[kns]

Hello guys - I added this addendum to help explain the fuel savings;


Addendum: While I didn’t want to get over-technical with this article, there is reader concerns how Volting can occur using less fuel so I’m going to offer a scenario which will help clear up the matter.

Lets take a situation where we’re driving down the road at 60 mph in mountain mode. We’ll say the battery is below 45%, so our little I4 engine is both charging the battery and pushing the car at 60 mph. While this does not sound so amazing, lets look at it a bit closer; the engine is generating (charging) at a rate of “one mile of charge per minute” therefore this is enough energy to propel another car (or ours) at 60 mph going in the battery each minute.

Therefore, at any given moment our little engine in Mountain mode is producing enough power to propel two (2) cars at 60 mph or 120 mph of energy, since its moving the car at 60 mph and storing energy to propel the car at some time in the future at 60 mph. The real important fact here is its doing so using about the same amount of fuel it takes to move one car.

If what you are suggesting is correct then the GM engineers missed an opportunity to double the MPG of the ICE. I doubt that they -- and their counterparts throughout industry and the folks who write the CARB and CAFE rules -- would have missed such an opportunity.

KNS

 

[kns]

Nothing new is being added to this thread. I think it is time for the mods to lock it or for the rest of us to put it on our ignore list.

KNS