In my last post about the “scandal” I gave my view that Governments across the world were also negligent in the issue. I used scandal in quotes simply because I don’t see it as being as bad as several other recent automotive issues that have resulted in many deaths and injuries.
I said that Governments were negligent simply because the industry has been demanding that the tests used are changed because they do not relate to the real world usage of the vehicles tested. Had they made changes when encouraged to do so, then the software that is in the control units on VW Group cars (other members products are now under scrutiny) would not have worked because it was designed for specific conditions only found in EPA (Environment Protection Agency) and other similar Government tests.
Now, according to a report in the Australian Financial Review, researchers at Kings College in London had repeatedly requested the British Government to change their tests because they found many diesel cars producing more emissions in the real world compared to the test results. By “many cars”, it is clear that this is more than just VW models because tens of thousands of cars were tested simply by putting sensors near roads in Britain and this study has been ongoing since 2011. The research was funded by a Government department yet the results were ignored by them! In the meantime, the Government was offering tax concessions to encourage more diesel car sales!
Diesel cars produce less carbon monoxide than petrol cars yet produce significantly more nitrogen oxide pollution. It is this test that the VW engineers have figured out how to manipulate whilst the tax regime is interested in the levels of carbon monoxide pollution.
A former British Transport Minister has also claimed that the British Prime Minister has delayed new stricter rules on car pollution because of an agreement with the German Chancellor to protect the car industry in Germany – i.e. VW Group, BMW and Daimler Benz! How true this is, is up for discussion, however I’m sure this topic will become a bigger part of the whole pollution testing issue because this shows that various Governments knew that the tests were faulty but colluded to ensure higher sales of German vehicles.
Had the British Government changed their tests when recommended by the researchers, this would have exposed the tests in other European countries and the US as being faulty and the whole issue would have been found many years earlier – in fact as I said earlier, the changes would have negated the software from changing the vehicle dynamics and this would have ensured that the vehicle pollution levels would be real. This in turn would have forced all manufacturers to adjust their cars to meet the regulations.
What Government departments need to understand is that once a test is created it needs to be audited against changing technology, fuels and other items. Any test must evolve and change as the world changes around it. It seems that the tests in this issue have not changed in probably 10 years (possibly more). The world has changed around them, so it is clear that someone would try to manipulate the results. Changing the tests regularly would slow down the ability to do that. This happens in other industries, so why not with Governments?
It is a work-in-progress to me but I am trying to figure out why I knew about this years ago. Sure I am a BE (Mech) engr, but it is not from my professional life I knew. Have been rebuilding / “hotting up” cars and bikes for decades for the fun of it and maybe somewhere in there was the info. Don’t think it was constrained to just VW but, maybe there is some more to run on that one…
What I DO know, as a professional eng’r, is that one thing you are going to do when confronted with a difficult set of competing criteria is thread that needle and find a way through the lot! In this case “passing the test” is what is required, NOT what some believe that to mean; ie have a car that drives on a road and does what it did when passing the test. See how easily the ethics are side-stepped when you just have a pragmatic focus?
Indeed I personally did this exact thing. However, unlike some (VW?) engineer yet to be identified and fully scape-goated, I was hailed a hero with a brilliant solution that was adopted industry wide. Personally I am not sure there was that much difference between that situation and the current one, because those VW cars are a pleasure to drive and they are made available as they are and people like them. Despite the appearance of this “scandal”, the cars are the same today as they were yesterday, although there is talk of that changing if the test lobby gets its way.
Remember when pollution controls first “afflicted” vehicles back in the late 70’s? They are a great idea that caused a lot of stupid things, and some sensible things to happen. eg no drama with noticing that a throttle gently shut produces less emissions than one slammed shut and putting a damper on it. Cool, good work. But adding a whole air pump system which just pumped atmospheric air into the exhaust MAY have done a small job im creating some additional after-burning in the exhaust gasses as it was claimed to do, but the REAL purpose was to simply dilute the air down to a level it would pass the test. These things were universally spurned by all and commonly ditched as they were doing more polluting by the power consumed to run them than any slight actual benefit they may have provided. Is the current “scandal” more of the same, except the bs testing overhead is not being carried through to the end users? Where does it actually matter and what is unreasonable wishlist stuff in the current debate I wouldn’t know. But just watch all the vested interests come out for a run in the sun to capitalise on what were once the good intentions of an engineer somewhere when confronted with ridiculously impossible and incompatible demands.
Curious about my “hero” story? I ran the design for QR’s 2800 class locomotives and the client wanted world first, never before achieved levels of noise reduction on the vehicle. A lot of good work was done to reduce noise sources etc but we definitely reached a point where I concluded it was not an absolute certainty that we would get there so I created a Plan B that I have always regarded as “Vince’s bandaid” but I see has been adopted by many others around the globe. Basically this loco had to be tested in stationery and drive-by modes. The test prescribed where the meter was to be held and I wanted to put a barrier between every significant noise source and the test meter. In all tests the meter was hand-held a convenient height above ground level. So I had an acoustic shield fitted to the hand-rails down either side of the loco and had all openings in the main engine cab redistributed below this level. Any non-handrailed openings got internal baffles added. Passed with flying colours. Too bad for anyone living at an elevated position who got line-of-sight to the noise sources, although the reality is that this treatment did make a difference for them to, albeit whether they hit the test limits or not I wouldn’t know – after all we may have got there if we did nothing too. The only difference with this situation is that I declared we were doing this to pass the test and it was well recognised by all to be a good thing to do, and obviously because it spread.
Now, back to the question of why I knew about “test-mode” for epa test passing before the news broke; I will ponder that one some more…..