Holden cuts Commodore V8 power to save gas
For the first time in many years, the engineers at Holden, GM's Down Under division, have cut the power of a V8 engine in the big Commodore sedan. The 6.0L V8 automatic transmission combination in the Commodore is now equipped with Active Fuel Management, GM's terminology for cylinder deactivation. The system allows four cylinders to be shut off at light load conditions. In the Commodore (which is sold in North America as the Pontiac G8) the power drops from 362 hp to 349 hp while combined fuel efficiency goes from 16.44 mpg to 18.23 mpg (US). That's still not particularly impressive, but the 1.8 mpg increase is at least notable.
[Source: Drive.com.au]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
why not the LS2LS7? 11:33AM (1/05/2009)
Go back to your gpm charts you published a few weeks back. Soing from 16 to 18mpg saves a lot of fuel. It saves as much as going from 18 to 24, 24 to 34, or 34 to 50.
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slk23 12:35PM (1/05/2009)
But driving a 25 mpg vehicle instead of a gas guzzler like a V8-powered G8 is a far better improvement. I believe the reason many people aren't impressed by 16 to 18 mpg improvements is they question the need for that type of vehicle in the first place. Large/powerful vehicles do have practical applications, but they are also used unnecessarily which wastes fuel, pollutes, and creates greenhouse gases.
Ready for your reply which will prove that you're always right ;->
why not the LS2LS7? 4:06PM (1/05/2009)
I do see why you say people question the need for these vehicles. And there's a lot of truth to that.
But telling people they can't buy what they want doesn't seem to work. If instead people still bought what they want but each vehicle just makes better mpg, we'll all benefit.
slk23 4:58PM (1/05/2009)
I'm not sure who you are referring to... Who is telling people "they can't buy what they want"? I certainly didn't, or imply anything in that direction. I simply commented that there's a reasonable basis for not being impressed by an increase from 16 to 18 mpg, regardless of the improvement in percent terms.
All mpg improvements are welcome, but there's not a whole lot to applaud they start from such a low level.
why not the LS2LS7? 5:46PM (1/05/2009)
You are arguing that it'd be better if people didn't buy V8s, instead of buying a V8 that does a little better on mpg.
That point is either theoretical, since people will continue to buy what they want, or would require the government to bar people from buying V8s, which is politically impossible.
So it's an argument with technical merit, but its lack of practicality means using it as an argument to dismiss the value of improving mpg on this vehicle probably is to miss the point completely.
slk23 6:05PM (1/05/2009)
"You are arguing that it'd be better if people didn't buy V8s, instead of buying a V8 that does a little better on mpg."
Having to explain what is common sense gets tedious.... but isn't it obvious that people aren't going to get excited about going from extreme gas guzzling to moderately gas guzzling? Also, you appear to read all sorts of other things into my intentionally simple and direct statements. Please try reading what I wrote again and avoid jumping to unsupported conclusions.
noz 2:52AM (1/06/2009)
LS2:
Please explain to me how getting 2MPG more is AS MUCH AS getting 10MPG more.
I would REALLY REALLY love to know what mathematical formula you are using.
Sam Abuelsamid 10:52AM (1/06/2009)
LS2s numbers were a little off, but the idea was correct. If you go from 16-18 mpg and drive 12,000 miles a year, you will reduce fuel consumption by 83 gallons a year. If you start at 34 mpg and improve to 44 mpg you reduce consumption by only 80 gallons. As the mpg increases the reduction in fuel consumption gets smaller because it's a reciprocal relationship. Beyond about 40 mpg the savings from improvements gets smaller and smaller.
The total fuel consumption is definitely lower with higher mileage vehicles but the impact is more significant on the vehicles that are getting poor mileage to begin with.
noz 1:05PM (1/06/2009)
In terms of effect on climate conditions and air quality, total consumption is important...not reduction.A car gettign 44MPG uses 2 1/2 times less fuel than a car getting 18 MPG in 12000 mile circuit.
The change in a poor mileage vehicle is great because the percentage relative to the poor mileage is greater. But the starting point of a high mileage vehicle already destroys the argument that starting low and improving on that is a smart idea.
In this day and age, a car getting 16MPG is truly utterly pathetic. The meatheads and petrol heads who are too high to realize it are just hindering the progress in the right direction.
jharlan 11:36AM (1/05/2009)
Progress comes in small increments, but an 11% increase in fuel efficiency (if my weak math skills are close to being correct) is notable. I suspect auto makers have to achieve this kind of progress to stay competitive in today's market and in combination with the change in driving habits induced by last summer's rape, (which I believe resulted in permanent changes in driving habits), is very good for the planet, and very disappointing to OPEC. This fall in demand and subsequent crash in fuel prices is the greatest stimulant to the economy we could hope for. We need to be vigilant because the wealthy elite are preparing us for an increase in fuel taxes which would adversely affect the working poor and lower middle class, which are the base of our economic pyramid, which could kill our economy because these people are the consumers that drive it. It is just a poorly obscured scheme to get more taxes from the poor.
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MikeW 1:34PM (1/05/2009)
Why didn't the G8 V6 get the 6L50 6 speed automatic for '09? (and 3.27 axle ratio)
Suzuki is now using the 6t70 in the XL7 for '09
What about a high mileage G8, ala the new 3.0V6 & 6L45 & 3.70 axle ratio (and smaller tires 225/55 17)
http://media.gm.com/us/pontiac/en/product_services/r_cars/r_c_g8/09index.html
If that isn't enough for mileage, then the 2.4 D.I. I4 should show up under the hood of the G8, but that would need an axle ratio of about 4.4-4.5:1
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Carney 1:58PM (1/05/2009)
Straining might and main to wring a few extra miles from our gasoline-only fuel tanks is, given the opportunity costs, a waste of finite man-hours.
A much wiser course is simply to add, at the cost of $100 per vehicle, the ability to burn either gasoline or alcohol fuel with equal ease.
Who cares how much fuel a vehicle guzzles if the fuel in question is alcohol? It's a huge environmental improvement over gasoline.
Alcohol fuels produce drastically fewer materials causing acid rain and ozone smog. Burning ethanol and plant methanol is carbon neutral, and cultivating the plants to make them helps global cooling. Alcohol is not mutagenic or carcinogenic, and biodegrades readily in hours or a day at most into safe components, rather than lingering in the environment, making spills and leaks a non-concern. Alcohols burn cleanly, with no smoke, soot, or particulate matter emissions.
All the obsessing over MPGs accomplishes is to slow down the race over the cliff - conservation merely reduces the rate of GROWTH of world oil demand. We need to change direction, and alcohol flex fuel vehicles can accomplish that because they are affordable, the fuel is cheaper, and they can burn gasoline if they have to (unlike rivals such as EVs and natural gas).
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Chris M 11:48PM (1/05/2009)
Hmm, Carney, do you happen to be a midwesterner, perhaps even a corn farmer, maybe?
Sorry, but even for a flex-fuel vehicle running on pure alcohol, fuel economy still matters, as it takes some energy and fuel just to produce that alcohol fuel, and the more alcohol one flex fuel vehicle burns, the less is available for another. Since there isn't nearly enough alcohol fuels produced, that can mean more petroleum fuels consumed, instead.
The biggest problem with "flex-fuel" is that it has been used as a loophole aroung CAFE rules to sell more high profit margin gas guzzlers, thus, ironically, increasing oil consumption. It hasn't helped that most of these fuel guzzling "flex fuel" vehicles rarely if ever drive on E85, let alone E100 or M100.
Please note that the population and economy would grow even without conservation, but thanks to conservation efforts the oil consumption hasn't increased as much as the growing population and growing economy.
Carney 8:57AM (1/06/2009)
If I were a Midwestern corn farmer, I wouldn't be advocating dropping the tariffs on imported ethanol, and wouldn't have said as I have that ethanol subsidies are an unlovely distortion of the market (although far smaller and less egregious than OPEC).
What I was was a space nerd, a guy interested in Mars exploration. That's why I'm a fan of Robert Zubrin, who I think has a lot on the ball. When he wrote his first article in The American Enterprise pushing flex fuel, I read it and shrugged. But over the last few years he has written a lot about it and I've become convinced and sold. The man is brilliant, and his book "Energy Victory" highly persuasive.
You're of course correct that current FFVs rarely burn alcohol, and are made simply to evade CAFE. That's an example of why we need a flex fuel mandate, because without flex fuel capability being standard, there won't be a sufficient critical mass of alcohol capable cars to make a gas station owner willing to devote one of his six or four pumps to alcohol.
Matt 12:45AM (1/08/2009)
Once again, biofuels are a hoax.
For example: "Hey lets cut down and burn the Amazon so we have room to grow sugar cane for the production of ethanol.. just don't mention how much energy has to go into producing it, or the damage done by burning the Amazon to start with".
Whats the benefit out of corn based? In the end it works out to getting approx. 1.25 times the energy out as what went in. Craptacular.
Carney 4:12PM (1/08/2009)
Matt, you simply do not know what you are talking about.
Sugarcane roots rot in the Amazon's wet soil; Brazil's ethanol crop is therefore entirely grown in the southern grasslands far from the rain forest, their equivalent of our Great Plains states. However, Brazil, aware of this perniciously false meme's widespread prevalence, passed a superfluous law banning sugarcane cultivation in the Amazon to try to overcome this marketing problem for its ethanol. It's as if Russia banned banana plantations in Siberia. Even this hasn't put a stake through the heart of this STUPID myth.
Almost as stupid and just as thoroughly discredited is the falsehood that ethanol takes more energy to make than it contains. The ONLY scientist claiming this is not an engineer, but a quack insect entomologist writing far outside his field of expertise, and whose paper on this has been completely refuted in the refereed scientific literature. Despite having no credibility among experts, however, this other myth staggers on because it was seized on and spammed around the world by conservative and libertarian bloggers whose rigid free market principles oppose ethanol subsidies but somehow overlook OPEC's even bigger market distortion.
For more information from someone who actually knows what he's talking about when it comes to the energy content of fuels, namely a former NASA rocket scientist, see here:
http://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/in-defense-of-biofuels
Dave 3:50PM (1/05/2009)
Carney, do you really have to spout the same diatribe on every single article?
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Carney 4:23PM (1/05/2009)
There's a lot of fashionable ignorance to correct, and no certainty that someone reading any particular article has read one of my posts in a prior one.
The question you should ask instead is, why does ABG presume that fuel efficiency, hybrids, and EVs offer any worthwhile environmental benefit at all, let alone frauds like hydrogen fuel cells? Why does it post article after article pushing these distractions and (at least implicitly) pushing myths and falsehoods?
If it didn't, I wouldn't have to correct the record.
why not the LS2LS7? 5:48PM (1/05/2009)
Because they do have value.
Also, your argument that conservation only reduces the rate of growth is false. Look at what happened over the last 3 months. World demand dropped because people conserved.
Not everyone is absolutist like you. Incremental improvements can make a huge difference in the long run.
Carney 9:03AM (1/06/2009)
I'm not opposed to incremental progress on principle.
In fact some people oppose flex fuel cars because they don't solve the global warming issue.
That's a long term problem we'll have to get to and can't ignore, but as long as they don't make things better, and arguably they make things incrementally better, FFVs address some more urgent short and mid term issues.
And you're mistaken about the effectiveness of conservation - it's utterly useless. OPEC can quite simply and easily cut production to raise the price. That's why despite significant gains in fuel economy since the 70s, the price of oil hit all time highs in 2008.
http://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/achieving-energy-victory
The economic collapse in the last few months of the year caused a catastrophic downturn in all activity and movement, thus reducing not only overall demand, but also projections of future growth that affect the market price. Rest assured the OPEC has recently announced drastic production cuts to "fix" this "problem" for itself.