Turbos roar to forefront in race for fuel economy
By Ken Bensinger | Tribune Newspapers: Los Angeles Times December 3, 2007
The next thing in greener cars doesn't need hydrogen, lithium-ion batteries or a power cord. In fact, it's based on century-old technology that has been used on trucks since before World War II: the turbo.
Under pressure to cut emissions and boost fuel efficiency, automakers quietly are turning to turbocharging as a relatively inexpensive, easy-to-implement technology that soon could be a permanent staple on internal combustion engines.
That's because turbos, high-velocity fans that recirculate and compress exhaust gases back into the motor's cylinders, can increase fuel efficiency by as much as 30 percent, while at the same time increasing power output. Thanks to that increased power, smaller engines can be used, reducing weight and further increasing efficiency. And because it is a proven technology, the research and development costs are enticingly low.
"There isn't a dynamometer in Detroit that doesn't have a turbocharged engine being tested on it right now," said Eric Noble, president of Carlab, an automotive consultant in Orange, Calif., referring to machines that measure an engine's power. "There's still a lot of fuel savings that can be gotten out of a traditional engine."
Automakers are cagey about announcing how many cars will get the turbo boost, but General Motors Corp. executives say they are considering putting turbos on even their largest passenger vehicles, while Hyundai just announced its first turbocharged car, the Genesis coupe, for the U.S. market in a dozen years.
Volkswagen and Mercedes are preparing to hit the American market with new turbocharged diesels starting next year. And at the recent Los Angeles Auto Show, Ford Motor Co. Chief Executive Alan Mulally announced a major initiative to begin putting turbochargers and a related technology, direct fuel injection, on a large portion of its fleet in the near future, calling the move a "cornerstone of Ford's near-term plan."
The first Ford vehicle to get the boost will be the new Lincoln MKS, which will be introduced this spring with a standard engine but will go turbo by early 2009. The new engine will be smaller, 3.5 liters compared with 3.7 liters, yet have better performance.
"This is not something on the drawing board. Turbos are here," said Adriane Brown, president and CEO of Honeywell Transportation Systems, the leading turbo manufacturer, with $2.5 billion in turbo sales last year. As turbos gain more acceptance, she expects sales to grow three times faster than the automotive segment in the next few years, or about 8 percent.
Technology not new
Turbos are hardly new. After finding a place on ships, locomotives and airplanes in the first half of the last century, they were adopted for passenger cars in the 1970s, when BMW, Mercedes, Mitsubishi and Buick bolted them onto manifolds. Despite popularity among car tuners, they quickly lost acceptance among the general population, which saw them as unreliable, expensive and, with their sudden bursts of acceleration, dangerous.
Older turbos delivered great amounts of torque, yet frequently there was a short time gap between stepping on the pedal and feeling the power. That gap, called turbo lag, could cause unsuspecting drivers to crash.
New turbo technology essentially has eliminated that gap while providing a variable boost depending on the engine velocity, turbo manufacturers say. And turbos add only slightly to the cost of a car, they say, between $1,000 and $3,000, part of which can be offset by using a smaller engine.
Some carmakers are just now embracing the technology, and a very few still shun it, but others have been pressing the turbo button for years. GM's Saab, for example, has long used turbocharged engines, and Subaru has had them in cars for 25 years, including four current models. In Europe, turbocharger-equipped diesel engines are far and away the most common engine type, approaching 50 percent market penetration. Yet in the U.S., said Honeywell's Brown, only 6 percent of cars and truck are "boosted."
Contrary to American tastes
That gap, experts say, largely is due to American tastes and prejudices. Simply put, Americans want big, heavy motors, and they associate displacement -- the volume of air and gas drawn in by an engine -- with power. Turbos are seen as accouterments for tin-can sports cars and low-slung street rodders, hardly something useful for towing, say, or lugging kids to soccer practice.
The reality, however, is that turbochargers have been on heavy-duty trucks in the U.S. for years. The Big Three automakers had 19 different turbocharged diesel trucks in their 2007 lineups, according to Edmunds.
"The U.S. is probably the last market to look at the upsides of downsized turbo engines," said Mary Brevard, spokeswoman for supplier Borg Warner Inc., which saw sales of its turbos increase 17 percent last year, to $825 million. "Americans think bigger is better, but if they drive a turbo, they find out" it's a powerful, high-performing car.
They might be finding out whether they like it or not. With government fuel-consumption standards expected to rise significantly in the near future, many automakers see turbos as the least expensive and easiest short-term way to increase efficiency, especially with experts saying hydrogen cars will cost as much as $1 million each and are at least a decade away.
By Ken Bensinger | Tribune Newspapers: Los Angeles Times December 3, 2007
The next thing in greener cars doesn't need hydrogen, lithium-ion batteries or a power cord. In fact, it's based on century-old technology that has been used on trucks since before World War II: the turbo.
Under pressure to cut emissions and boost fuel efficiency, automakers quietly are turning to turbocharging as a relatively inexpensive, easy-to-implement technology that soon could be a permanent staple on internal combustion engines.
That's because turbos, high-velocity fans that recirculate and compress exhaust gases back into the motor's cylinders, can increase fuel efficiency by as much as 30 percent, while at the same time increasing power output. Thanks to that increased power, smaller engines can be used, reducing weight and further increasing efficiency. And because it is a proven technology, the research and development costs are enticingly low.
"There isn't a dynamometer in Detroit that doesn't have a turbocharged engine being tested on it right now," said Eric Noble, president of Carlab, an automotive consultant in Orange, Calif., referring to machines that measure an engine's power. "There's still a lot of fuel savings that can be gotten out of a traditional engine."
Automakers are cagey about announcing how many cars will get the turbo boost, but General Motors Corp. executives say they are considering putting turbos on even their largest passenger vehicles, while Hyundai just announced its first turbocharged car, the Genesis coupe, for the U.S. market in a dozen years.
Volkswagen and Mercedes are preparing to hit the American market with new turbocharged diesels starting next year. And at the recent Los Angeles Auto Show, Ford Motor Co. Chief Executive Alan Mulally announced a major initiative to begin putting turbochargers and a related technology, direct fuel injection, on a large portion of its fleet in the near future, calling the move a "cornerstone of Ford's near-term plan."
The first Ford vehicle to get the boost will be the new Lincoln MKS, which will be introduced this spring with a standard engine but will go turbo by early 2009. The new engine will be smaller, 3.5 liters compared with 3.7 liters, yet have better performance.
"This is not something on the drawing board. Turbos are here," said Adriane Brown, president and CEO of Honeywell Transportation Systems, the leading turbo manufacturer, with $2.5 billion in turbo sales last year. As turbos gain more acceptance, she expects sales to grow three times faster than the automotive segment in the next few years, or about 8 percent.
Technology not new
Turbos are hardly new. After finding a place on ships, locomotives and airplanes in the first half of the last century, they were adopted for passenger cars in the 1970s, when BMW, Mercedes, Mitsubishi and Buick bolted them onto manifolds. Despite popularity among car tuners, they quickly lost acceptance among the general population, which saw them as unreliable, expensive and, with their sudden bursts of acceleration, dangerous.
Older turbos delivered great amounts of torque, yet frequently there was a short time gap between stepping on the pedal and feeling the power. That gap, called turbo lag, could cause unsuspecting drivers to crash.
New turbo technology essentially has eliminated that gap while providing a variable boost depending on the engine velocity, turbo manufacturers say. And turbos add only slightly to the cost of a car, they say, between $1,000 and $3,000, part of which can be offset by using a smaller engine.
Some carmakers are just now embracing the technology, and a very few still shun it, but others have been pressing the turbo button for years. GM's Saab, for example, has long used turbocharged engines, and Subaru has had them in cars for 25 years, including four current models. In Europe, turbocharger-equipped diesel engines are far and away the most common engine type, approaching 50 percent market penetration. Yet in the U.S., said Honeywell's Brown, only 6 percent of cars and truck are "boosted."
Contrary to American tastes
That gap, experts say, largely is due to American tastes and prejudices. Simply put, Americans want big, heavy motors, and they associate displacement -- the volume of air and gas drawn in by an engine -- with power. Turbos are seen as accouterments for tin-can sports cars and low-slung street rodders, hardly something useful for towing, say, or lugging kids to soccer practice.
The reality, however, is that turbochargers have been on heavy-duty trucks in the U.S. for years. The Big Three automakers had 19 different turbocharged diesel trucks in their 2007 lineups, according to Edmunds.
"The U.S. is probably the last market to look at the upsides of downsized turbo engines," said Mary Brevard, spokeswoman for supplier Borg Warner Inc., which saw sales of its turbos increase 17 percent last year, to $825 million. "Americans think bigger is better, but if they drive a turbo, they find out" it's a powerful, high-performing car.
They might be finding out whether they like it or not. With government fuel-consumption standards expected to rise significantly in the near future, many automakers see turbos as the least expensive and easiest short-term way to increase efficiency, especially with experts saying hydrogen cars will cost as much as $1 million each and are at least a decade away.
