Jim Kenzie's The Driver's Seat

Eco Run Mark II - Diesel-Electric Automobiles

It is the second (now-we-can-call-it-annual) Eco Run, presented by the Automobile Journalists Association of Canada.

A covey of 23 journalists from across the country have assembled to drive a covey of vehicles which represent the industry's best examples of fuel-saving technology from our Nation's Capital to Montreal.

It's not just electrics and hybrids either, although they are well-represented here.

But neither type of vehicle has found much favour amongst Canadians - well, amongst anybody, really. Gasoline is just not expensive enough to make them worth the up-front cost, the fuss, the bother, and the unknown down-the-road reliability, repair and recyclng issues.

Besides, the strides made by gasoline-engine manufacturers are, as I have said before, the real technology story of this decade.

One of my mounts today - the Mazda6, a mid-size sedan with the company's so-called 'SkyActiv' technology which includes a direct injection gasoline engine - recorded a very impressive 5.6 litres per 100 km on a mostly-highway trip from downtown Ottawa to Chateau Montebello across the river in Quebec.

OK, so I was hardly lead-footing it as I - um - have been known to do on occasion.

Because the other goal of this event is to illustrate that by driving smart and carefully, you can save a boatload of fuel.

In last year's run, every single car was able at one point at least to meet or exceed its Transport Canada fuel economy numbers.

Accelerate gently, anticipate traffic slowdowns, coast down when possible, eliminate idling, keep your speed down - all common sense techniques, except that they aren't very common.

It was hardly scientific, but I also tried a few times to switch on the Air Conditioning while on a flat stretch of highway to see how that impacted the fuel economy. The 'delta' varied, but typically the 'instant' fuel consumption shown on the car's dashboard rose about 1.5 litres per 100 km. For example, 3.9 to 5.4.

Add that up over a long trip, and what price comfort?

One thing you can do on a really hot day is run the A/C for a few moments to cool the car down, then shut it off again.

My favourite moments on these events always involve how we keep the electric cars charged en route - by plugging them into a Diesel-powered generator.

In this shot, taken on the roof of the parking garage of the Chateau Laurier hotel in Ottawa, you can see the generator amping up a Smart electric car.

There's a Ford Fusion electric hiding in behind the Smart.

The Chevrolet Volt plug-in 'extended range' electric had just pulled out from in front of the Smart.

Incidentally, that generator is towed from venue to venue by a big ol' gasoline-engined pick-up truck.

Doubling the irony, the electrics were all the while blocking the gasoline cars from leaving - the white sedan to the left of the Smart is my Mazda6.

I rest my case...

Kia Rio with Folding Side-vIew Mirrors

This is no biggie; I just thought it was kind of interesting - first of all, that a car as inexpensive as a Kia Rio actually offers folding side-view mirrors, and that they open automatically as you approach the car, before you even unlock it.

Check it out here.

One of these days I'll find the little 'lavalier' microphone I bought so I can add voice-over audio to these video clips in addition to ambient sound.

Meanwhile, dig those special effects...

 

A Pass is a Pass is a Pass...

Is there anything more boring that watching a GoPro video clip of a car lapping on a race track - when driven by someone else?

So I have cut this bit of me driving a Jaguar F-Type S - that's the 380 horsepower V6 version of the car - at Circuito de Navarra, near Pamplona Spain, down to a mere 24 seconds.

I don't know who the driver of the other F-Type is - maybe some stroke 'lifestyle' journo who has never been at, let alone on, on a race track before.

But hey - it's my blog.

Enjoy - or suffer - here...

And if you missed my preview test of this car, let me summarize - F-ing Fantastic...

Jaguar F-Type Driven!

Yes, I have driven the new Jaguar F-Type sports car, the first real two-seater Jag sports car since the E-Type, launched in 1961.

Fifty-two years is a long time. Has Jaguar managed to catch up?

I am not allowed to tell you what it's like to drive until next Wednesday.

But from the already-released details - supercharged V6 engines of 340 or 380 horsepower, supercharged V8 with 495 horsepower, and weight starting at 1,597 kg - I'm sure you can guess.

Prices start at $76,900.

The cars start arriving this summer. Start saving now.

Mimi and Lady Leadfoot go Topless

Does this mean winter is finally over?

We actually drove Mimi - Lady Leadfoot's Mazda Miata - top-down for the first time this year today.

Heater on, and one window down - for some reason, that seems to generate less turbulence than both windows either up or down - and aside from the hair getting quite a work-out, it was very pleasant.

We don't drive her in winter unless there's an emergency. We keep her outside, under a cover, with a trickle charger on the battery. She never fails to fire right up.

If there were some sort of award for the car that best discharges its responsibilities, best fulfils its brief, does exactly what it is supposed to do - do you understand what I'm driving at here? - then the Mazda Miata would surely win in a walk.

More accurately, it would win in a lovely drive through the countryside.

In a nutshell, it was supposed to be a two-seat British sports car that didn't break and didn't leak oil all over your driveway.

That was pretty much what Mark Jordan, a designer for Mazda North America, and Bob Hall, previously and subsequently a car journalist but then a product planner for Mazda, had in mind when they conceived the car on a cocktail napkin in a bar in Irvine California back in the 1980s; in profile, the original Miata looked more like the 1964 Lotus Elan than the Lotus Elan did.

Despite considerable upgrading and improving over the intervening decades, that's pretty much what the Miata still is today.

I.e., damn-near perfect.

Oh yeah, the company can try to call it 'MX-5' if they want, because the marketing people say that's how it is marketed in other countries.

Marketing people can be such idiots; like anybody over here gives a damn what they do over there.

It was originally sold in Japan as the 'Eunos Roadster'. Does that mean we should have called it 'Eunos Roadster' too?

Um, I don't think so.

The Miata Owners Club is still (I think...) the largest one-marque car club in the world, testimony to the affection people have for this car. Lady Leadfoot and I aren't 'joiners' per se, but might be talked into going on some of their cruises this summer.

We understand that the next-gen Miata will be a joint venture with Fiat through its Alfa Romeo brand. That company has no shortage of sports car heritage, although dead-nuts reliability like Miata enjoys has never even been hinted at chez Alfa.

Can the joint venture pull off a car that's as spectacular as Mazda was able to do on its own with Miata?

I hope so.

But I must say, I have grave doubts.

Do Pick-up Truck Drivers Really Want More Fuel Efficiency?

Every major manufacturer of full-size pick-up trucks is going on and on about improved fuel efficiency.

Ford has their 'Eco-Boost' Direct Injection turbocharged V6 engine, claimed to offer the performance of an eight with the economy of a six.

Chevrolet advertises the most fuel-efficient V-8 in the class.

Ram (yclept 'Dodge') boasts 36 miles per gallon on the highway. (Er folks, Canada switched to Metric about four hundred years ago - isn't it time you caught up?...)

But is this something their customers give a flyin' wahoo about?

I guess if you're a business owner and your trucks are racking up thousands of klicks a month, fuel costs are a Big Deal.

So how come when I'm on the highway, all the pick-ups I see seem to be going a buck-forty?

And in town, the "That Thang Got a HEMI?" dude is rocketing away from the stoplight, seemingly trying to spin all four wheels at once?

I think the only reason truck makers are doing this is that in the States, Corporate Average Fuel Economy standards for trucks are getting tougher and tougher to meet. So the manufacturers have to build more fuel-efficient trucks whether their customers care or not.

The trick then is to get the customers to buy them.

In reality, it's the same reason they build hybrid cars; if they can force-feed enough of those down buyers' throats, then they can sell some of the less-efficient cars that the customers actually want.

Of course none of this would be necessary if the US government would only act logically and raise the price of fuel to something even approximating the world level. Then the market could decide how it wanted to spend its money, on efficient cars, or on fuel.

But asking any government - especially these days, the US government - to act logically?

Hahahahaha.....

 

Happy Birthday Aston Martin and Porsche!

Aston Martin has renewed the fourth car in its year-long total-product-plan refresh program - the Rapide S.

A new front end, designed largely around European pedestrian crash standards, the new more powerful and torquier engine and a revised rear deck spoiler are the main upgrades. 

Driving impressions to follow in a few days.

Aston Chairman Dr. Ulrich Bez also let slip at dinner last night here in not-so-sunny Spain that Aston will be the featured marque at the Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance this coming August, celebrating the company's 100th Anniversary. The official announcement will come on Wednesday.

Porsche will also be celebrating the 50th Anniversary of the 911 at Pebble.

This might be a good year to go...

How Clever Are Those Germans?

This certainly is no Big Deal.

But I thought it was interesting.

This is a picture (don't worry; it was taken when I was stopped on the shoulder of the road) of the SatNav display in the instrument cluster of a new Porsche Boxster.

It shows the 401 interchange I take every time I drive into The Big Smoke.

Now the normal route when coming southbound on 25 to follow Highway 401 eastbound into Toronto (what the road signs say you should do) is to take the on-ramp to the right, swing around on what we used to call a 'cloverleaf' - that would be the white circular piece of road below and just to the left of 'Chisholm Drive' in that pic - and join the highway.

But the route Porsche's SatNav is indicating suggests turning left heading towards the commuter parking lot (which isn't shown on the map) then continue onto the on-ramp from northbound 25.

This is in fact the route I often take, if the traffic lights look right, because you can gain a few seconds, especially if you would otherwise be following one of the multitude of huge, slow gravel trucks we have to put up with in our neighbourhood.

Can't beat local knowledge, right?

But how would Porsche's SatNav system know this?

I can only assume that the system integrates all possible routes, determines which is the shortest, and presents that route to you.

Clever, eh?

 

Can you really fly to work?

The dream of a flying car has kept engineers sleepless for maybe a century.

Dr. Paul Moller has been trying for over 40 years alone, so far without much success.

Perhaps just as well - we have enough trouble handling commuter traffic in two dimensions, let alone three.

But if the product this Dutch company appears to have invented is real (assuming the following YouTube clip wasn't fabricated by the video equivalent of Photoshop) it may be just around the corner.

The 'vehicle' appears to be more of an enclosed motorcycle than a car, and there's no indication of how much this thing might cost.

It also may end up being like the Amphi-Car, which was a terrible car and a worse boat - but it WAS both.

But it does look intriguing.

I guess time will tell...

 

MINI Makes a Big Bang

Does anyone else watch Big Bang Theory?

Yeah, pretty much everybody - it is at or near the top of Canada's TV ratings charts every year, and not just because Toronto's own Barenaked Ladies sing the theme song.

The episode I saw last week (originally shown last fall, according to CBS's web site) revolves around Howard Wolowitz getting a new car and taking over Sheldon Cooper's parking spot at the University where they both work.

Even though Sheldon doesn't even have a driver's licence, let alone a car, he decides Howard should not have 'his' spot, and tries to take it back.

First, he tries to push the car out of the spot - hard to do with the car presumably locked, in gear, and with the parking brake on.

You'd think a guy as smart as Sheldon professes to be would have known that...

Then he tries to prove he does 'use' the spot by setting up a work space there...

...and by painting his name over Wolowitz's on the curb stone.

I am ashamed to admit that even I didn't get this part of the joke, so thanks again to an 'alert reader':

Howard's car was a MINI Countryman Cooper S.

This might have been one of the most clever if most subtle product placements in television history...