Why are EV’s so polarizing? (Pun intended)

EV proponents point to zero tailpipe emissions, ever-increasing range capability, reduced lifecycle carbon production, reduced operating costs and a pathway to a zero fossil fuel future. EV detractors point to lack of available charging, extended “fill” times, limited range/range anxiety and dirty mining and power generation. Both are correct, so let’s lift the hood on this topic and poke around.

As fleet operators we owe our organizations every due diligence in evaluating new technologies, sorting through their capabilities and trying to visualize a possible fit in our operations. EV’s are getting more capable all the time but are not currently a one-size-fits-all solution. EV’s do some things very well; they have lower routine maintenance requirements, snappy acceleration (outright fast in some cases!), quiet operation and easy depot charging logistics (if you can support the chargers; a topic for another article). The operator can just hook them up to “fuel” at end of their shift, walk away and they’re charged by tomorrow AM. But the limited portfolio of available EV’s still makes the technology a tough fit in many commercial applications.

Product & Service Availability

One of the preemptive criteria of conscientious fleet procurement is that you must be able to support whatever you buy. This means if you buy an EV, you need to buy a product that has an established national sales and service network; or if you run a regional fleet, at least an EV which has good dealership saturation in your local market. This narrows down your available products dramatically and produces mostly passenger vehicles and light trucks. Not that EV’s aren’t being developed in specialty-equipment and limited big-truck sectors, but those efforts are currently just that: specialty and limited.  

And why is this? Automotive manufacturing is not an altruistic pursuit. While boardroom leadership can choose to support ideology over profit-margins (I said, “can”, not “does”), the reality of the situation is that manufacturers must be able to forecast enough market to develop the product, then have it generate enough revenue to pay for development and production costs while still showing earnings. That modeling currently pivots around high-end sedans, SUV’s and (what I would call) Sunday-go-to-meetin’ trucks. The reason is simple; the retail market tends to adopt new technology sooner and buy higher-level trim packages more quickly than the work market does, and it is easier to hide the EV upcharge in a more optioned vehicle. 

Purchasing Considerations

Understand, it is not that fleets are backward-thinking or technology adverse but having financial restrictions can have huge impact on procurement decisions. Let’s say you need to buy 100 half-ton trucks and the EV equivalent costs $15K more per unit/purchase that the ICE unit; that amounts to an effective $1.5M increase across that purchase. That additional $1.5M could have bought a whole lot of additional conventional vehicles (30-35 more when considering a basic fleet pickup).

Workforce perception impacts best intent too. Everyone wants the latest and greatest, so if you have 500 of a certain vehicle type and you re-spec that category, you either replace them all at once or manage expectations. I recall back when A/C was still an option checkbox in order guides (yes, A/C was once an actual option!), an option which my company at that time didn’t typically buy. But when my management made the decision to put A/C into our new service trucks we were only on the second annual purchase of a new truck model. Consequently, we were asked to refit A/C into the 35 units from the prior purchase (for continuity). Fortunately, the workforce gave us grace to defer the rest until scheduled unit replacement. They’d seen us actively changing equipment after a long hiatus and trusted us to do more. 

Operating expenses:

No one should deny that “fueling” a passenger EV costs less per mile than fueling a similar conventional vehicle (at least when charging with off-peak electrical rates). There are also economies to be found in preventative maintenance. Gone are the traditional PMs (Lube/Oil/Filters), emissions inspections and daily fluids checks. However routine systems (brakes, tires, steering, etc) must still be checked routinely. In fact, the price and frequency of brake and tire replacement will go up; the components are larger, more expensive and replaced more frequently due to vehicle weight.

I would consider this a financial wash but then consider the inevitable collision repairs. Currently any collision repair on an EV carries a significant premium (time and money) over a similar ICE vehicle; even worse if the damage gets into the HV electrical-drive system. Don’t believe me? Call State Farm, Shelter, Nationwide, or any other insurer and price EV insurance (if they still even offer it!). Better yet, talk to any of the private owners who’ve recently had their EV insurance cancelled without cause. Insurers are now distancing themselves from EV’s due to inversion of their profit/loss ratio by paying higher EV repair rates. 

Environmental impact:

One of the more touted arguments against EV’s is that dirty (carbon intensive) lithium production processes and power generation will offset any carbon reduction the EV may produce. Well? Sort of. EV’s do offer operational carbon reduction over ICE vehicles (even when charging in coal-country), but they also create more carbon in manufacturing processes as well. In effect, this defers any overall carbon reduction until later in lifecycle  and forces the fleet operator to view it as environmental depreciation.

Let’s say that your inventory only averages 5K miles per unit/per year and you’re replacing inventory every 5 years (to maximize resale value). Don’t be bragging at the local bar that your company’s EVs are reducing global carbon footprint over an ICE solution, because they’re not. It would take more than 25K/mi total service-life before reduced operating carbon offset the additional manufacturing carbon.

But if your inventory averages 15K miles per unit/per year and you rotate inventory every 7 years, you will indeed reduce your corporate carbon footprint over the unit’s life.

Remember, all else being equal battery size regulates the carbon produced in lithium-cell manufacturing. Mining and manufacturing keep getting cleaner, but it is still a “dirty” process. Depending on which source you cite, you will see a mileage accrual of 40-60K miles as the reasonable EV carbon-output tip-over point (assuming a standard 60-86 kWh battery vehicle). Your mileage may vary. 

Market acceptance:

Remember, in the early 1900’s EV’s were already a big thing in the automotive world (read up on Electrobat, Riker and Electric Vehicle Company, for just a few). ICE powered vehicles only started to own the market as they became cheaper, engines became more dependable, ran longer distances and were easier to fuel. EV’s were all but dead by the mid 1910’s due to higher cost, limited range and poor charging infrastructure. Ironic that those same issues plague the same technology 110 years later. 

Synopsis:

EV’s can offer significant advantages if you respect and work within their limitations. But as things stand today, EV’s are only a partial solution to the bigger problem; decarbonization of all transportation and manufacturing. Likely (as history has often proven) no single technology will prove itself a complete solution, but we will end up with a potpourri of different ideas as the fossil-fuel market declines. Those technologies will see categorical winners and losers eventually, but the votes will be cast with wallets, not at ballot boxes. 

Stay tuned! I need to jump into my Bolt EV for a meeting across town. …Hope I remembered to plug it in to charge last night… 

Truck’ese 101, Ver 3.0: Say What?

As I mentioned a couple of installments ago, it is very easy for recent inductees into the truck spec and purchase fraternity (no gender implied) the get lost in the nomenclature of truckdom. Complicating that fact is that terms are a moving target. Language it seems is malleable, continually bending and accommodating new interpretations and usages. Example: When I was a kid, a dope was someone behaving stupidly, then somehow it became slang for drugs of various types. More recently it has been adopted to mean something profoundly cool – IE: “That bike was dope, man!”. At least there is good news in truck’ese; these shifts and changes happen more slowly, largely due to the usage being technical in nature.

Today’s topic: Chassis stuff

Once upon a time I remember treading water trying to absorb all the TLA’s (three-letter acronyms), so I now pass along a few more of these trinkets to hopefully help-out others on that path and reduce some head-scratching. So here goes.

CA: “Cab-axle”- the distance between the back of the cab and the centerline of the rear axle (sorry, only two letters not three, but important in both light and heavy trucks). This determines the type and dimension of a bed you can put on a truck, the dynamics of the truck’s balance and how maneuverable it will be once in service.

CT: “Cab-trunnion”. Not unlike the CA term, but with a different application. The trunnion is the center pivot from which the rear axles articulate on a tandem drive-axle truck. On some tandems (mostly air-ride suspension jobs), there is no trunnion per se, so the term has come to mean the centerline between the two rear axles. That’s where the distribution of the rear load will rest.

“Clean” CA: having defined CA, it is sometimes important to know this facet of that dimension. “Clean” means there are no protrusions and/or equipment mounted on the outside of the frame rails between the cab and the rear spring hangers. No so important if you are building a dump-truck, flatbed or 5^th-wheel tractor, but hugely important if you are mounting a utility bed or something else that sets down over and extends below the frame.

BBC: “Bumper to Back of Cab” – In our world this isn’t the home of British sitcoms, but rather the distance between the front bumper and the rear of the cab. This is steered by physical engine size and cab configuration and ultimately determined by the end use of the vehicle. IE: over-the-road trucks typically use big-bore engines that take a lot of real-estate. They can have a long(er) BBC as they aren’t required to do sharp turns continually in city-traffic & stretching the truck smooths out the ride and reduces front axle requirements.

AF: “Axle to end of Frame” The distance from the centerline of the rear axle to the rear-most frame-rail end. This dimension can be specified on big-trucks and needs tuning to accommodate certain upfits.

OAL:” Overall Length”. ‘Nuff said?

COE: “Cab-over-engine”. Once as common as childhood fears due to Tractor/Trailer length restrictions, Cabovers are now scarce. From their enclosed-cab debut in the 1930’s through the mid 1950’s the term meant a portion of the cab was mounted up over the rear part of the engine, but the truck still had a sort of a nose. However, by 1954 a COE built by a little company named Freightliner had lost virtually all signs of what had become a vestigial nose and gotten a slab front-end, so the term evolved. Now the engine was truly under the cab, so what do we call the short-nosed trucks with the engine partially under the cab now?

LCF: “Low-cab/Forward”. Fine points will be argued as to when, but by observation trucks that had been categorized as Cabovers before the slab-front Freightliner was introduced were now starting to be called LCF’s after its introduction. And indeed, on these trucks the cab sat forward from where it was on a “conventional” truck and was “low” enough that there was a pronounced hump in the floor where the engine stuck back under part of the cab, followed by a flat floor. Look up a picture of a GMC “Cannonball”; slang term for a style of road tractor popularized by a 1958 TV show of the same name. Yes, the cab is still well up there, but not quite as far up as what Cabovers had gone.

This LCF term evolved further though. In certain more recent specialty applications (think front-loading trash trucks since the late 1970’s), the operator is seated slightly ahead of the front axle with the engine behind. This is to allow a very low cab-height for increased overhead clearance. Examples would be the GMC/Volvo/Autocar Expediter and Mack MR688 series. No idea where the term is headed next, so hold on for the ride.

Conventional: Like the name implies, the engine is out front with the cab behind it. IE, the truck is in a “conventional” configuration. The Cabover’s day in the sun ended sometime shortly after the 1982 passage of a highway bill which lifted the 53’ length restriction (mentioned earlier) for interstate tractor-trailers. Cabovers still have some advantage in urban settings were tight turns are the norm, so they still enjoy some success in America (and even more in Europe) as delivery trucks. However, they are a hard-sell to modern drivers covering mostly open highway. Truck for truck, a conventional will be quieter and ride more smoothly than a Cabover in the same application.

So by all means, jump in your LCF instead of your COE, as this may help you manage your OAL due to the shorter BBC. Just remember your CT is longer, so if you don’t want to clean your own CA, mind your turns.      

© 2019 D.W. Williams 

Truck’ese 101, Ver 2.0: Power to the People

The How’s and Why’s are critical in writing specification and averting failure. In the long-game of 8-12 years of living with a truck, it really does pay to get it right on the front end. Retroactive adjustments in specification (through refit and/or reprogramming) can cost many times more than if it was spec’ed properly on the front-end, or worse yet, compromise the longevity and usefulness of the truck in the first place.

Today’s topic: Power

Engine manufacturers will talk about 2-basic engine ratings, torque and horsepower (throw in “torque rise” if you are talking about big trucks). There are lots of misunderstandings about how these two interrelate. This often this causes misuse of the terms and they aren’t interchangeable. An executive summary of the terms and what they mean? Torque is a physical measurement of how much effort an engine can produce, whereas horsepower is a calculation of how much work that effort can produce over a period of time.

When engines are being developed or optimized, they are installed on an instrument called a dynamometer. In the crudest sense a dynamometer is a device that can take something that makes effort while in radial motion (IE: an engine’s rotation) and measure its output in terms of force. This is done by placing a fluid coupling between the engine’s output flange and a scale. On these devices the amount of “coupling” between the engine and the load can be varied, allowing the engine to run at maximum capability across a variety of rotational speeds. The effort produced is then measured though a system of levers and transducers to determine the force the engine makes, usually measured in lbs./ft in non-metric speaking countries.

So, let’s say you are running an engine at full capability, but stalling it with the coupling so it is only capable of turning 2000 RPM. Your dynamometer has an effective 3-foot lever which it measures force from, and at the end of that lever you are measuring 85lbs of effort. In this scenario our test engine makes 255 lbs./ft torque (potential twist) at that rotational speed (85lbs X 3 ft).

Regarding horsepower: the nature of any internal combustion engine is that it will make peak torque at a speed that is less (sometimes significantly) than it is capable of turning. After an engine reaches peak torque, the effort it can produce will drop off quickly as engine speed increases, but as the engine is turning faster it makes more “power” anyway (remember, work & time). But if this same test engine is still generating 160 lbs./ft of torque at 4500 RPM, we can do some math a calculate that it is generating 137HP {(160X4500)/5252} at that speed. Horsepower then is a relative measurement of the amount of work an engine can get done by applying effort over time. These are hypothetical figures produced by a hypothetical engine, but to put it into perspective this is somewhat typical of what your mom’s full-size station wagon would have produced in the mid 1970’s, so this is kind of a “just get it done” engine in the passenger car world.

Segueing to a big-truck engine we will find that the engine speeds drop dramatically, and at the same time torque ratings rise a lot. These are large engines and they turn slowly. There are a variety of technical reasons for this, but for expediency we will say it is easier to control the dynamic forces associated with their big, heavy internal parts and combustion processes at lower speeds, and the lower speeds reduce fuel consumption.

Torque-rise is the difference (in percentage) between the maximum torque an engine will produce, and the amount of torque it is producing at its maximum rated horsepower.

Let’s say our 12.9 liter diesel in the shiny new Kenworth we just bought is producing 410HP at 1850 RPM (kind of a typical mid-upper range fleet rating). I won’t bore you to tears with the math, but that means the engine is producing 1164 lbs./ft of torque at 1850 RPM. Now let’s say this same engine will produce its peak torque at 1300 rpm, and that figure is 1450 lbs./ft. This gives you a 25% torque-rise (25% more effort available at the torque peak than at HP peak).

Why is this important? Remember, the slower an engine turns, he less fuel it consumes (Fewer rotations mean fewer firing sequences, fewer times filling the cylinders, fewer times injecting diesel to cause combustion), so there is incentive to want to turn them as slowly as practical while maintaining sufficient power. So, while it is possible to spin this engine at 1850 rpm all day, it isn’t cost effective. You need access to all that power to accelerate the load, but not to cruise or maintain speed.

If however we choose to gear the truck so the engine is turning 1500 rpm at its optimal road speed, we are above the speed at which the engine makes maximum effort (1300 RPM), but below where it makes maximum power (1850 RPM). That allows us to optimize gear selection so that as our driver starts into a hill at cruise, the truck will slow (and so will the engine) but likely only to the point that the torque has increased enough to counter the additional load (due to torque rise). You’ve used the available torque-rise as a buffer to counter the truck’s tendency to slow-down on hills.

Hopefully this has given you a better understanding of interpreting the technical-ese associated with gearing and engines. Do it right and both your owners and drivers are happy. You burn less fuel so your costs are less and the driver isn’t having to downshift at every small hill. Next time you shake his hand, you may not feel calluses from all the shifting he’s had to do!   

                                                                                                                               

© 2018 D.W. Williams 

Truck’ese 101: He Ain’t Heavy

It’s easy for truck-fleet guys to lose track of how odd, or even maybe obtuse some of the lingo involved in the trade can be. Whether you work on them, drive them or buy them, there is a lot of stuff for the newcomers to dice-up and swallow. And we need the newcomers. Times are such that recruitment into any aspect of the trade has never been harder, so if I ever find anyone with an innate love of equipment I try to encourage them… We need new folks in the industry.

Because of that need, this installment can’t weight (intentional misspelling), so let’s talk about your truck’s BMI. Or, what exactly do all those weight-related TLA’s (three letter acronyms) mean, anyway? OK, full disclosure: we graduated into FLA’s some time ago.

Billing terms-

·         Tare Weight: this is what the truck and its associated trailer (if any) weigh before you put any product (payload) on it.

·         Gross Weight: this is the combined weights of the truck, trailer and payload.

·         Net Weight: This is the result of subtracting the tare-weight from the gross weight. IE: If you are hauling a bulk commodity, this is the product you deliver.

·         Bill of Lading: Think of this as the truck’s ship-manifest. It defines to any questioning authority what was hauled, and what time, on what day.

So – Figure you are commissioning or operating a dump-truck to haul some gravel to a job site. The truck will weigh at the scales on the way into the quarry (establishing the tare weight) and weigh again on the trip out (establishing the gross weight). The difference between these two numbers is the Net Weight, or the amount of product you are hauling or paying for. Disclosure of this weight and product description would go on the bill of lading. Pretty straight-forward except for the medieval terms, right?

Equipment terms-

·         Payload: A somewhat vague word that is often thrown out by the manufacturer when they are talking about the “Net Weight” capacity of a truck; often seen in light-truck ads. I say somewhat vague because there are so many variables that steer this, and it is by no means a fixed number. Remember, fuel weighs in at 6¼-7lbs/gal, depending on what flavor you are burning, and passengers and the driver figure in too. So dependent on your tank level and how many McDoubles you or your co-pilot wolfed-down before you got on the road, this number can move… A lot.

·         GAWR – Gross Axle Weight Rating: this is the maximum amount of weight that can be placed on any specific axle, and the figure results from the weakest of the spring ratings, tire ratings or mechanical axle ratings. So why wouldn’t you want to match all these values you ask? Good question. Stability or safety margin. IE: I will often spring a vocational truck with a 21K lb. rear axle with 23.8k lb. springs. This can stiffen up the roll-resistance on units that load-out top heavy, making for a more confident feeling truck.

·         GVWR – Gross Vehicle Weight rating: this is the maximum weight that the power unit (truck only) can roll at. This is governed by the interplay of GAWR’s, frame strength, spring ratings, driveline configuration and stopping capabilities.

·         GCWR – Gross Combined Weight Rating. This is probably the one that matters most in trucking. This is a rating of how much the truck can weigh and pull at the same time. This figure takes in to account power/torque, gear ratios, transmission type and the resulting gradeabity (the trucks ability to hold speed on a climb), as well as the ability to stop the thing once it’s rolling.

OK – We’ve addressed this weighty topic, so we’ll do another next time. Stay away from multiple McDoubles!

                                                                                                                               

© 2018 D.W. Williams 

The finest of Austria, part zwei:

It was about this time last year I last posted. Life and work being the whirlwind it sometimes is, I hadn’t even realized that fact until I got the hankering to tear into another story. I might have to pick up the pace… I would like to write more than 10 more articles before I retire. In our last installment my son and I had resurrected a 1978 Puch Newport moped and I was consumed with its thrift and questioned why everyone didn’t do this for transportation. … Then I found out why.

The reality sank in (well, was more like beat in) about the fifth time someone pulled out right in front of me as if I was non-existent. In most cases I was burning along on my chainsaw-engine driven bike wound up tight with no opportunity to dodge the bullet, I just had to out-brake it. Each time, the drivers not only had a telephone glued to the side of their head, but also had that distant gaze thing going, so I truly wasn’t “seen” even though they looked right at me. Had they been paying attention, they likely could have seen the fear in my eyes as easily as a saw the lack of cognition in theirs. On other occasions I had impatient folks pulling around me so closely that they polished the end of my left handlebar grip. In the end I concluded life and limb hinges not only on the rider’s awareness, but lots of visibility and a little power to get out of trouble when needed.

The Puch didn’t go away, but it did adapt. It got faster and much more visible; I’ve hot rodded it modestly and improved the lighting. The economy has suffered as I now get an appalling 85 MPG for my shenanigans. But I can swallow this distasteful fact as it makes the machine more practical, more usable and safer (yes, faster can be safer. If you don’t believe that, try keeping your cool as a 2½ ton SUV blows by you within millimeters going 45MPH while you are buzzing along merrily at 25 MPH on a machine that weighs less than 100 lbs. dripping wet).

All these mods which I’ve performed on this antique got me thinking; How much of our modern automotive evolution would we willingly pony up for ourselves if we didn’t already have those decisions made for us? In my case I opted for improved performance and visibility; an attempt to enjoy the hobby more and hopefully postpone a trip to the hospital. And when my wife and I went car shopping earlier this year, I was grateful I would be putting her in something with side-curtain airbags. I’ve seen the pathetic attention paid my much of motoring America and wanted her to have some protection.

I recently had the opportunity to travel to one of the auto manufacturer’s annual model year preview events, wherein they blew their own horn about the new model’s bells and whistles. This time they spent most of the presentation extolling the virtues of vehicles which required even less interactive operator involvement than we have already slumped to. Standard equipment will now include (if I understood correctly) autonomous braking and lane-departure warning systems. Based on my adventures in Slo-pedding, I’m not at all sure I object. NHTSA may have a strong point: Since you can’t change the driver, change the equipment.

You see, the garden variety American motorist is hell-bent on proving not only that they don’t know how to drive, but also that they have no interest in learning…. “Oh please” they clamor, “take these pedestrian duties from us so that we don’t have to become pedestrians!”. I can hear the crinkle of checkbooks opening now….

… Or maybe that’s just my ears acting up from riding the chainsaw.

© 2018 D.W. Williams 

The Finest of Austria

Longer ago than I care to remember, I was given a 1978 Puch Newport moped (say “Pook”). I said I don’t care to remember because like a lot of things in my life, it became a project “I will get to someday” … (Let me apologize in advance to whoever it is that administers my estate sale). It chased me through a couple of garages yet somehow always found its way to the back, where it would sit and sulk, gathering more patina.

About the time the eldest son was starting to drive, he thought the poor-man’s motorcycle would be cool to have running. He saw it as a bicycle, but faster. He and I both have fond recollection of beating the corroded carburetor apart and trying to sort-out the rest of the fuel system, all in 100-degree heat while being chomped on by mosquitos (they were THICK, like a scene from an Alfred Hitchcock movie). We did get it to sputter and cough on starting fluid, but the 40-year-old Bing carburetor wasn’t drawing fuel, so we couldn’t keep it running.

It languished once more, going back to the rear of the garage to gather more rust, until 3-years later the same kid bought a 25-year-old Lexus LS-400. Antique Lexi have things going for them (remarkably tough), but fuel economy didn’t appear to be one of them. He pulled out the Puch and got busy ordering tires and other parts. I remember coming home and seeing him in the driveway wrestling a new carburetor onto it. He pulled me in on the job, and after some massaging and more starting fluid we managed to get it to running, but it sputtered and coughed like it had COPD. We persisted and eventually got it dialed-in, it was running pretty well and making more power all the time. But it didn’t take the progeny long to realize that we were messing with a 25MPH machine, so he rapidly lost interest and having money saved up, bought a Honda Ruckus.

So, yours truly now had a decent running, complete but ugly 1978 Puch Newport moped. I continue to piddle with it every so often, trying to improve its performance and dependability. It will now bury the 30 MPH speedometer if the wind is out of the right direction, and seems to start with ease. And in my Puching around I’ve remembered what drew me to motorcycles in my late teens; the feel of the air rushing over you, making even hot days feel cool, and the immediacy of the road in front of you.

It’s dependable enough now that I routinely use it for running errands. It has the stylin’ book-rack thingy with the spring-clip on back, so picking up a few sundries at the grocery store is a realistic endeavor. Since it’s resurrection I believe I’ve put about 180 miles on it, and this with a mere 1-1/3 gallon of gas. So yes, internal combustion vehicles can get over 100 MPG (over 120 even!). And it’s also cool not having to hunt and fight for a parking space in our local shopping district. I just ride straight up to the bike rack and jump off. Bonus: in this state, actual Mopeds don’t require registration or a motorcycle license, but are simply a “motorized bicycle”. Yes, it is.

Crude, simple, effective and economical. I’d never ridden one before, but I can see now why these things swarmed all over Europe after WWII, all over domestic college campuses after the oil-embargo in the early 70’s and all over SE Asian countries (Laos, Cambodia, etc.) yet today.

Your basic ‘get’er-done vehicle. If your needs are simple, what’s not to like?      

© 2017 D.W. Williams 

The Little Carmaker that Lost its Way?

I remember thumbing my way through car magazines back when automotive technology first pricked my interest in the late 60’s and early 70’s (yes Lucy, I really am that old!). Then the truth was often more, uhmm, subjective. Once upon a time, product liability lawsuits were only a gleam in mercenary lawyer’s eyes, and there was often more poetry, opinion and yes, even outright fabrication in the stories that went into print. Cars were an emotional purchase for your average American. Many people, then as now, bought vehicles based on the vague promise of gratified need, not cold hard facts and research.

Some marketing used comedy. Volkswagen comes to mind when they introduced automatics in the revered type-1 Beetle; “They used to call us ugly. Now they call us shiftless” the copy read.

Others touted superior roadholding by virtue of preposterous dimensions, such as the infamous “Wide-track Pontiac”. Today we find the promise of good handling being connected to a 2½ ton automobile with its own zip code laughable.

But probably one of the more counter-intuitive campaigns devised was whatever it was the Madison Avenue elite dreamed up for Volvo. No fluff, no humor, no flowery language, just the facts.

You see Volvo had established itself in the North Americas in progressive fashion starting in 1955 with import of the adorable little PV444 (look it up, sort of a tiny 1947 Ford looking thing). Volvos then, and over the next 2-3 decades, were seldom “exciting”, but they were as dependable as dirt and developed a reputation as a superior foul-weather friend. By the late 1960’s Volvo had introduced their shoebox looking 140 series, perhaps the car most associated with the marque (along with the very similar 240 series, an updated version of the same).

With this shoebox Volvo, engineers realized, and admen concurred, that its brutish simplicity combined with solid build quality and dogged dependability had another benefit; safety. And so from the early 1970’s up through the mid 1990’s, the car that the magazine writers dubbed the “Swedish Chevrolet” became the car of choice for the conservative family-man. Volvos had a track record and ad campaigns extoling safety, not style, as a virtue. So a whole generation was brought up with boxy Volvos (loaded down with kids, groceries and harried parents) being as ubiquitous as crossover SUV’s are now.

Flash forward to now. I was looking through a fleet trade-rag the other day and came upon an article about Volvo’s brave entry into connected motoring. Like peer systems in so many product lines it offers auto synchronization with your phone, Bluetooth connectivity and a screen based navigation system, but it one-ups the competition from there because Volvo has added “Skype for Business”. In addition to the typically stupid amount of connectivity cars already have, Volvos can now be ordered with a webcam so that the person (people) on the other end of the call can see you as well as hear you. Not only can you telecommute while you are commuting, but you can attend your board meeting via videoconference while driving to another meeting across town. Volvo says this is in anticipation of autonomous cars. Fair enough, but cars aren’t autonomous yet.

I don’t know your opinion, but the thought of someone swerving around in traffic while they piddle around with adjustments on the center console so they can Skype with their best angle on the big-screen makes me uncomfortable. Or maybe it’s someone else using the built in camera to locate food stuck in their teeth while going down the road. Do we really need more possibilities for distraction in this day of technology? And no Lucy, there are no interlocks that prevent the usage of this feature while you are rolling.

So what are we saying here? This manufacturer that has built its safety reputation on decades of conscientious engineering and practical performance is now trash-canning all that momentum? Certainly this technology “could” be feasible with autonomous cars, but shouldn’t it have waited for those cars to be autonomous? Up next on YouTube: Automotive death-videos?

I really, really don’t want the last footage of me showing the fear in my eyes as I mouth “Oh $h&*” and drive up under a semi, followed by a black screen.   

© 2017 D.W. Williams