I’m generally not one to post up about the environment, politics and or government affairs. After watching the trailer for “Earth 2050″ however it seems painfully obvious that if we want to keep enjoying the vehicles we love, that most of us should take notice of what’s happening to our planet. Click through and check it out.

You can also view the full length video (42:39) here.

Source: Youtube.com

We’re all familiar with the venerable Otto cycle—intake, compression, expansion, exhaust. But that’s just not enough for veteran race engine builder and performance aftermarket mogul Bruce Cower. He added another two. The Crower Six Stroke promised to boost power and efficiency while eliminating the cooling system altogether years ago. So what happened to the concept engine? 

The Crower Six-stroke may be old news to a lot of you, but apparently I’ve been lost in an engineering Bermuda Triangle and have only now learned of its existence. First, a little about Bruce. Crower is a truly epic figure in hot rodding. They guy built and sold parts for ’32 roadsters in high school. Today Crower Cams sells ultra-high-performance cams and a ton of other go-fast accessories.

Crower is a mechanical genius. And like any mechanical genius, he can’t stop rethinking engineering conventions. Like cooling. Seriously, radiators and cooling systems are huge, heavy and inefficient. If only there were a way to eliminate them altogether while retaining all the benefits of a water-cooled engine. Crower thought of a way: The six-stroke engine.

On a very basic level, Crower’s system works like this: Squirt water directly into the combustion chamber.

Water injection happens after the exhaust stroke. Water hits the hot piston, instantly turns to steam and expands, providing an additional power stroke while cooling the engine. It’s brilliant. And it works.

Crower built a functional single-cylinder prototype. The thing runs without any cooling system. And it runs cool. This is what Crower told Autoweek way back in 2006:

“It’ll run for an hour and you can literally put your hand on it. It’s warm, yeah, but it’s not scorching hot. Any conventional engine running without a water jacket or fins, you couldn’t do that.”

The secret, of course, is in the cams. Crower developed double-lobe exhaust cams that keep the exhaust valve closed after the first power stroke. This recompresses the combustion gasses and increases the force of the steam stroke.

There are many benefits to the Crower six stroke. The steam stroke provides extra power. You can replace heavy cooling systems with a small water tank. The engine runs so cool that Crower estimates you’d be able to bump compression all the way up to 13:1 on low-octane pump gas.

Again, from Autoweek:
“I’ve done this many times on regular engines: 15-to-1 on gasoline for the first five seconds works pretty good until you get some chamber heat and then suddenly it gets into pinging. But with the chamber being chilled, I bet 12-, 13-to-1 will be no problem on cheap fuel. So what we can maybe do is have fuels that aren’t quite as good…It’ll save a nickel a gallon not having to keep three grades going.”

Overall efficiency, says Crower, could also be boosted into the stratosphere:
“Can you imagine how much fuel goes into radiator losses every day in America? A good spark-ignition engine is about 24 percent efficient; ie., about 24 cents of your gasoline dollar ends up in power. The rest goes out in heat loss through the exhaust or radiator, and in driving the water pump and the fan and other friction losses. A good diesel is about 30 percent efficient, a good turbo diesel about 33 percent. But you still have radiators and heavy components, and fan losses are extremely high on a big diesel truck.”

Crower thinks the six-stroke could reach 40 percent, easy.

So that was all in 2006. What happened to the Crower Six-Stroke? Unfortunately, Crower fell ill and was unable to continue research. According to representatives from Crower Cams, the project is currently on hold.

Hopefully Crower or the engineers at Crower Cams can revive the project. It showed a lot of promise and we’re in dire need of cheaper, high-efficiency engines.

Source: Autoweek

Chris Harris can usually be seen thrashing about in some form of high end exotic. He’s a hoonigan of the first order and has left his tread marks on countless roads throughout the world. To do this however requires something with a bit of grunt which is why it’s so strange to see him in Renault’s new electric car, the Twizy. At it’s core the Twizy is not a long winded open road car, but a small urban vehicle that, as Harris states, is perfect for something like the rental car market at your favorite tourist destination. From an efficiency standpoint the Twizy is well… not so hot. For instance, it will take you 12 hours of charging to get 50-60 miles of driving, and that’s if you’re easy on the throttle. Keep the go-pedal flat however and you may get a max range of about 30 miles. Be that as it may though the Twizy is an interesting little car for the European market. I just find it amusing that we’ve had the same thing here in the States for years – we however just call them golf carts.

Source: Youtube.com/DRIVE

I’ve been in California less than a month and I’ve already seen more “green” cars then I’d seen in a year back in the New York metro area. The Toyota Prius for example – these suckers are EVERYWHERE. Then there are the gaggles of Tesla Roadsters, Chevrolet Volts and Nissan Leafs that roam the freeways. It’s strange, but I’ve got to admit it feels pretty good to see these cars on the road. Back in NY it was almost part of the culture NOT to be green as most New Yorkers I know simply didn’t take recycling seriously. Here in the Bay area though, it’s part of everyday life. From riding your bicycle to work, to having three different garbage cans for your waste materials, going green is definitely the thing to do around here. Now while it’s doubtful I’ll be getting rid of my 8-mpg muscle cars anytime soon, I’m actually considering buying something a bit more economical for a third car. Who knows, maybe these Californian’s are actually onto something…

When it comes to diets, I’m an omnivore leaning towards the meatitarian side. I’ve tried tofu, which is essentially congealed soy milk, and to me it’s always tasted like sweat socks cooked in dishwater. That’s when it tastes like anything at all, which it usually doesn’t; imagine my surprise, then, when a vegetarian and PETA member in Tennessee purchased a license plate that read “I Love Tofu.”

Actually, the plate read ILVTOFU, which could be interpreted in several ways, only one of which is innocent and relates to wholesome but tasteless vegetarian food products. The other way, which is embraced by DMVs in Colorado, Florida, Virginia (and now Tennessee) is “I Love To Engage In Sexual Intercourse, Perhaps With Anyone And Everyone Reading This License Plate,” or in simpler terms, “I LV TO F U.” The plate was subsequently called back by the Tennessee DMV, prompting a press release from PETA on the benefits of eating tofu and the evils of eating meat. And the absurdity of a DMV reading too much into a license plate.

Personally, I wonder why no one has addressed the evils of eating tofu, which is more likely to cause gagging and vomiting than knocking boots with the member of the opposite sex in the car behind you. Perhaps I’ll ring up the other PETA (People Eating Tasty Animals) and see if we can put together a press conference. Over a big plate of bacon, of course.

Source: Autoblog

Ugh… So this is how the 2011 car season on the East coast is going to end; by God deciding to mess up everyone’s plans by smacking us dead in the jaw with hurricane Irene. You see car storage in the Northeast, especially the boroughs (Bronx, Queens, Brooklyn, Staten Island and NYC) is miserable. In fact it’s not uncommon to see the occasional $100,000 car or vintage muscle car parked on the street or in a driveway. This weekend though may seriously change that. Irene is supposed to hit the New York Metro area late Saturday night and into Sunday, and with it bring up to 12-inch’s of rain and wind gust of over 100 mph. That means that everyone who keeps their beloved rides in a car port, pop-up tent and or on the street is petrified right now of the impending doom that possibly awaits their vehicles. My advice is simple; tuck those cars in good and tight and try, if at all possible to get them into a secure location. Hell, if you live in a place with a secure parking structure then you may want to actually look at ponying up some cash and keeping them there for the weekend. Either way though, prep now because this bitch is going to hit with both fists and I have a feeling her impact is going to hurt.

Good luck Northeast.

Image: FlyingPete

The problem with absolutes is that they’re, well, absolute. I’m quite certain at some point in Ferrari’s history, perhaps Enzo Ferrari himself was asked about Ferrari building cars with automatic gearboxes. I’m quite certain his reply would have been along the lines of “Ferraris are cars for the driver, and you’ll never see a Ferrari with an automatic gearbox.”

Times change, technologies evolve, and the only Ferrari still available with a manual transmission today is the California. That’s why I have to chuckle at Ferrari’s president, Luca di Montezemolo when he says, “you will never see a Ferrari electric because I don’t believe in electric cars.” Never is a long time, and technology changes in a heartbeat. We’d be the first to admit that electric cars lack practicality today, but their performance potential keeps us intrigued. At some point in the future, assuming technologies like smart roadways and inductive charging progress, electric cars will be lighter and more powerful than their gasoline counterparts. That’s why you never say, “never.”

More intriguing are di Montezemolo’s comments on hybrids, which he views as “the future” for Ferrari. Hybrids, by nature, are heavier and more complex than either gasoline vehicles or pure electric vehicles, and weight is the enemy of the performance car. It’s likely necessary for Ferrari to embrace hybrids in order to meet fuel-economy and emission standards worldwide, but it seems odd to back a technology that goes counter to what Ferrari was once about.

These days, it’s not about pushing the limits of performance. It’s about selling cars that make you look fast.

Source: Engadget via Autoblog

Image: Jane M. Sawyer

Compromise means that no one walks away from the table happy, but no one walks away really pissed off, either. Such is the case with the newly agreed upon CAFE standards for 2025: no one’s really happy with them, but no one found them overly objectionable, either. The EPA, and the Obama administration, had initially pushed for a standard of 62 mpg before agreeing to back off to 56.2 mpg. Although it’s really splitting hairs, the administration and the automakers agreed on a target of 54.5 mpg.

So what does that really mean? It’s hard to say, since automakers will get credit for things like using environmentally-friendly air conditioning systems and building electric or plug-in hybrid vehicles. Larger trucks are excluded from consideration, and the plan has a “review step” in 2020, so if technology hasn’t yet caught up with legislation, implementation could be further delayed.

It’s also worth noting that a CAFE-mandated fuel economy of 54.5 mpg isn’t the same as an EPA fuel economy label of 54.5 mpg. I’ve yet to see any tangible math converting the two values, but I know this: it’s not as bad as critics think it is.

The good news is that even the California Air Resources Board agreed to the new standard. Until the measure was passed, there was some reason for concern that California would shoot down the new standard as not rigid enough, which would have required automakers to build cars just for California (or, alternatively, not offer their products for sale in the Golden State). All sides seem happy for now, but let’s see how things shape up as we begin transitioning into significantly more restrictive fuel economy requirements in 2017.

Source: Autoblog

Man… it looks like just about everyone is jumping on the electric bandwagon. First it was cars, then motorcycles and now boats. I suppose it was inevitable that boaters would follow suit, however it seems like the cost of admission is unbelievably high. This is the EPIC 232se Electric Sport Boat, a boat that’s designed specifically for wake boarding. It’s sleek, fast and can hold a charge for up to 10 hours, however it also cost a whopping a $150,000 which is a lot of scratch for a 23-foot tow vehicle. Granted the EPIC 232se is filled to the gills with the latest and greatest in electric vehicle technology, but $150,000 just seems like and exorbitant amount of money to pay for a boat that does little more than tow you around a lake at speed.

When you think of automakers who give the single-digit salute to environmentalists everywhere, who comes to mind? Clearly Hummer is the obvious choice, but they’re out of business. Who’s next on your list – Ferrari? Lamborghini? Bentley or Rolls-Royce? If you’re Greenpeace, the automaker in your crosshairs is Volkswagen, who Greenpeace accuses of overstating their environmental record and resisting attempts to make cars like the Golf more fuel efficient (um, Golf TDI, anyone?).

Volkswagen, portrayed as the evil Empire in the VW ad spoof below, has also opposed tougher EU emission standards, which require emission cuts of some 30% by 2020. Worse, VW isn’t forcing people to buy their most fuel efficient models, allowing the uncaring consumer the freedom of choice to pick their own VW models, thus destroying the planet in the process. In fact, Greenpeace reports that only 6 percent of VW’s global sales were of its most fuel efficient models, so Greenpeace is giving VW a dose of their own medicine in the commercial below.

We’ll give Greenpeace some leeway here, since the Volkswagen Group does include automakers such as Lamborghini, Bentley and Bugatti, but let’s remember how successful (and environmentally friendly) VW’s TDI clean diesel models are. It was VW who built the 260 mpg XL 1 concept, rumored to be built in limited numbers beginning in 2012, and their soon to be launched Passat TDi will deliver 43 mpg on the highway. That’s good enough to be green in my book.

Source: Auto Spies