Hacker News Reader

Comment by Lionsion | Hacker News Reader

Didn't the US auto industry make this same mistake before? Gas was ~$1/gallon in the 90s, so they neglected everything to focus on the (truck-based) SUVs that were then popular and profitable. Then gas prices went up and they were totally unprepared.

View on HN

The US car industry has made that mistake multiple times.

But, even when gas prices were climbing, Ford made most of their profits on trucks. They kinda own the US truck market, making about a third of all trucks sold (as I recall, anyway), and more than any other make, by far. I don't know what it is in the international market, but I think Ford trucks are strong in a lot of other markets, too.

I don't know that you're wrong, but I am holding some F lately (mostly because it went on sale on disappointing earnings last quarter), so I kinda think that in the short term it's a good move. The writing has been on the wall for a while about this move, though it's more dramatic than I expected. I thought they'd drop to a lineup of four cars, instead of just two.

They have begun focusing on hybrid and electric drive trains for their trucks, and they already have probably the best economy option in pickups with the EcoBoost 6 cylinder that tows like a big V8 (an F150 with EcoBoost and tow package has a tow capacity similar to my older diesel F250), and gets car-like MPG. So, it's not that they're ignoring efficiency, it's just that they're acknowledging that American consumers like big-ass vehicles for their big asses to ride around in (I make fun of American consumer culture and its dumb choices, but I have an F250 for towing my house, so I'm included in that demographic).

So...it could play out like the 70s and early 80s did, but I'm not so sure it will. I think we're going to see car makers take a beating on other fronts, but I dunno exactly how it'll play out. Fewer young people are buying cars and more are opting for transit and Lyft/Uber. More young people are moving to cities where that's a feasible lifestyle choice. So, the pool of people buying cars is looking like it's gonna shrink. Cars are lasting longer, too, and quality has gotten pretty good across the board. So, cars made today might make it through to the end of car ownership as we know it. Again, I don't know how it'll change exactly, but it's looking like fleets of self-driving cars owned by Lyft/Uber/Tesla/GM/etc. are gonna replace a lot of current car ownership within the next decade.

One other point about trucks: People outside of cities buy trucks at a much higher rate. Vehicle ownership in rural areas is still very, very, high, by necessity, due to no mass transit and inconvenience and expense of ride sharing services when the trips are very long and far out. So, Ford may just be acknowledging that city driving by individuals is on the way out, while we have a few more years with a solid rural truck market.

My impression about inefficient cars in america is that people are mostly inconvienced about frequent visit to gas station, not actual costs.

I believe I've read that when gas prices fall, US car sales almost immediately noticeably shift toward cars with lower gas mileage, and when gas prices rise, sales almost immediately shift to cars with better gas mileage.

I think that shows that gas price is a significant factor in car buying decisions.

(It also says some unflattering things about the rationality of buyers that they let short term price variations greatly influence buying an expensive item they will be using for years).

(It also says some unflattering things about the rationality of buyers that they let short term price variations greatly influence buying an expensive item they will be using for years).

I don't know - at least for those without any specialist knowledge, retail fuel prices can likely best be approximated as a random walk, for which the best estimate of future value is the current value.

Presumably Ford could repurpose their European models quickly.

A 2018 F-150 with EcoBoost will essentially get the same MPG as a 2018 Ford Taurus. I suspect the Focus Active will be their high efficiency vehicle and they'll continue to increase the MPG on SUVs and certain trucks.

I'm in the market for an SUV or crew cab truck for weekend road trips (I walk to work) and have been impressed with the 2015+ F-150s. If I actually did commute every day I could just buy a 10 year old Honda or Toyota and have the best of both worlds.

But how does that mileage compare to a Taurus with Ecoboost (I don't even know what that is -- a fuel efficient engine or a hybrid drivetrain?) -- surely any technology that improves gas mileage in a 5000lb, 80" wide x 78" high truck would do even more to improve mileage in a 4000 lb 76" wide x 60" high sedan?

Comparing an efficient truck to an inefficient car seems like an unfair comparison unless your goal is to justify buying the truck.

Ecoboost is Ford's name for using smaller displacement turbo engines to replace larger naturally aspirated ones. My experience with these types of cars is that with typical real drivers they do not deliver anywhere near the EPA fuel economy numbers, because they're essentially designed to make the turbo never spool up in the EPA tests. You can get the EPA numbers if you drive very slowly though.

I have a 1.6 EcoBoost Mondeo, it gets pretty close to the published economy numbers and I don't drive particularly slowly.

The Mondeo is apparently the UK version of what's known as the Fusion in the US, maybe the UK has more accurate fuel economy testing than the US. Or everyone I know who complains about not getting EPA numbers just has a lead foot.

Everyone you know has a lead foot. Everyone has a lead foot.

It's not hard to get EPA numbers on any car I've driven.

> has a lead foot

Also known as: isn't being paid-by-the-hour to make whatever trip he/she is making at the moment.

I recall the summary phrase from an article about Ecoboost a while ago: "You can have Eco, or Boost, but not both."

It's possible to get better fuel economy with a larger engine than a smaller one, since the larger one won't need to be flogged a lot to get the needed power. The old American cars with big V8s could get surprisingly high (20+mpg) mileage this way. Of course, the trick with a big powerful engine is to resist the temptation to use all that power all the time. ;-)

Wouldn't larger engines still draw more power at idle, though?

Its more like traditional buyers of a Taurus are buying an Explorer instead. The new Explorers drive much better than the old truck-based models, and get about the same MPG as the Taurus, but carry 7 people or 5 people and all the luggage and christmas presents for the week with grandparents. I've got a track focused mustang and the explorer is surprisingly fun to drive, both around corners, on the freeway and around big bear.

But does the Explorer get the same MPG as a Taurus with the same fuel efficiency technology? That's the comparison that people should be making if they care about gas mileage.

The Taurus is rated 18/27mpg, the similarly sized Honda Accord is rated 30/38. (though with less horsepower with a 4 cylinder than the Taurus's V6 -- but that's the problem with lax fuel economy standards, manufacturers will sell horsepower over mileage... until the next fuel crisis, then they'll whine that no one wants to buy their cars)

Car companies sell what people buy. We replaced a 35mpg Kia Rio with a V6 AWD Explorer. That was my choice. It wasn't because Ford don't make a hybrid focus or efficient fiesta. My mustang gets about 11mpg also, and race gas is $10/gallon.

Something that is stupid though, is that I would prefer to use E85 in my mustang, but it would be illegal in california for me to modify the car to be able to do so. Bigger fuel injectors and a tune, costs about $500 to do, but nope, illegal.

Which is my point -- people, by nature, are selfish, and don't mind using up scarce resources and continue to kick the environmental disaster tin can down the road. E85 in this country is a farmer subsidy, it's not a more environmentally friendly choice.

If you were taxed by engine displacement and/or were paying $6/gallon for gas, you might make a different choice. And when most of the cars on the road were smaller, more fuel efficient cars, you wouldn't feel like you need to buy a big car for defense against the other large cars on the roads.

I agree that government disincentives would reduce gas use, and also that people are selfish. You, for example, are using electricity, the manufacturing and commerce systems that produced your computer, and all the infrastructure of the internet to make a post on a little known website for hackers, that will ultimately have zero impact on the result of things.

Now, you could go live in a cave, and it would reduce your consumption footprint more than if I drove a Kia. Yet you don't. Nobody does. Either we will figure out how to control climate change with world-scale engineering, or we will cease to exist as a species. My Mustang, my neighbors 7000lb hybrid truck (lol), they aren't going to make the difference. So yeah, I'm having fun while Rome burns. Probably going to drive the V6 up to mammoth for the weekend too, and the ski lift will consume energy to lift my fat ass to the top just so that I can slide down a hill going "wooohoooo".

Now, you could go live in a cave, and it would reduce your consumption footprint more than if I drove a Kia.

I wonder if that's true? My household energy consumption is around 250KWh/month, which is around the amount of energy in 8 gallons of gasoline. My laptop can run for nearly 3 months on the amount of energy in a single gallon of gasoline.

Of course, the difference is that living in a cave is a huge difference in lifestyle, but is switching to smaller/lighter more energy efficient cars really a significant change in lifestyle? I've lied in countries where small cars are the norm, yet people seem to get by.

It actually does, slightly better.

The only Taurus trim with the 3.5 Ecoboost is the SHO. It's rated at 16/22.

The Explorers are actually slightly BETTER at 17/24.

The SHO is a performance oriented model that has grippy (draggy) stock tires though.

But basically to your point - yes. Modern areodynamics have come a long way from the brick SUVs of the 70s.

If only police departments didn't love them so much. Seems like I end up with one in my rear view mirror every other day and half the time can't tell whether it's an undercover patrol car or not.

But what about the focus and fiesta?

It's true that the Taurus is a ridiculous fuel burner but to get the same fuel inefficiency out of the focus you have to move to the rs super hot hatch.

This move would take Ford out of the introductory/small vehicle market.

Bizarre.

It gets the same mileage on paper. It gets nothing remotely close in the real world. Read how the EPA tests mileage and you'll realize Ford is just gaming the system. How often. Do you do 55mph and take 5 minutes to get to that speed in normal driving? Ya, me too.

And, that EcoBoost will haul as much as an F250 from a few years ago, which is pretty incredible. It's my next truck, if I keep hauling an RV around (currently in an old F250, but it needs enough work now to where I'm shopping for something else rather than repairing it).

What is the point of getting a truck for weekend road trips? Do you own a trailer or boat? Plan on off roading? Otherwise I’d get a fuel efficient vehicle. If you’re going to bite the bullet on an F-150 to own a weekend fun truck get a Raptor.

That’s not so much saying the F150 is efficient as it is saying the 2018 Taurus is sadly inefficient.

The F150 is a huge and heavy vehicle. While the current model is more efficient than other recent models it is not an efficient car. Not remotely.

EPA rating is a joke. On Fuelly F150 Ecoboost drivers report 18 MPG which is rather less than the 27 MPG reported for my Crosstrek which can also tow, although not as much.

> my Crosstrek which can also tow, although not as much.

You're comparing 1,500 pounds to between 5,000 and 13,200... I don't think "not as much" quite captures it...

I mention it because hardly any cars come factory-equipped for towing these days. And FYI the Outback tows 2500lb and gets 25 MPG. Considering that th typical trailer weight even for F-150 drivers is zero, 2500 covers many use cases

> A 2018 F-150 with EcoBoost will essentially get the same MPG as a 2018 Ford Taurus.

My brother in law has a 2.7 EcoBoost F-150 that's getting about the same gas mileage as I got in my old 2010 Mazda 3.... the Mazda isn't close to the most fuel efficient in its class, but the F150 isn't in that class at all.

They'll still be selling their cars in Europe. The latest gen Focus and Fiestas all came from their European divisions, if problems occur they could theoretically reintroduce them quickly - although they would have lost all their brand momentum in the small car market.

I think the fact that the Focus and Fiestas sold from 2011-2016 had defective transmissions (complete with class action settlement) already destroyed their brand momentum in the small car market.

Nobody was ever meant to buy those. They were slapped together for the purpose of meeting CAFE requirements.

what destroys the brand momentum for me is that the cars look dated (even in the updated versions) and the company seems technologically behind (no real electric car).

The quality is really bad. Maybe they've improved in the past few years but one of my friends has a 5 year old Focus that he bought new and is total garbage. The doors don't lock half the time, the transmission craps out once every 6 months, sometimes the engine won't start without wiggling the battery cables, the plastic trim around the windows keeps falling off.

My focus from 2000 is still in great condition. Good for another 15 years.

I think their quality in the late 90s/early 2000s was really good. I've known a lot of people that drive Fords from that era and a lot of them are still around. Not sure when but it seems to have gone massively downhill at some point at least for the Focus, though maybe they're back to being decent again.

Of course this is the problem when looking at the reliability of old cars, it says nothing about what the company is actually currently producing.

From what I've heard the safety standards are so different and often conflict that it would be difficult for the exact same car to sell in both markets. Bumpers are mandated to be higher in the US because the average car is much bigger. I remember hearing a few others due to Americans being fatter on average and Americans tending to drive longer distances (maybe it was EU focusing more on pedestrian collisions where as the US focused more on car-to-car?)

There are differences but they currently share the same platform right now so clearly they are not insurmountable.

It's possible over time the smaller platforms will evolve and lose their compatibility. But it's not a guarantee.

The fuel economy situation today is vastly different though. Sticking with the Ford line,

In 2000:

Taurus sedan: 20/28

Taurus wagon: 19/27

F-150: 16/21

In 2018:

Escape SE: 23/30

Edge SE: 21/29

F-150: 20/26

There are (not all, for sure) crossovers and pickups today doing, fuel-wise, what sedans did when gas was $1 a gallon.

Note: I don't work for Ford, never have, no plans to. I don't own one, never have, but I do have plans to.

Is that supposed to show improvement or something? I think that's pathetic. The equivalent sedan of today, Fusion Hybrid, gets 45 mpg, a ~50% improvement from 2000. Meanwhile the F-150 has eked out a 20% improvement because of fundamental issues with SUVs & Trucks being aerodynamically inefficient.

This is a real loss for the environment and cutting greenhouse gases.

Yep. In addition, a modern plug-in hybrid gets over 50mpg on gas alone and ~110mpge on electricity. (something like a Chevy Volt or Hyundai Ioniq or Toyota Prius or similar)

You don't even have to go full electric -- If the average driver just switched to driving a plug-in hybrid and charged roughly nightly on a regular 120v US household outlet, you could erase ~75% of all emissions from personal vehicles nationwide, without changing anyone's commutes or driving patterns in any way. (Even if we still use dirty sources for the electricity during the switchover to renewable electricity)

Or you could buy a 2018 F-150 pickup truck with the fuel economy of a 20 year old sedan -- a fuel economy so low it's actually slightly below fleet average for all existing US cars driven today...

I think it's somewhat of an exaggeration to say "a modern plug-in hybrid gets over 50 mpg" rather than "the Prius Prime gets around 50 mpg". The Honda Clarity and the Chevy Volt are more like 40 mpg, I believe. I'm not sure of the reasons, but both seem to have larger batteries than the Prius.

Why wouldn't the increased electricity demands negate most of the environmental benefits of hybrids versus similarly-sized fuel-burning vehicles? The same work is being done to the vehicle cabin, no matter whether the fossil fuels are being burned at the vehicle or at the powerplant...

There are two reasons: (1) electricity can be, and often is, produced using methods such as hydro and nuclear that use less carbon and produce less pollution, and (2) pollution control on carbon-intensive sources can be more effective at a central location.

I don't think that stated figures for Ford hybrids are representative. I rented a Fusion Hybrid and got more like mid 30s. Really, no better than a non-hybrid Altima. It's been widely reported in the automotive press that the Fusion and C-Max don't live up to their EPA figures.

And my figure is based on the mpg computer - in every car I've ever calculated using actual gas put in vs the tripmeter, mileage is even less than the automatically calculated figure.

> There are (not all, for sure) crossovers and pickups today doing, fuel-wise, what sedans did when gas was $1 a gallon.

Gas prices crossed $1 around 1989-1990 and never crossed back, so your description doesn't match your vehicle comparison.

I know for a fact that gas was $0.98/gallon in the late 90s, at least in my hometown. We went on a trip to Montana and I remember wondering how people afforded to drive with gas at the $1.28/gallon or whatever it was there.

Perhaps you were using 82 octane gas? When you get into parts of the Southwest, gas stations down there offer some really low octane gas. I personally always go for premium (92 octane) at a large chain like Costco when going cross country if the local gas stations are slinging anything below 87 octane gas (which is the lowest commonly offered on the West Coast), as it leads me to think the gas offered at that station/in that city is all of lower caliber. Obvs not selling lots of high or normal octane gas at least!

I have seen 85 octane, never 82. Probably in Colorado. The theory seems to be that lower octane is tolerable at high altitude, so you see it in some of the western mountain areas. But there seems to be some dispute over whether lower octane is acceptable in modern cars.

It pretty much doesn't matter in a fuel injected engine. The non-design octane can be lower efficiency/lower power/worse emissions, but the engine management system prevents knocking, so it isn't a big deal.

Putting higher octane fuel in an engine that isn't designed for it is just a waste because the engine won't develop more power with it (the whole point of higher octane).

I use higher octane fuel than necessary for one of my cars, because I feel it's prudent to use ethanol-free gas which is only available at the highest octane level. According to what I've read, the ethanol that's standard today can degrade the rubber in older cars' fuel lines sometimes and that can lead to a leak and catastrophic fire. It's also rumored that higher octane gas may (sometimes) have more detergents or something.

In any case, I wouldn't trust even a modern engine computer to handle gas that is definitely too low in octane, because as far as I know, it's going to compensate after it detects pre-ignition, which is suboptimal.

I think the concern about older fuel system components is real.

The engine management system will compensate in milliseconds, so meh on that part.

87 / 89 were the two options (Iowa).

No 92 octane gas? Very odd, must not be many higher end cars in that part of Iowa.

You can buy it, just have to go out of your way a little for it. And yes, higher end cars are pretty rare.

I filled up for less than a dollar in AZ in the very late 90s. It was a temporary phenomenon though, and may have never gotten that low in some parts of the country.

In the south, gas was cheaper than that up until the mid-90s.

Yup.

Although they're rolling out a half-ton diesel F150 which will help a bit. Still I'd wager that most people who buy one rarely put it to use. The number of commuters in the city I see with F150s/1500s/etc is pretty staggering.

They still have the Focus and as I understand it the margins on the other vehicles are just crazy high that hedging your bets with other models about possible fuel prices .... would cost a lot.

They're billing the "Focus Active" as a crossover, not the Focus-style hot hatch, aren't they?

SUV's are a lot different now than they were then... many of them are basically station wagons stretched up a bit, and the truck-style body-on-frame designs much less common. (For many good reasons.)

Yep. And not having many affordable models as well. When the economy inevitably “corrects” they will be saying “Oh crap who could have seen this coming!” Again.

Since that time, the gas mileage on an f-150 has gone from around 15-16mpg up to as high as 22 mpg. So they have that going for them.

Only tangentially related, but at the ARPA-E Summit this year, there was a company demonstrating an opposed cylinder, 2-stroke, compression ignition engine that they had placed in an F-150 as a test bed. They were claiming something like 37 MPG.

https://www.energy.gov/articles/transformative-tech-2018-arp...

Was it less polluting than most other 2 stroke engines? Because they're generally horrible polluters compared to 4 stroke engines.

That is the claim anyway.

http://achatespower.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/JSAE_s171...

http://achatespower.com/

"compression ignition" presumably different to a Diesel?

Yes, a gasoline engine.

"ABSTRACT: Achates Power has spent the past 12 years modernizing this historically efficient engine architecture to deliver a step-wise improvement in brake thermal efficiency (BTE) over the most advanced conventional four-stroke engines. In addition, with the elimination of parts such as the cylinder head and valve train, it is also less complex and less costly to produce - making it even more appealing to manufacturers. This paper highlights the work done, to date, on the Opposed-Piston Gasoline Compressions Ignition engine and discusses the advantages of the OP engine as an ideal platform for incorporating gasoline compression ignition (GCI) technology, the study of which recently was funded by the U.S. Department of Energy’s Advanced Research Projects Agency–Energy."

http://achatespower.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/JSAE_s171...

Unless you bought a first gen F-150 Raptor.

But then you'd have a Raptor so you'd have that going for you.

Ford caters more to the business market who are buying these vehicles due to their usage in heavy duty hauling. The fact that they are focusing on trucks/SUVs doesn't have to exclude moving to electric vehicles in the future. It's the same as any company focusing on enterprise customers rather than consumers.

When gas prices are high, people still want and need trucks. It’s the large passenger SUVs that take the biggest hit on gas prices.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com