2016 CAFE rules.

Posted on August 25, 2012 by Oleg Volk

I get a distinct impression that USGov is deliberately trying to make cars too expensive for the majority of the population. The so-called “clunker” destruction reduced the availability of inexpensive used vehicles. CAFE rules on fuel efficiency slated for 2016 phase-in would be the end of simpler, lower-maintenance engines. I wonder what can be done to arrest this undesirable trend.

This entry was posted in advice requested and tagged , , . Bookmark the permalink.

21 Responses to 2016 CAFE rules.

  1. Flint says:
    August 25, 2012 at 6:19 am

    I attempted to comment in the LJ post, but it asked for a captcha answer, without actually showing a captcha anywhere on the page.

  2. Underground Carpenter says:
    August 25, 2012 at 6:23 am

    I can think of a few things, mostly involving rude treatment of people involved in the insanity we call government.

    Dave

  3. Kristopher says:
    August 25, 2012 at 10:01 am

    CAFE is only the law in CA. The feds under Obama gave them a waiver to allow the CA state government to have tougher standards.

    Car manufacturers can refuse to sell cars in that stupid state. This is an easy fix. If you don’t sell cars there, the CA government can just fuck off and die.

    • McThag says:
      August 25, 2012 at 11:10 am

      CAFE is Federal and has nothing to do with California’s emission standards.

      CARB is not the same as CAFE.

      • TheIrishman says:
        August 25, 2012 at 11:15 am

        And good luck getting auto makers to stop selling cars in Cali. It is one of the biggest markets for EVERYTHING. Cali knows it and knows it can get away with ridiculous restrictions.

        • Kristopher says:
          August 26, 2012 at 12:01 pm

          TheIrishman: If it becomes impossible to make money and sell cars in California, expect automakers to split off new companies that only sell in CA.

          It will happen if these retards keep turning the screws.

      • Kristopher says:
        August 26, 2012 at 11:59 am

        Yer right … but CAFE combined with CARB is making a bad mess worse.

    • LarryArnold says:
      August 28, 2012 at 2:28 am

      California has that all figured out. They’re building a train.

      • Paul Koning says:
        August 28, 2012 at 2:50 pm

        Actually, they are claiming to be building some pieces of track. Not clear it will ever have a train on it, or that anyone will ever be in the train. Apparently, the rest of us (for now) are on the hook to pay for much of this nonsense.

  4. J. Croft says:
    August 25, 2012 at 1:02 pm

    Only way we can have independence in any way is to separate ourselves from the beast. And it is a beast. Now, individually we are vulnerable but if we band together in mutually supporting communities or at least be within muster range of each other we can collectively say NO. When people see how much better we live than they (still slaves) and they join up, we grow our numbers.

    Only way we can have any kind of Freedom. Grow and take back Our America.

  5. Rolf says:
    August 25, 2012 at 1:33 pm

    Only thing that comes to mind is elect a different president and a whole bunch of new congress-critters, and maybe a few new SCOTUS justices to toss some of the stupid EPA regs.

    Some of the basic ideas behind better economy standards and pollution controls are reasonable – we are all better off with cleaner air and water, and encouraging using less of limited resources (how limited is an open question) is not totally stupid. But, the way the EPA and FedGov have gone about doing it, and the current marginal cost:benefit imposed ARE getting pretty ludicrous. I mean, the war on plant food (CO2)? Really, REALLY stupid. Limiting coal plant emissions of heavy metals is a good thing; limiting CO2 production is prohibitively expensive for the extremely questionable benefits, and the costs imposed by higher electricity prices and diminished reliability are not worth it, especially if we are pushing for more electric cars and such (which also need more copper, lead, and lithium, mines for which I do NOT see the greenies pushing for).

    There is an old saying that you want armor to be light, effective, and cheap: pick any two. Well, a newer version might be you want cars to be efficient, safe, and cheap: pick any two. It’s a trade-off that MUST be made explicit to those who have no understanding of economics (meaning, those on the political left).

    • Flint says:
      August 25, 2012 at 6:43 pm

      There’s no electable presidential candidate who would do anything to curb such nonsense, this time around. Barack Obamney and Mitt Obamney are both worshipers at the altar of “tax and regulate.”

    • theirritablearchitect says:
      August 26, 2012 at 11:07 pm

      Rolf,

      I have some answers to certain questions, but…few would actually want to listen, nor do they have the capability of understanding, in my estimation.

      Point; Did you know that running a catalytic converter costs you mileage? Most don’t, and the Feds have never wanted to review any of the science behind it. Modern Mass-Air fuel injection solved a bunch of the stoichiometric issues that carburetors could never have dealth with, and was a primary reason for their inclusion in all US cars back in ’75.

      Lose the Cat, gain a mile or two per gallon. It’s horsepower that the engine doesn’t have to waste (extra fuel) to push past the restriction of the matrix and its attendant expanding gas.

      Instead, we have retards telling the masses (more retards) that we absolutely NEED to have stability control on all new vehicles, because without it we’ll all kill ourselves. Nuts, but there it is. Same with anti-lock brakes. Fifteen airbags. Safety devices galore, which adds weight. Lots of weight. Which increases gas consumption.

      The Gummint wants to tell the car companies EXACTLY what they can put in to EVERY vehicle, and then turn around and DEMAND that the same vehicle gets a minimum mileage requirement. Again, nuts.

      I am seriously considering buying an old 4WD pickup, and tearing it down to the frame, and rebuilding it EXACTLY the way that I WANT IT, because I can’t seem to find anything else that works the way I want it to, and the Gummint would seem to want it that way.

      The fix? Isn’t it obvious?

  6. Paul Koning says:
    August 25, 2012 at 5:11 pm

    As Neil Smith has pointed out, socialists hate individual freedom in any form. Among them is the individual freedom to go where you want to, when you want to. It’s no surprise that cars are rare, and mostly toys of the elite, in communist countries.
    So how to fix it: stop electing socialists.

  7. Scott J says:
    August 26, 2012 at 10:08 pm

    This is a subject near and dear to my heart as I was a gearhead long before I ever became a guncrank. Going back to being smitten with this magazine cover way back in 1983 when I merely had a learners’ permit: http://graphic-server.com/cgi-bin/usedmagazines.cgi?full/CD198312.JPG

    We have experienced the displacement in the used market first hand recently as we attempted to replace my wife’s beloved 2002 Audi A4 we lost to a rear ender recently. The prices being asked for used junk is astonishing these days. Cars with blown engines listed for $1,000 or more. Or $2,000 for a 10+ year old Acura Integra with 220K miles on the clock. We drove a couple of 2002 Accords. Both were asking FULL retail and neither in condition to actually justify it. One was a salvage title.

    Fortunately we managed to come to an agreeable price on the first car we looked at back three weeks ago. A 2001 A6 2.7T six speed.

    My plan going forward is to own and maintain a fleet of older vehicles I can work on and free of the big brother black boxes which are becoming more common. The point of the fleet is the ability to take one out of service for an extended time while I scrounge parts and do my own work (service prices have also skyrocketed in the past decade). Fortunately I live in a state with fairly lax emissions and inspection laws and I’ll do my part at the ballot box to keep it that way.

    • theirritablearchitect says:
      August 26, 2012 at 11:22 pm

      Scott,

      Good on you, sir.

      I have, right now, three cars for two drivers, and we’re adding a fourth next week. It’s new, but fills a bit of a gap in what we don’t have at this point.

      My longtime beater is a ’96 Nissan HB pickup, which I’ve owned since almost new, and it is scheduled to turn a quarter-million miles by the end of this year. The engine runs better now than when I bought it. It’s rusty, and I need to attend to some minor mechanical issues, but I keep telling myself that it’s not worth giving it away for $500, considering my needs and its absolutely stellar reliability record to this point. If I had the scratch and time, I’d rebuild it into something similar, and just keep driving it for many years.

      I’m also considering a project vehicle of some sort in the future, and it would be something of extreme vintage, as you alluded to, with a bunch of modern technology, that I WANT, put in the places that I want it.

      I may need to build another garage. Thankfully, I have the skills for that too.

      Good luck.

      • Scott J says:
        August 27, 2012 at 5:52 am

        Your post reminds me I forgot to mention we had 198K miles on the A4 and were planning on putting at least 50K more on it before it was hit. So we know about driving them forever.

        It was still driveable but I didn’t fight the other driver’s insurance on the total because the events let us shed a lien (and payment) and saved me from the $600 timing belt service about to be due on the car.

        I thought about buying it salvage but at $1480 it was a bit much for what I’d have to sink into it after the fact.

        Aside from my 2003 Dodge Ram I have a 1987 Alfa Spider and a 1985 CJ-7 I need to quit neglecting.

  8. Rivrdog says:
    August 29, 2012 at 1:03 pm

    The solution involves cleaning up the mess that personal injury lawsuits has fallen into.

    Without the lawyers, we wouldn’t have to have all the safety crapple on our cars. Without the safety crapple, we could look into and perfect engines that solve the pollution issues (the real ones, not “carbon loading”) by delivering far better mileage. When the above is done, we open the gates to companies like Tata Motors of India, who already builds adequate, light-weight motor vehicles that do the job with half the weight of ours.

    Above all, we IMMEDIATELY look into powering what we have with Natural Gas, the best stop-gap solution.

    Note that I haven’t said a thing about electric power. You can’t polish that turd enough to make it look like a transport solution, because our grid is inadequate to deliver the additional electric load, even if the industry could deliver the cars, which it can’t.

  9. Doug Rink says:
    August 30, 2012 at 7:04 pm

    Before government gets done with its tinkering, Americans may end up handing down their old minivans and pickups to their daughters and sons the way families in Cuba have handed down 50s era Chevys and Plymouths for generations.

  10. Will says:
    August 31, 2012 at 1:55 pm

    If you are playing with a vehicle that has to meet any smog regulations, the .gov has a way to screw you. They can simply change the specs. If it won’t pass anymore, you can’t register it. CA did this a few years ago. A friend who is a smog tech told me that he could no longer get any of the Ford Rangers with carbs to pass. Checking the specs printed on an old test one of the trucks still had in the glove box, he discovered the software from the mainframe system had had the specs altered. The test equipment is connected to the state’s center while running, so there is no way to fiddle the results locally.

    So, without any fanfare, the state removed a bunch of trucks from the road. I’m guessing they did the same for everything with a carb, which would be most vehicles up to the mid-80’s.

    Bear in mind, some states use CA smog specs now. As in other areas, as CA goes, so goes the nation, to some extent. Unfortunate, but that’s been the reality for some years now.

    Breaking up CA into multiple states would have a huge impact on this idiocy. Wish there was some way to force it. Maybe a maximum occupancy limit on a state?

Comments are closed.