On today’s show… the Department of Energy awards Hyundai with a grant to develop a spark/compression ignition engine… PPG creates a new process to reduce energy consumption when painting vehicles… and Bob Lutz explains what led to the demise of the Pontiac Solstice and Saturn Sky. All that and more coming right up on Autoline Daily.
This is Autoline Daily the voice of the automotive industry.
FLOODING HALTS HONDA PRODUCTION IN MEXICO
Due to flooding in the area of Honda’s plant in Celaya, Mexico, the company has been forced to suspend production of the Fit and HR-V. AutoForecast Solutions reports that production of the models will resume in November. According to WardsAuto data, Honda only had 34 days supply of the Fit at the end of August. So it won’t be easy to find one of those in stock until production resumes. But the company is in better shape with HR-V, which has a healthier 55 days supply.
INCREASING EV RANGE IN WINTER
An EVs range can decrease as much as 40% in the winter when you factor in outside temperature as well as that energy needed to heat certain components and the cabin comes from the battery. But the supplier Continental has developed a new intelligent thermal management system that will help cut those losses. New Coolant Flow Control Valves are used to better manage heating and cooling to only the places where it’s needed. Continental says it’s feasible to increase the winter range of an electric vehicle by around 25% as well as speed up charging time when it’s hot out.
TESLA NOW BUILDING CAR CARRIERS
Last week Tesla admitted it was having trouble getting Model 3s into customer’s hands, but it’s going to unique lengths to fix that. Tesla has launched a door-to-door service, bringing vehicles directly to customers. Elon Musk also Tweeted out yesterday that Tesla has resorted to building its own car carriers to make deliveries. And once a new owner does get their car, it might just be a current Tesla customer who volunteered to educate them on their purchase.
Still to come… Mercedes plans to start exporting GLC’s built in India to the U.S.
PPG REDUCES PAINT SHOP ENERGY CONSUMPTION
It may surprise you to learn, the paint shop consumes nearly 70 percent of all energy at an automotive assembly plant. But paint supplier PPG has come up with a process that can cut paint shop energy consumption by up to 39%. It developed a specially formulated clear coat that cures at about 175-degrees Fahrenheit, instead of nearly 285-degrees like current systems. This makes it possible to bake carbon fiber and composite parts with the body of the vehicle, resulting in better color uniformity between pieces in addition to simplifying the manufacturing process. The new system can be used with existing equipment and the painting cycle and bake time is the same. OEMs could also reduce the physical footprint of their paint shop because fewer ovens are needed. Ferrari is the first automaker to adopt this low-cure paint technology.
HYUNDAI WORKING ON SPARK/COMPRESSION IGNITION
Billions are being invested in electric technology, but the internal combustion engine is not dead yet. Hyundai just received funding of nearly $5 million from the U.S. Department of Energy to conduct research and development on a new engine that would improve fuel economy and CO2 emissions. What makes this interesting is that Hyundai is looking to develop a spark/compression ignition engine, likely similar to Mazda’s SKYACTIV-X engine, to be used on its own as well as for plug-in and mild-hybrid vehicles.
MERCEDES TO START EXPORTING GLC FROM INDIA
Last year, Ford began importing EcoSport’s made in India to the U.S. And now another automaker will follow suit. Automotive News reports that Mercedes-Benz will export GLC’s built in India to the U.S. The crossover is currently made in Germany and there aren’t plans to build it at the company’s plant in Alabama. This is a bit of a risk for Mercedes. Not only is the GLC the best-selling luxury compact CUV in the U.S., it’s also the company’s number one vehicle in the country. It wouldn’t be surprising to see more automakers ship vehicles from India to the U.S., especially with the trade war the Trump Administration is waging with China.
Coming up next, Bob Lutz explains why GM dropped the Pontiac Solstice and Saturn Sky from its lineup.
WHY GM DECIDED TO AXE THE SKY & SOLSTICE
Do you remember the Pontiac Solstice and Saturn Sky? They were affordable, two-seat roadsters designed to compete with the Mazda Miata. After some initial success, General Motors axed the models, after just a few years. On last week’s Autoline After Hours, we were joined by Bob Lutz, the former Vice Chairman of GM, and he shared why the company killed those models and why either one didn’t live on as a Chevrolet.
(Clip from AAH # can only be viewed in the video version of today’s show.)
You can watch that entire interview with Bob Lutz right now on our website, Autoline.tv or you can find it on our YouTube channel.
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But that’s it for today, thanks for watching and please join us again tomorrow.
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Comments (35)
September 25th, 2018 at 12:06 pm
Great show. Great fan of the pretty solstice gxp coupe. Too bad only four manual gxp coupes wer built? In black..
Btw…THE CHINESE STARTED THE TRADE WAR WITH THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA A DECADE AGO..OUR PREVIOUS POLITICANS JUST IGNORED IT…TRUMP HAS PROMISED TO CREATE A FAIR TRADE WITH CHINA. CONSIDER NOT CALLIT TRUMPS TRADE WAR…
ITS THE CHINESE TAKING ADVANTAGE OF US AT A 400 BILLION TRADE IMBALANCE THAT NEEDS TO END.
September 25th, 2018 at 12:29 pm
Mercedes needs to make sure they get good quality from the plant in India. If I were paying near $50K for a small CUV with a three pointed star, I’d want it to come from Germany. Maybe most buyers wouldn’t care about that, but they would want it to be well assembled.
September 25th, 2018 at 12:32 pm
The U.S. started a trade war involving vehicles about 50 year ago, with the “chicken tax.” Trump has greatly intensified the trade war.
September 25th, 2018 at 1:01 pm
#3~~The chicken tax is a 25% tariff on potato starch, dextrin, brandy, and light trucks imposed in 1963 by the United States under President Lyndon B. Johnson in response to tariffs placed by France and West Germany on importation of U.S. chicken. It was not started by the U.S.
September 25th, 2018 at 1:10 pm
The part involving vehicles was started by the U.S. Yes, the “chicken” part was France and Germany.
September 25th, 2018 at 1:18 pm
2 absolutely agree. And if some people are worried buying a vehicle made in China, they should worry ten times as much if it is made in India, not only because of what India has shown us in the past (those god-awful Mahindras and Tata Nanos on Fire) but also because of the very troubling dishonesty of Mahindra itself, which left US dealers high and dry last time, and is pulling another scam right now. And don’t forget the fired Ford VPs, above all liar Nair with his 47-47-47 MPG nobody got ( he was fired for harassment tho). India is not ready for prime time and will not be for decades.
September 25th, 2018 at 1:22 pm
a. Why does the US dept of Energy fund failed Huyndai’s research? Shouldn’t South Korea’s Dept of Energy fund them?
b. Bloviating Lutz and his sorry attempt at a joke (wooden trucks by Tesla) keeps up the excuses why the Solstice and the Sky failed. They failed because they were inferior toys. Their segment is a tiny one anyway, so who cares, and in that segment of affordable cabrios you have the tiny Miata (I would never drive this thing on a long trip, cannot even stretch, and I am only 6 1″. ) that dominates the segment, and with good reason. So, Bob Lutz, spare me the “dog ate my homework” and “Gramma Died”. We heard those excuses before.
September 25th, 2018 at 1:25 pm
I also would want to see Peter de Lorenzo come back as a guest. By some accident, I followed his webpage almost from the very start (Autoextremist.com). His family were Detroit 3 Insiders (GM I believe) but he was highly critical of the domestics back then. I bet that has resulted in a loss of many invitations in the industry.
September 25th, 2018 at 1:40 pm
5 while there are tiny islands of protectionism, no other nation in the world in the last 80 years at least, has been more encouraging of Free Trade, ignoring blatant violations by poorer nations, esp right after WW II, when the US wanted to strengthen the Free World economically so that the economic illiteracy of communism and all its other evils would not spread even further.
The USA is 100% correct in its grievances with CHina, and not just because of their protectionism, but for their blatant stealing of intellectual property. They have to be told this officially and in no uncertain terms, that THEY HAVE TO STOP Doing that! It is outrageous, every time I have been in China and taught a course and assigned a textbook, they just bought ONE copy, and made xeroxes (back in 06) for 96 students, and in 2016, they just scanned the text, without paying the creator of all this important knowledge, the author, a damn dime!!!
THANK GOD for Trump not just complaining about it (which all previous Presidents did and achieved NOTHING), but putting his $ where his mouth is.
And China cannot win this war. The US imports a whole lot from them and they import next to nothing from us. The tariff war will hurt them 10 times as much as it hurts the USA, and Trump, not being another corrupt lawyer politician, understands it. He did not become a multi-billionaire by being stupid, but many politicians I see on TV sure look that they were unfit for any real job!
September 25th, 2018 at 1:54 pm
@Larry D – you may have seen these, but Peter DeLorenzo has been a guest of our shows somewhat recently. AAH #415: http://www.autoline.tv/journal/?p=54678 and ATW #2132: http://www.autoline.tv/show/2132. Peter is always welcome and I’m sure he’ll be back again.
September 25th, 2018 at 1:54 pm
#7 The solstice and Sky had the same problem inherent with GM building any other two-seater than the Corvette. The market is very small and in direct competition with the Vette. Not that the Solstice and Sky had great performance but years before the Pontiac Fiero was canceled after only 4 years. It was significantly cheaper than the Corvette and with the proposed engine for 89 which was planned to be a turbo-charged Iron duke which turned better 0-60 times than the Corvette. With one more year that car would have been a great vehicle. GM killed it to save sales on the Vette.
September 25th, 2018 at 1:57 pm
I heard that a trade war exemption was made for iPhones. As with everything manufactured, parts come from all over the world, so maybe someone decided that it “averages out,” though they are assembled in China. Also, Trump wouldn’t want to be blamed for iPhones getting even more expensive.
September 25th, 2018 at 2:02 pm
Like all good story tellers, Bob Lutz molds the tale to the audience. If this means leaving out a few critical details, so be it. The Sky and Solstice may have had the issues he mentioned, but he completely glossed over that these cars were nothing special, especially for an enthusiast they were not at all that fun to drive. Sure, with the turbo it had some get-up-and-go, but handling was so-so and you felt all of its 3,000 lbs. All GM had to do was buy a couple Miatas, strip them down, measure and weigh everything, then design their own version. If they did do this, they were incompetent, if they didn’t do it, they were incompetent. I took each version on a closed track and street drive, and they were just fine for tooling around and looking cool. Otherwise, their demise was easily predicted. Too bad as GM really had an opportunity to do something interesting.
September 25th, 2018 at 2:04 pm
#9 Larry you haven’t partaken in the cool-aid? Some people are fine with a trade deficit and continuing to give away technology that millions and billions of dollars are spent on to achieve. Not only has China had a 25% tariff on US cars for decades but they also limited the number of cars regardless of market demand.
So yep upsetting the apple cart may cause some disruption in commodities and prices but we did not get into this position overnight. As you very well pointed out for years this deficit has just been ignored.
September 25th, 2018 at 2:04 pm
11 I think the Fiero was also supposed to get power steering, if it had lasted another year. A few years ago, I saw a really interesting Fiero at a car show. It had a Northstar engine, very neatly installed. I didn’t talk to the owner, but he must have had to cut some firewall away to fit that engine. The “widest” OEM engine used was the 60 degree pushrod V6.
September 25th, 2018 at 2:05 pm
14 …but why does Trump want a trade war with Canada?
September 25th, 2018 at 2:11 pm
13 Solstice and Sky looked good, but they struck me as “underdeveloped,” both the driving dynamics you mention, but also the top mechanism, and general interior design. The only one I drove was an early one with the 5-speed manual, and the gear spacing seemed too wide, and just didn’t seem “right.”
September 25th, 2018 at 2:15 pm
Its great that PPG has a lower power consumption paint curing process. Now if they could improve the durability of todays paint coatings used on cars. It seem that chipping on todays paints is worse than cars from the 60′s and 70′s. Love to see ratings on the auto manufactures paint quality. We only have to look back to all the bad paint work from past years to see the results of “new and improved” paints and application techniques. How many Fords,Honda’s ect. did we see with peeling and fading paint and many of those owners were stiffed by the manufacturers to get them repainted.
September 25th, 2018 at 2:28 pm
18 From my experience, today’s paint is much better than in the 60′s or 70′s. It was once common for silver and light blue paint to fall off of cars after about three years. It was common for metallic red paint to get really dull after very few years. I don’t see that now.
September 25th, 2018 at 2:33 pm
10 Sean, I was not implying Peter is not welcome in any of your programs, I was thinking obviously of big 3 Execs and their PR divisions not being happy with his earlier strong criticism of their moves, and not treating him as nicely as they do the mainstream automotive press in their events.
Recently I find agreeing with Peter less than I used to, BTW.
September 25th, 2018 at 2:37 pm
11 The Pontiac Fiero was a terrible car. Most 80s cars were too, but it stood out.
13 Good points
14 I don’t mind a trade deficit as long as it is a result of free and fair trade, and as long as our economy is vast enough to be able to pay it. Many many nations have a ton of tariffs. as I wrote earlier, the US has been the champion of Free trade world wide for decades, because trade is much better than no trade or less trade, but in the process it ignored blatant violations by the rest of the world.
But I repeat, Intellectual property theft is at least as important as any other trade issue, whether practiced by China or any other nation out there. And this part hurts the US much more than other nations, because we are at the forefront of research and technology.
September 25th, 2018 at 2:42 pm
16 I believe Trump is econ literate enough (MBA Wharton) to know better, I doubt he really wants a trade war with anybody, and he much prefers negotiations (dealmaking was his career’s strong point) to improve trade agreements for the US.
He also has a voting base who were really hurt by NAFTA and other “freer trade” agreements so this is a constraint. And unlike politicians, he not only says what is on his mind all the time, he also kept all his campaign promises, whether they were economically proper or not!
In the specific case of Canada, the Canadians do protect and subsidize their lumber industry, causing a lot of harm in the US timber industry. There is no reason for Canada to do this, it is not some developing nation protecting its infant industry.
Sorry for all this, we got carried way today into political discussions.
September 25th, 2018 at 2:46 pm
Doesn’t Trump hold some kind of record for failed casinos? Sorry, I couldn’t help myself.
September 25th, 2018 at 2:58 pm
19 I don’t know where you live but in the Northern states where salt/brine/cinders and sand is used chipping and paint damage is a major concern. Once the coating is damaged and not detected and touched up, then the real paint degradation begins. The southern states have extreme sun exposure and bug damaged to deal with and that to can be tough on paint. I never saw cars from the 60′s and 70′s have the wide spread paint peeling we have seen in cars from the 90′s as an example. I have seen many newer cars with paint conditions that are poor for the year of the vehicle. For someone like myself who keeps a vehicle for more than 10 years, paint quality is important. I do wish there would be a rating system on paint quality.
September 25th, 2018 at 3:15 pm
@ 1, 14, 21 on Trade. As a free trader fewer tariffs are better as far as I am concerned. With al the talk about punishing China for intellectual property theft: do you realize that most exports from China are sold on FOB Port of Origin terms? That means that freight and all import duties are paid by the U.S. buyer. How does that punish Chinese producers for anything they may have done? It only means that U.S. buyers will be able to buy less, and the Chinese will have to sell more elsewhere. Which is easy to do with all economies except for the Russian, Brazilian and Argentinean economies being strong. So in reality no or hardly any harm to the Chinese. Price increases in the U.S., though.
A trade deficit is not necessarily the result of unfair trade. It is usually the result of a lack of competitiveness. In our case caused by labor unions and education. The American High School system favors delivering “generalists” and reduces the number of students who are fit in skilled trades by the time they are 18 years old (like in other countries). And has poor results in STEM education for those who should be prepared for academic studies: we score in the high 40′s in global comparisons. And the American college system which cranks out English, Communications, and Political Science majors in far larger numbers than Engineers. 6% Of U.S. students are engineering students; 30% in Germany and most of Western Europe, 60-70% in India and China. If we want to produce here, we have to ensure we have the workforce for it. That is a long term investment, and we are currently negatively affected by education policies of the past decades.
What we are doing now is ignoring our weaknesses and blaming the rules. That will get us nowhere IMHO.
September 25th, 2018 at 3:52 pm
14 I lived the first 56 years of my life in central Indiana, where they dump megatons of salt on the roads. I now spend about 2/3 of the year about halfway down in Florida, and 1/3 in Indiana.
I always made it a point to look for any stone chips, and touch them up before rust could spread from a small ding.
Not only did certain colors of paint fall off of 70′s cars, but the paint faded and dulled much worse than today’s paint. Maybe “old” paint was better in regard to rock dings, but that hasn’t been my experience.
Maybe part of why today’s paint doesn’t seem as good to you, is that cars last much longer, so the paint has more years on it. If driven year round in Indiana, with the road salt, 60′s and 70′s cars were rust buckets in 10 years. Today’s cars generally go twice as long before the rust is bad.
You mention 90′s cars, and there were a number of white 90′s cars that had paint fall off. It was fairly common, on multiple brands of cars.
September 25th, 2018 at 3:59 pm
24, continued
In Florida, older cars that have been parked outside all the time have dull paint, opaque headlight lenses, cracked dash pads, and faded interiors. Even 15 year old cars that are garaged, except when driven, often look like new. Cars kept near the beach sometimes become rusty from sea spray, but it’s not nearly as bad as the road salt in Indiana, Michigan, etc.
September 25th, 2018 at 4:51 pm
why would hyundai or mazda waste time developing more efficient internal combustion engines when they already exist, nautilis hcci true sparkless compression ignition, or achates power?
September 25th, 2018 at 5:34 pm
No those will fit without firewall modification. I also have one.
September 25th, 2018 at 5:40 pm
28 Thanks for info. Maybe they had plans for things that never made it to production.
September 25th, 2018 at 5:51 pm
27 don’t get me started on the opaque headlight lenses they should be glass… but you know they should come standard on a lot of new cars with those blinding LED headlights.
September 25th, 2018 at 6:00 pm
30 The best headlights I ever had were 7 inch round Hella H4′s, that I used on a 1974 Plymouth Duster.
September 26th, 2018 at 9:20 am
21 The Fiero was a horrible car at first as GM tried to do it on the cheap borrowing suspension components from existing programs like the citation. However by 1988 the car was pretty good for the period. At the time I worked on the program and testing for the turbo 4 was in development as well as a few turbo 2.8L V6 versions. The V6′s were crazy fast and fun to drive but I think more of someone wanting to just do it, knowing it would never see production. Had they released it with a turbo V6 it would have surpassed the Buick grand national and Corvette for quickness. Just in the middle of the program it was killed and I wanted that development bad. I believe it was crushed.
September 26th, 2018 at 10:14 am
Lambo the Solstice GXP and the Saturn redline were damn quick . My parents still have a 08 GXP and it will plant you in the seat when you nail it. I was extremely impressed with the performance and handling. I can’t speak for the standard models as I have not driven one but the top line models delivered in spades.
September 26th, 2018 at 4:26 pm
I was examining the spy photos of the New Honda Passport and believe it will have the underpinnings of the refreshed Honda Pilot but six inches shorter as per all the available information. The front clip will be almost identical to that of the Honda Ridgeline and the back end will just be a closed cabin similar to the Pilot including taillights.
If this is what Honda is going to unveil at the 2018 LA Auto Show it should be a real winner. The only thing I would suggest to the Honda Design Team is do not carry over those ridiculous lower square turning indicators next to the beautiful circular fog lights. Integrate the turning signals into the headlight assembly for simplicity and streamlining the look of the front bumper.