|
Motronic posted:There are largely no "extra parts" on cars, which are cost engineered to save pennies per unit. if a carmaker puts a heat shield somewhere it’s because they really want you to use it
|
#
?
Apr 16, 2023 17:03
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 28, 2024 11:36 |
|
|
Motronic posted:There are largely no "extra parts" on cars, which are cost engineered to save pennies per unit. Part of me wants to say, "PENNIES? drat, you're doing good" Another part of me wants to say, "lol you think there's any sort of competence?" But there are parts that exist to meet non-technical requirements, like noise, etc. But often, those parts also serve some technical purpose that applies only to the worst 2% of cases so probably not you, but they can't have 2% of cars coming back.
|
|
#
?
Apr 16, 2023 17:56
|
|
|
Any recommendations for a front license plate frame that won't get chewed up in a car wash? My 2006 Silverado had a very nice front license plate frame that got chewed up today the really new nice car wash. I was able to bend it back in place, and I have an old but ugly metal frame on it but I would love to find something that is car Wash proof that will help it not get chewed up again.
|
|
#
?
Apr 16, 2023 23:39
|
|
|
Stick to touchless washes if you care about things mounted to the outside of your car. Actually, stick to touchless washes if you care about the outside of your car. You never know what the car that went through five minutes ago had on it that might be all over the brushes about to get slammed in to your paint at 120 RPM.
|
|
#
?
Apr 17, 2023 04:32
|
|
|
Speaking of carwashes, I need a cover for the spare tire on my partners rav4. Where's the best place to get an OEM one....dealer?
|
|
#
?
Apr 17, 2023 10:01
|
|
|
found this in a bag in storage, is it worth selling, or is it junk? it's the attachments, screws, etc for a 1983 Volvo Station Wagon protective net. I THINK the net might be in the basement somewhere, but lord knows what condition it's in at this point. this stuff though was still in the bag unused, dunno if extremely edge case vintage car bits like these are even worth a drat.  could only find one listing on ebay, and it's for just the manual.
|
|
#
?
Apr 17, 2023 10:32
|
|
|
Captain Invictus posted:found this in a bag in storage, is it worth selling, or is it junk? it's the attachments, screws, etc for a 1983 Volvo Station Wagon protective net. I THINK the net might be in the basement somewhere, but lord knows what condition it's in at this point. this stuff though was still in the bag unused, dunno if extremely edge case vintage car bits like these are even worth a drat. I bet there's people out there who would kill for that, maybe find a retro Volvo forum?
|
|
#
?
Apr 17, 2023 11:22
|
|
|
Dumb Question - My Spark has a backup camera, which is an aftermarket addition. The backup camera sucks. Unless it's super sunny, it looks like it has been smeared in vasoline. I've not messed with it, because I'm waiting on my registration so I can put on my plates. It also points in all the wrong places, but that's fixable when I get back there with a screwdriver. Is the whole awful quality of the lens being constantly poo poo and foggy a problem that would benefit from replacing the camera itself? Or do I just need to mess around with how it's mounted? Truth be told, I'm still old and paranoid and will always be physically looking over my shoulder. But if it's there, I'd like it to work. ---------- That said, are there good license plate covers or frames? I ask, because I think the dealer license plate frame is contributing to it floating around. I see license plate frames with the camera built in, which seem like it would make sense.
|
|
#
?
Apr 17, 2023 12:33
|
|
|
nitrogen posted:Any recommendations for a front license plate frame that won't get chewed up in a car wash? Here's a stupid (honest) question: what purpose does the license plate frame serve, for you?
|
|
#
?
Apr 17, 2023 14:52
|
|
|
Steve French posted:Here's a stupid (honest) question: what purpose does the license plate frame serve, for you? It informs people why I’m speeding 
|
|
#
?
Apr 17, 2023 15:29
|
|
|
Steve French posted:Here's a stupid (honest) question: what purpose does the license plate frame serve, for you? Maybe he/she is in New Jersey or some other state that requires front tags. I’d get one that’s metal-diecast.
|
|
#
?
Apr 17, 2023 17:12
|
|
|
PainterofCrap posted:Maybe he/she is in New Jersey or some other state that requires front tags. I’ve had plenty of cars with front plates and never felt a desire to have a plate frame… aesthetically no frame seems cleaner to me personally so I’m wondering if there’s a practical reason not occurring to me or if it’s just taste.
|
|
#
?
Apr 17, 2023 18:58
|
|
|
A car wash will absolutely mangle the thin sheet they use these days for license plates. My front plate was mangled by a snowdrift. Putting a heavy metal frame on it solved the issue.
|
|
#
?
Apr 17, 2023 19:28
|
|
|
PainterofCrap posted:A car wash will absolutely mangle the thin sheet they use these days for license plates. Yeah, nobody would gently caress with a fuckin Iron Maiden plate frame.
|
|
#
?
Apr 17, 2023 22:21
|
|
|
Steve French posted:I’ve had plenty of cars with front plates and never felt a desire to have a plate frame… aesthetically no frame seems cleaner to me personally so I’m wondering if there’s a practical reason not occurring to me or if it’s just taste. My state’s plates have a crappy uneven border at the very edge so I like using plate frames. My favorite these days is the silicone ones.
|
|
#
?
Apr 17, 2023 23:01
|
|
|
New York needs to introduce one of those nice clean plates that's just like all black with a white or yellow font, half the appeal of a frame to me is to just hide the ugly plate itself.
|
|
#
?
Apr 17, 2023 23:04
|
|
|
PainterofCrap posted:A car wash will absolutely mangle the thin sheet they use these days for license plates. This is exactly why I have a license plate frame, it's just the cheap metal of my last frame was only slightly better than the license plate itself.
|
|
#
?
Apr 17, 2023 23:36
|
|
|
nitrogen posted:This is exactly why I have a license plate frame, it's just the cheap metal of my last frame was only slightly better than the license plate itself. wesleywillis posted:Yeah, nobody would gently caress with a fuckin Iron Maiden plate frame. 
|
|
#
?
Apr 18, 2023 00:19
|
|
|
My friends' FR:S had some wiring chewed up by rodents. Any goon approved preventative actions for this once it gets repaired? Mothballs, ultrasonic sound devices or anything like that effective? She parks outside at an apartment complex, so the options are limited.
|
|
#
?
Apr 18, 2023 18:31
|
|
|
StormDrain posted:My friends' FR:S had some wiring chewed up by rodents. Any goon approved preventative actions for this once it gets repaired? Mothballs, ultrasonic sound devices or anything like that effective? She parks outside at an apartment complex, so the options are limited. https://www.amazon.com/LMParts-Genuine-RoDENTT-4019-2317-40192317/dp/B09B37W8LJ
|
|
#
?
Apr 18, 2023 18:37
|
|
|
I just got my FiST back from the body shop. They fixed the rear wheel arch/fender panel that my sister backed into and supposedly replaced parts of the rear bumper carrier/etc that had corrosion. I paid my $1k deductible and everything looks and feels fine, although my neurotic brain seriously cannot tell whether it’s ever so slightly more rounded and less sharp than it used to be. Dude tells me they popped the dent as best as they could but had to bodyfill it at the end. Should I be worried/annoyed? The car lives outside and I have plans to long-haul keep it. I’m worried about water getting in and damaging the repaired spot. Is that reasonable? This is the second shop I took it to, the nearest one that my insurance (Allstate) was a partner with. They’re well-rated but the first, unaffiliated, shop I took it to quoted me double what these guys ultimately charged me+Allstate because they said they wanted to pull and possibly replace the panel. Is it unreasonable for me to be annoyed about this turn of events? Is bondo going to be a problem down the road? According to the shop, the car already had some bondo around that area, which was news to me based on the carfax.
|
|
#
?
Apr 18, 2023 22:40
|
|
|
You used a partner shop. That should come with a lifetime warranty on the work. If something happens, use it. And look into the cost difference to lower your deductible, unless you can afford to drop $1k anytime something happens.
|
|
#
?
Apr 19, 2023 01:28
|
|
|
wesleywillis posted:Yeah, nobody would gently caress with a fuckin Iron Maiden plate frame. BRB gonna get one of these for my El Camino.
|
|
#
?
Apr 19, 2023 04:19
|
|
|
Has anybody messed with the new and miraculous! home ceramic coatings? I’m just starting to notice swirling and I have some other scratches, figure I’d like to do something a bit better than straight wax (if that’s even a thing) that might hold for a while without paying $1k+ for my accord. Thanks to everyone for battery advice…50 pages ago 
|
|
#
?
Apr 19, 2023 17:35
|
|
|
REMEMBER SPONGE MONKEYS posted:Has anybody messed with the new and miraculous! home ceramic coatings? Ceramic in this case is just marketing-speak for silicone. Silicone waxes have been around for decades. I've been using one on my car regularly for years. It looks nice. I rewax it once a year or so.
|
|
#
?
Apr 19, 2023 18:03
|
|
|
Is there any reason not to use extended life coolant meant for diesel engines in the 460? I figure a lump of cast iron is a lump of cast iron.
|
|
#
?
Apr 19, 2023 18:37
|
|
|
I personally can't think of any. I wouldn't go the other way without at least considering whether you need to add anti cavitation additive, but diesel coolant in gas engine, can't think of anything. Maybe service temp? What's the boiling point on the coolant at desired mix ratio?
|
|
#
?
Apr 19, 2023 18:44
|
|
|
The boilover of the Rotella ELC is 129*c at 50/50. Just looking at the data sheet, everything that it's designed to do for heavy diesels would also benefit a cast iron gasser. Anti-cavitation, anti-corrosion, It would just be handy to have both vehicles use the same coolant.
|
|
#
?
Apr 19, 2023 19:07
|
|
|
I haven't owned a car since 1993. Things have moved on a bit since then. Am I understanding the difference between full hybrid (I think called hybrid electric in the US) and plug-in hybrid correctly? Both types have an ICE and an electric motor. The battery in the full hybrid gets charged only by braking, so you fill it up with regular petrol and get improved fuel economy over an ICE only. The battery in a plug-in hybrid can be charged from an external source and also from vehicle braking. This allows the car to drive in full electric mode, but the range is considerably less than a fully electric vehicle. Plug-in hybrids also have an ICE that runs on petrol when the main battery is empty. Then the battery gets charged via braking and the fuel economy is roughly similar to a full hybrid. Is this generally correct? If I can charge at home, and just use the car for short trips, the plug-in is probably a better choice, right? But what about summer road trips? I assume the electric componenets are heavier in the plug-in. If we just run it on the petrol engine after we use whatever charge we got at the hotel or at lunch, how much are we going to notice? Also, I live in Europe so there's the whole 2035 thing that I'm kinda thinking about.
|
|
#
?
Apr 19, 2023 19:52
|
|
|
Yeah a plug in hybrid is basically* an EV with a gas powered range extender. For the 90% of trips you do that are less than 30 miles, you'll never hear the engine come on and you treat it as an EV, but when you go drive to grandma's house on the other side of the country the gas engine gives you 300 miles of range *Not at all basic
|
|
#
?
Apr 19, 2023 20:28
|
|
|
greazeball posted:I haven't owned a car since 1993. Things have moved on a bit since then. Phev is ideal for what you're describing, yes. It'll do around town no problem for you on pure electric, but you won't have to wait for a charger if you're on a long road trip and just want to get there, just fill up and roll. In fact you should run it as close to empty as possible and refill the tank about once every year or so just to keep the fuel from going stale in the tank.
|
|
#
?
Apr 19, 2023 20:45
|
|
|
nitrogen posted:Any recommendations for a front license plate frame that won't get chewed up in a car wash? I managed to find this, which is plastic, but might help the best I can figure, in case someone else has a similar problem https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0B9XY1FBR At least if the carwash eats my plate this time, it might not bend like a piece of paper. I will put a generic one of these on the front and hopefully I will be ready for evil carwashes everywhere https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B08DHVSSG8
|
|
#
?
Apr 19, 2023 21:01
|
|
|
greazeball posted:Also, I live in Europe so there's the whole 2035 thing that I'm kinda thinking about. The 2035 thing is for new vehicle sales so it won't affect you now for what car you buy. But I believe Germany successfully argued for ICE exemptions for renewable fuels, H2, etc., so there's a good chance that ICE vehicle sales will remain past 2035. I would also expect to see more applications using a dedicated hybrid engine where the engine is not connected to the powertrain at all and is used entirely to charge the battery, which allows it to run at peak efficiency without worrying about transient conditions. totalnewbie fucked around with this message at 21:11 on Apr 19, 2023 |
|
#
?
Apr 19, 2023 21:08
|
|
|
Yeah cars that run on synthetic gas are exempt, whatever the gently caress synthetic gas is. Hydrogen, CO2 and methane cooked at high temp and pressure maybe I suspect diesel will be pretty hard to kill, the military is highly dependent on it and can't be beat for low volatility high energy density power, farming and aviation will be using diesel and kerosene for another hundred years at least Average Joe will be driving an electric car though
|
|
#
?
Apr 19, 2023 23:03
|
|
|
Don't forget trains and trucking. The world still runs very much on diesel. If I got it right, synthetic gasoline is a cop-out by the automotive industry to be able to keep making very expensive supercars for rich people. EU wanting to ban gasoline cars by 2035 has gotten the car industry a bit rattled. I predict that in the future, most gasoline cars will be banned, except a few very expensive supercars that can run on synthetic gasoline, so it'll just be a few rich assholes that can afford to run those cars.
|
|
#
?
Apr 19, 2023 23:07
|
|
|
I doubt most super cars will go through more than a couple tanks of synthetic gas a year. A lot of Ferraris and poo poo are already drinking $10/gal 110 octane race gas so what's an extra $8/gallon Short haul trucking and cargo rail will go fully electric by the the of the century. I can see long haul rail freight in the US having to be drug kicking and screaming away from diesel. The first all electric freight rail was actually here in the US like 100 years ago, it's doable
|
|
#
?
Apr 19, 2023 23:21
|
|
|
Europe is full of electrified rail, of course it's doable. It just needs to be done. And investing in infrastructure isn't the US' strong suit. Eventually it'll happen but I suspect diesel will be around for much longer than gasoline.
|
|
#
?
Apr 19, 2023 23:32
|
|
|
spankmeister posted:Europe is full of electrified rail, of course it's doable. It just needs to be done. And investing in infrastructure isn't the US' strong suit. Eventually it'll happen but I suspect diesel will be around for much longer than gasoline. Hadlock posted:I doubt most super cars will go through more than a couple tanks of synthetic gas a year. A lot of Ferraris and poo poo are already drinking $10/gal 110 octane race gas so what's an extra $8/gallon Hadlock posted:Yeah cars that run on synthetic gas are exempt, whatever the gently caress synthetic gas is. Hydrogen, CO2 and methane cooked at high temp and pressure maybe spankmeister posted:Don't forget trains and trucking. The world still runs very much on diesel. WCX is literally happening right now and if anything is clear, it's that nothing is clear. There are a lot of options for synthetic fuels - methanol, kerosene, ammonia, other hydrocarbons, etc. They all have various ups and downs. It really doesn't matter what the energy carrier is - the main issue is where to get the energy to turn them into synthetic fuels. This really gets into the debate of how vehicle emissions should be regulated. For example, let's say tomorrow I find a magic fountain that sucks up CO2 from the atmosphere and turns it into gasoline, without any energy input. Oh and because it's magic, it also doesn't emit NOx or anything like that. Well, according to today's regulations, even though it's a magic fuel that's net-zero carbon emissions, we still can't use it because what comes out of the tailpipe is CO2. This in spite of the fact that creating the fuel took an equal amount of CO2 out of the atmosphere. That doesn't make any sense, right? Because replacing it with a BEV means you're contributing to environmental damage due to cobalt mining, etc. This whole idea is called the life cycle analysis and there are various versions of it in terms of scope. Common ones are tank-to-wheel (basically tailpipe emissions), well-to-wheel (which includes the fuel cycle), and cradle-to-grave which starts with natural resource extraction and then all the way to when it becomes waste. LCA is a complex topic because it becomes immensely more complicated when you start adding things like the process of making the fuel. There's a lot of work that's going into it but regulators are very reluctant to try any implementation of it; CARB, for example, has clearly stated that they much more prefer to regulate each industry with their own stand-alone regulations. Which makes sense in one way because it's much easier to do that and you risk making really lovely regulations if you try to do it without good understanding, but makes no sense because if I'm burning pure plant-based fuel, and the GHG burden is much, much less than what you see just from tailpipe emissions. But the current regulations doesn't reflect this and gives you no incentive, from the vehicle side, to do anything of that sort vs. just burning dead dinosaurs. CARB has said things like they want to make regulations that push toward the ultimate goal (100% ZEV) and ICE will still have criteria emission (NMOG + NOx) which is true, but aftertreatment systems are very good and these are problems that can be addressed by engineering. Given the ENORMOUS task ahead of us to convert to an electric/hydrogen economy, I think barring some DRASTIC actions from the federal government (I don't think anyone is capable of projects required at this scale), it's pretty clear that regulators' hopes are just hopes. When it comes to heavy duty applications, diesel may hang around a little longer but it wont be nearly by as long as you think. Maybe another 5-10 years after LDV but in some ways, it's much easier to decarbonize HD applications. For a long time, FCVs' biggest weakness was transient conditions, because FCs simply cannot put out enough energy to handle those needs. But paired with modern (and even better, in the future) batteries, those problems are not much of a concern. Also keep in mind that FCs have very high efficiencies (near 100% theoretical efficiency possible vs. ~58% for ICE), there's a lot of incentive to move to FCVs. Because HD applications tend to be very hub-and-spoke with vehicles returning to depots, etc. or traveling along major interstates for long haul trucking, for example, rolling out the necessary infrastructure to support refueling FCVs is in some ways much easier than coming up with the required electrical generation and distribution necessary for full BEVs. Also keep in mind that H2 ICE is a thing. I literally just spent the entire day today listening to talks about H2 ICE. Work is still ongoing but OEMs (HD/Off-road) are 100% preparing themselves for a possible future where diesel is replaced by gaseous fuels like renewable natural gas and hydrogen. I have no doubt that diesel will remain in some very niche applications but they will be very niche. The hierarchy is basically going to go BEV -> FCV -> H2 ICE -> diesel and you're going to have to have a drat good reason to hang on to diesel, to the point where I don't think anyone other than military and/or emergency services, or maybe if you live in the outer reaches of Alaska or something, are going to be using diesel maybe even 20-30 years from now. Also keep in mind that a lot of the discussion for timeframes centers around new car sales, not what's allowed on the road.
|
|
#
?
Apr 20, 2023 00:24
|
|
|
I'm extremely skeptical about anything H2 I just don't buy it from a reliability/mechanical complexity/maintenance standpoint The only people looking at H2 are researchers literally funded by oil companies, and Japan. Japan doesn't have direct access to lithium reserves so from a national defense standpoint H2 is a valuable backup but otherwise nobody is seriously looking at it as a technology. This seems to be industry wide consensus
|
|
#
?
Apr 20, 2023 00:44
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 28, 2024 11:36 |
|
|
Are you talking about H2 ICE? Or FCV? Because like I said, I literally just spent the entire day listening to talks about H2 ICE from OEMs and not-Japan. I'm not sure what you mean by mechanical complexity because they are basically converted diesel or gaseous fuel engines. Reliability maybe, but I also haven't heard of any concerns about reliability due to hydrogen.
|
|
#
?
Apr 20, 2023 00:52
|
|