1 You really are an evil conservative ogre aren't you? Not wanting to pay TWELVE BILLION DOLLARS to research these new cars that of course will help us on the way to "paradise" on earth. Didn't you hear, once they (the government) is done with this, they will release the cancer cure they already have, or didn't you get the memo? Damn that evil Glennnnn(how many "n's" is it now), intercepting our mail, I just got mine and my check from Rove wasn't there, so I'm sure I just bought one of those "n's". Good to be back where I can read the blogs again, that 80 hour week last week nearly killed me!

2 Heh! Thanks for stopping by, Smoke Eater! And yes, I got the memo, but I'm trying to help keep the cure for cancer hidden because I'm also in the pocket of "Big Pharmaceuticals," too!

3 Ogre - unfortunately people don't understand conservation of energy. If you plug it in, THAT power has to come from somewhere. Heinlein had the term TANSTAAFL... Is a 250mpg vehicle (non-hybrid) possible? Maybe - but it won't be gas, it'll be a diesel, and it'll be very small and very light (i.e. very dangerous in a crash), with a top speed around 40mph, and will accelerate 0-40 in about 60 seconds with the pedal to the metal. Cargo capacity would be about one bag of groceries. Tires would have to look more like bicycle tires pumped to 100psi to reduce rolling resistance (i.e. they would wear out VERY fast). Brakes would have to be light and flimsy to cut down on weight - they too would wear fast. MPG on any sort of slope would plunge dramatically. All of these hi-mileage schemes rely on using VERY tall terminal gear ratios which fall apart climbing hills where they have to down shift. Be great in FL where the highest geographical feature in the whole state is a 200' tall mound of garbage ;-> What I just described would be a death machine that would never be allowed on the highways. Detroit certainly can do better than the mundane drek they're hawking these days, but I suspect the top end for a (non-hybrid) vehicle that could pass safety crash tests and all the other govt mandates is somewhere in the 75-80mpg range and that would be a real small single passenger diesel.

4 Interesting and good points, tony! The people supporting plug-ins do admit the power requirement for recharging, but they claim that's much cleaner and much cheaper than refined gasoline (and they're likely right there). Right now there are some people claiming they have 250mpg cars right now -- they're modified hybrids with massive amounts of battery power from plug-ins. So I'm sure they do meet current highway standards, but you're absolutely right on the flat ground vs hills. The current folks also admit it only works for the first 30 miles or so because after that the batteries run out of fuel and the car has to switch back to gasoline power. All of your points are valid -- and that's why current manufacturers simply say that with today's technology, it's simply not cost efficient -- and the eco-terrorists admit as much by claiming they need $12 billion in government funding to make the cars! Again, I would absolutely LOVE to have my car get 250mpg -- but I don't want government to do it, and therefore it's not going to happen any time soon.

5 Forget 250mpg, for a minute. I'd just like a NICE SIZED family sedan that I KNEW would give me 30 mpg. That's it. I don't need 250. My husband has a smaller SUV, getting 22. His lease is up and since we've never really looked at family 4D sedans since we've been getting family cars the last 8 years, I figured we should go that route as gas is so daggum expensive. He was cool with the switch (he has a sports car he tinkers with on the side to feed his male need for speed)... until we realized that sedans get the same crappy mileage as his SUV or my mini-van. Why bother? It pisses me off. After all these years we still can't get a decent family sedan that won't kill us all in a crash that gets 30 mpg? And don't beieve that crap about the hybrids. We did our research. What they say they get and what they REALLY get are two different things. Pisses me off.

6 And I think there is a huge demand that's waiting to be met there. There are a very large number of people who do want a large vehicle with good gas mileage -- I just think physics won't allow it. When you take all the parts that go into making a safe car -- steel, airbags, crumple zones, emissions, etc., add enough glass to satisfy Donald Trump, then add features and comfort, the darn thing is heavy! It takes a lot of power to get something that big moving. After 100 years, we still haven't found a truly more efficient way than the internal combustion engine. Having worked on cars (a lot) before, I know exactly how it is that explosions are turned into forces to drive the wheels -- the more weight, the more explosion power needed. So if you want that mileage from a big car today, your only hope is to drive downhill...a lot.

7 Bou, The car you want exists today - a 1.8L turbo-4 version of the VW Passat with a MANUAL tranny. I've got a 2000 model and it can do well over 40mpg on flat ground keeping it around 45mph. At 55-60mph it'll be in the 36mpg range. Hammering it (where the turbo starts to spin) drops you into the low/mid 20mpg range. Local start/stop driving with a lot of stop lights going to the grocery store and such at 35-40mph toppng out in 4th gear (the manual is a 5-speed, but I don't hit 5th locally) yields around 25mpg. I run full-synth oil in mine and its MPG kept improving till it had maybe 80,000 miles on it. Now its leveled out now that the engine is *completely* broken in. Sweet engine for a gas job, and Passats do pretty well in the crash tests. These days, its getting hard to find a new VW with a manual anymore in the USA though... They are putting the TDI diesel in Passat now, *BUT* the damn fools ruined it by mating it with the Porsche Tiptronic ("gizmomatic") automatic tranny. I suppose it appeals to yuppies who don't know how to shift... VW salesmen will say - "oh, but you can shift it" which is true - but there STILL is a torque converter in there that is going to hurt the MPG (I don't believe its a "lockup" type torque converter). I couldn't stand the thing...but I'm a purist too ;-> There are apparently manual TDI Passat's being sold in Germany and Canada though, but the waiting lists are LONG. VW has always made superb manual transmissions (good for at least 200K), and wretched automatics. If you can find a TDI diesel Jetta Wagon with a manual, it should yield around 50 mpg on the highway. I bought my mom a diesel Jetta a few years ago and its outstanding. I've had a number of the 4-banger VW diesels over the years and they're all in the 50mpg range. Probably hard as hens teeth to find, but back around 1983/84 or so VW put the rabbit diesel engine in the Vanagon - only sold it in the US for a single year. Those had the aerodynamics of a barn, but still got about 32mpg under almost any conditions, and you can pack a LOT of stuff into a Vanagon.

8 Passat? How big is that thing? Isn't that really, really small? And I can imagine the trouble with finding manuals trannys -- I love them, but they are getting harder and harder to find. I guess I'm dating myself when I say that I remember when the automatic transmissions used to be EXPENSIVE options on cars...

9 I just got back from a cross country trip, do you know how many hibreds I saw on the highway? 0.. that's as in none. I saw a couple in the cities I passed through, but they didn't seem to handle well to the hilly land of western Missouri. You want to talk about gas mileage? I get 12 miles to the gallon in my truck. I love it. Sure it costs me more to drive it, but I have the power that I need to carry all of my re-enacting equipment around. I don't notice hills on the highways. There is no worrying about not having enough room for my family and being able to carry anything. I've never been worried about the price of gas and gas mileage on a vehicle. I've always been of the mind that if have to worry about the cost of operating and maintaining the vehicle, then you just can't afford it and need to get something different.

10 Ah, another evil one. That's one of my biggest complaints about hybrids -- power. A month ago I got a load of gravel. Can you picture a hybrid having the power to carry that to my house? I won't even drive a 4-cylinder engine car -- not enough power for me. Why? Because that's how I like my cars. I prefer big-block V8s, but those are pretty hard to find today, so I'll settle for a powerful V6 with manual transmission. You notice all the selling points of hybrids never seen to mention horsepower?

11 Tony- I have three kids. Boys. I don't think a Passat will do it, although I'd go to manual in a heartbeat. I tried to get my mini-van in manual, but that was a no-go. They don't sell 'em that way. Ogre... you did date yourself. ;-) I remember when automatic was an extra and my Dad used to gripe that he had to pay the extra cash because Mom couldn't drive one. (I can and prefer manual.) That's the problem the hybrid industry is having today. They have those who think people want high mpg warring within the company with the marketing people who know people want 'pep'. So they're not meeting anyone's needs. Frickin' decision by community crap. So they've upped the power and are now getting less MPG. Why bother. Contagion- Hybrids are big down here. Other than 'canes, we don't get the nasty weather down here, which may be why you don't see so many hybrids up there. It's just frustrating. I don't even need a LARGE sedan. I'm not talking a caddie. But I can't have a small one either. My boys are growing and I don't need to feel like a family of sardines. Thankfully we stopped at 3 kids or I'd be driving a bus the rest of my life. Blech.

12 I do think Florida is a good market for them BECAUSE it's flat! And sure, get me a 400-hp, 250mpg hybrid. And I'll take that NOW, please. Hey Bou, maybe you can get a Passat and cut a rumble seat in the rear section in place of the trunk. Oh crap, I think I'm REALLY dating myself now...

13 Passat isn't all that small Ogre - its mechanically identical to the Audi A6 but costs about $12,000 less than an A6. With the back seat folded down I can carry 10' lengths of conduit or lumber with nothing hanging out the windows. The back seat will hold about 20 concrete blocks comfortably, and the trunk is huge.

14 Rumble seats! Holy crap! You're older than I am! ;-) I'll look around to see what we have on the street down here as far as the Passat. I just don't think it'll hack it with 3 soon to be grown boys in the back. But hey, I'm open to suggestions!

15 They're boys, they fit anywhere!