.fuzzenstein

John T Carroll wrote: »

In general I would agree with the above points but as a long time owner of VW cars for over 50 years I have to say that I do feel very very disappointed with the current "goings on". I can honestly say that I have "sold" dozens of VWs purely based on what people saw in my cars and in conversations with me in which I always gave the pros and cons. To me anyway, its like a betrayal of my trust in VW and even though everyone knows, only too well, that self regulation is no regulation, it still saddens me.

And yet no one blinked an eye when they had dodgy injectors, concrods exiting the engine and the chain to the oilpump snapping, wrecking the engine and turbo.
But as soon as people hear "your car is still the exact same as it was yesterday", everyone jumps up and down and howls.

samih

BoatMad wrote: »

In Europe the tests are tailpipe tests.

Which can also be defeated by rigging? American NOx emission permissions are not that much lower (order of magnitude) than Euro, just the same for petrol and diesel over there.

For example I can imagine that it would be easy to program the engine management to detect the euro cycle and use mad high EGR rate that would result in DPF reaching it's capacity in a very short of time. This would not work in the long run as far as DPF was concerned and would also result in much higher fuel consumption as DPF regeneration was performed regularly. The engine would also choke to death very quickly due to inlet side contamination from soot.

Tea 1000

FortySeven wrote: »

Pretty sure the almost 600,000 VW employees care about their jobs. Pretty sure the almost 11 million new car buyers in 2014 care about the potential depreciation. Fairly sure there are a large bunch of fee hunting lawyers rubbing their hands together with glee. Environmentalists might have a slight interest. Revenue department probably cares. As a hater of diesel, I care.

Can we have less of the rubbish 'nobody cares' argument. Quite clearly, lots of people do.

If you think that 600,000 employees will lose their jobs, then you are grossly over-estimating the issue.

bazz26

Wild hysteria spill on aisle 5.

samih

bazz26 wrote: »

Wild hysteria spill on aisle 5.

Possibly. But at the same time you'd have to think that it will be particularly expensive for VW to fix this or that it will have a major affect on how the engines in question perform without the hack. The only alternatively I can think of is that somebody forgot to remove the code from the the software.

Tea 1000

samih wrote: »

Possibly. But at the same time you'd have to think that it will be particularly expensive for VW to fix this or that it will have a major affect on how the engines in question perform without the hack. The only alternatively I can think of is that somebody forgot to remove the code from the the software.

They certainly didn't forget!!

I think it'll cost VW a lot. Some of "a lot" in fines and the rest of "a lot" in mechanical and software resolutions. But they'll cope. Car companies have been in billions of debt before and are still around today. VW might not even go into debt because of this, their profits are large!
It's hard to get proper details without histeria on the internet, but I think the problem in Europe of the software removal versus the Euro 5 emissions benchmark seems like it's going to be an easy fix versus the US issue.
If that is the case, and the software removal means the cars are still Euro 5 compliant, then it'll be mostly case closed once word gets out that it won't affect people.
Either way, in 6 months when people mostly forget about it, people will still be buying their VW's new and used, and the world will go on, and VW's profits will be the only things taking a beating for a couple of years until everything is ironed out.
The bigger knock-on is that if they modify the test, then every car manufacturer will be hit. And our cars will become more expensive, no matter what we choose.
But ultimately people forget, and companies survive. Remember the Ford Pinto saga where compensating relatives of the customers who died was cheaper than recalling?!!? They got over that eventually!

jimgoose

Tea 1000 wrote: »

...Remember the Ford Pinto saga where compensating relatives of the customers who died was cheaper than recalling?!!? They got over that eventually!

In 1977 it came to light that the tank was mounted between the back axle and the bumper, and could be punctured in a shunt by the differential bolts. It wasn't an unusual design "feature" at the time, but it was particularly problematic in a small rear-drive hatchback. The Pinto's safety record was about on par with other subcompacts of that vintage, American and otherwise and Ford had nothing to do with the infamous memo anyway. The memo in question was written by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, regarding liability arising out of fuel fires from a few kinds of impact in cars from all the major American manufacturers. What kicked the whole thing off that time was the emergence of the practice of placing an actual dollar-value on human life, which had been kept largely under wraps by industry generally until the Pinto episode.

Tea 1000

jimgoose wrote: »

In 1977 is came to light that the tank was mounted between the back axle and the bumper, and could be punctured in a shunt by differential bolts. It wasn't an unusual design "feature" at the time, but was particularly problematic in a small rear-drive hatchback. The Pinto's safety record was about on par with other "subcompacts" of the vintage, American and otherwise. Ford had nothing to do with that. The memo in question was written by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, regarding liability arising out of fuel fires from a few kinds of impact in cars from all the major American manufacturers. What kicked the whole thing off that time was the emergence of the practice of placing an actual dollar-value on human life, which had been kept largely under wraps by industry generally until the Pinto episode.

I know, but my point was the public at large thought one thing, the reality was slightly different, and less urgent, and the result is that no one even thinks of that some time later and Ford are still around.
This will be the same.

Stallingrad

Tea 1000 wrote: »

I know, but my point was the public at large thought one thing, the reality was slightly different, and less urgent, and the result is that no one even thinks of that some time later and Ford are still around.
This will be the same.

Mercedes were selling rust buckets 15 years ago and look at them now. You are right of course, people will move on, but the short term the damage to VW's reputation and brand are massive. Never mind the financial aspect.

Tea 1000

Stallingrad wrote: »

Mercedes were selling rust buckets 15 years ago and look at them now. You are right of course, people will move on, but the short term the damage to VW's reputation and brand are massive. Never mind the financial aspect.

The only question is exactly when to buy VW shares!!

Tea 1000

Maybe we won't buy them yet...
http://fortune.com/2015/09/30/volkswagen-investors-lawsuits/

There's an article that really highlights what all this is about. Money. People want money, and they all have different ways to try and get it. VW wanted money from sales in America, and cheated their way into getting it to the detriment of the Environment.
Now Americans and others want money to compensate themselves, for what? Because they gambled and lost is one reason. Because they think the Environment suffered is another, but on the face of it that might seem legitimate until you ask "wait a minute, what is giving you lots of millions going to do for the already damaged Environment?" Nothing is the answer. But money makes people not care anymore.
It's all a load of shít.
What really should be done is that VW must now have to build cars that are at least 10% cleaner than any other for the next 5 years in order to off-set the damage their less-than-clean cars have done for the past 5 years. And no one else should get one red cent.
That way VW will have a painful and costly, yet challenging and interesting from an engineering point of view lesson; the Environment will benefit about as much as it lost; and no fat-cat will get rich for no good reason.

John T Carroll

Tea 1000 wrote: »

Maybe we won't buy them yet...
http://fortune.com/2015/09/30/volkswagen-investors-lawsuits/

There's an article that really highlights what all this is about. Money. People want money, and they all have different ways to try and get it. VW wanted money from sales in America, and cheated their way into getting it to the detriment of the Environment.
Now Americans and others want money to compensate themselves, for what? Because they gambled and lost is one reason. Because they think the Environment suffered is another, but on the face of it that might seem legitimate until you ask "wait a minute, what is giving you lots of millions going to do for the already damaged Environment?" Nothing is the answer. But money makes people not care anymore.
It's all a load of shít.
What really should be done is that VW must now have to build cars that are at least 10% cleaner than any other for the next 5 years in order to off-set the damage their less-than-clean cars have done for the past 5 years. And no one else should get one red cent.
That way VW will have a painful and costly, yet challenging and interesting from an engineering point of view lesson; the Environment will benefit about as much as it lost; and no fat-cat will get rich for no good reason.

Correct, profits/money,was/is the root of all this, VW certainly have the ability to engineer a fix for this and should have done so originally but they were not the first or last arrogant organisation to think that they could bluff those "stupid" Americans, who is looking stupid now?.

CJhaughey

Tea 1000 wrote: »

What really should be done is that VW must now have to build cars that are at least 10% cleaner than any other for the next 5 years in order to off-set the damage their less-than-clean cars have done for the past 5 years. And no one else should get one red cent.
That way VW will have a painful and costly, yet challenging and interesting from an engineering point of view lesson; the Environment will benefit about as much as it lost; and no fat-cat will get rich for no good reason.

That sounds good, but with the current emissions standard EU6 I don't think its possible to build a reliable and durable diesel thats 10% below EU6 with any of the present technology.
If that scenario came to pass the loser would still be the environment because the cars still have to be made of something that comes from nature be it Oil/Steel or Plant material.
The second loser would be the poor saps who buy these modern diesels based on Co2 emissions and the engines are not suitable for their purpose and end up costing them a fortune with their continued breakdowns like clogged DPF etc.

robnet77

CJhaughey wrote: »

That sounds good, but with the current emissions standard EU6 I don't think its possible to build a reliable and durable diesel thats 10% below EU6 with any of the present technology.
If that scenario came to pass the loser would still be the environment because the cars still have to be made of something that comes from nature be it Oil/Steel or Plant material.
The second loser would be the poor saps who buy these modern diesels based on Co2 emissions and the engines are not suitable for their purpose and end up costing them a fortune with their continued breakdowns like clogged DPF etc.

they should just give away a bunch of electric cars to compensate for the added pollution...
... and as a customer of a "polluting" car, I would still want some refund considering the lower value of the vehicle I bought, being unaware of the scandal that would burst out.

Atlantic Dawn

It's rather shocking that VW Ireland still have not given a figure of the cars that have the issue in this country, do they not know what cars they are selling?

jimgoose

Atlantic Dawn wrote: »

It's rather shocking that VW Ireland still have not given a figure of the cars that have the issue in this country, do they not know what cars they are selling?

I think someone gave a figure of 80,000 on the radio earlier:

http://www.breakingnews.ie/ireland/irish-standards-authority-to-take-action-after-volkswagen-emissions-scandal-698547.html

_Kaiser_

Have to agree with Tea and Boatmad on this - all your average owner cares about is if it's cheap to run, reliable and (especially in Ireland!!!) on cheap tax rates.

Most people won't give a toss beyond that. VW will come out with a fix, pay some fines and in 12 months this will all be forgotten about. Haters will still hate regardless, but that's irrelevant in this case.