actually i met a man through an automotive teahcer i had that created a car that got 75mpg on reg gas. after he got the patent he was offered about 10 mil for it by an automotive company in australia(where he lived) and they made sure the car was not made. oil and car companies have been squashing patents for years.

 

I def. believe this. There's no doubt about it. But hiding evidence of global warming? I don't know about that. I could see it being true, I'm starting to fail to be surprised by this administration, but I think it's a bit unlikely.

 

Physics is physics. We can't make a car that gets 100mpg because none of us would drive one that small. Physics. We can harness physics (not to mention spending trillions of dollars) to explore the solar system, but we have economic restraints for making cars. And the ships that go 30 years "without refueling" are nuclear powered. Can't wait for that new Ford SUV that requires a CVN number...

 

If he really did invent a car that was like typical cars of the day except for getting 75 mpg, he could have gotten finanical backing and made himself a billionaire overnight. It's BS.

 

I wasn't implying that some people have already made great milage cars and that the gov't/oil/car co's are stopping them from seeing the public. I was saying that if everyone realized that global warming IS fact, and the gov't/oil/car co's didn't block funding for DEVELOPMENT of better milage tech, that there would be way more very smart people working on it with more money to figure it out.

 

I call BS. There are cars now that get around 50 mpg. You can't tell me that we can't make something somehow that gets a measly 50 mpg more than that.

Yes I realize the ships are nuclear but the point is the technology is there to be discovered. We just won't spend the R&D money to discover it, Exxon wouldn't be able to set record profit margins every single quarter that way.

 

We can't. People won't drive cars that weigh 1200 pounds and are styled by windtunnels to have much lower drag. and show me a car that gets real-world mileage above 40 and isn't a hybrid, which is technology that only recently became possible in large scale.

Actually Exxon's crazy profits prove the money is there to develop alternatives to 20 mpg SUVs. And nuclear powered ships have absolutely no bearing on this discussion because it's impossible to apply it... except by building many more nuke power plants and using them to power electric cars, which is feasible. Maybe.

 

The VW Golf TDI routinely gets 40-50 mpg. My good friend has one and gets over 40 on a regular basis.

And why are you limiting us to internal combustion? My point is that the technology is there for us to discover but we won't spend the R & D to do it, because why?

Because then oil wouldn't be the huge profit making animal that it is.

I think you might have taken my ship/nuclear comment a little to literally. I definately didn't mean that we should try and build nuclear cars or anything like that, but that 50 years ago (well maybe 60 or 70, my nuclear history isn't very good) if you would have told someone that a normally diesel powered ship wouldn't have to refuel for 30 years due to this "new" energy source they would have looked at you and said it wasn't possible.

Is it your contention that it is IMPOSSIBLE to build a car that will be able to get 100 or more mpg of some type of fuel?

Remember the earth isn't flat?!

 

No, it is my contention that nobody will buy such a car, because it will not even resemble what we think of as a "car." Can you conceive of a car that weighs under 2000 pounds, passes Federal emissions and safety standards, isn't a Lotus Elise (meaning zero interior or cargo space and no amenities), and costs less than $25,000 as a base model? I can't. Barring major advances in hybrid/electric technology, we're about as far as we're going to get in the MPG game.

 

So we're driving down hill for the most part.


I think more V8's need what the Crysler 300 has, it shuts down 4 cylinders when cruising.

 

How about we just make cars that can get by with 4 cylinder motors? You know, like Subarus?

 

That is a nice marketing campaign Chrysler has going with it's MDS system but it really doesn't do much in the mileage game. You may or may not save 1 mpg with the MDS. My Boss drives a 300 with the Hemi and he gets crap for mileage.

 

Oh really? I thought it did do something. It'd be awesome if it did. . .

 

My mom's V8 gets better gas milage than my Subby. Cruising it can get 30+, I usualy get 25-27.

 

Crusing mileage is overrated. 90% of my miles (and those of anyone else who works within 10 miles of their home) are city or mixed miles.