Reminds me of my first truck, a '68 S10 with a 402 CID "396" in it. Back then gas prices were a horrifying 60 cents a gallon, and I got maybe 8 MPG on a good day. I lived in a one stoplight town, and if it looked like the light was going to turn red on me, I'd shift into neutral, turn off the ignition and coast to the intersection and wait out the 2-3 minutes before the light changed. The starter interlock was gone, so I could shift into "D", turn the key, and the starter would propel me across the intersection by which time the big block had come to life, and I drove away normally.
I'm with Gavin about the A/C. I don't know how many people thought that they were going to race me in my Mustang because I had the engine turning at 2 grand at a stoplight, just to keep the cold air flowing.
CAFE is not going away. Any American who thinks we have it bad should go to Europe and see some really Draconian car laws. We have it good here in the US of A, whether we realize it or not.
Eddie, back during the OPEC oil embargoes, a lot was written about how to save fuel, and a lot of seemingly good ideas got debunked. Back when your average car had a ~350 CID motor with a carburetor and points, getting it started did waste energy (don't forget the fuel burned to top off the battery every time) restarting it vs. simply letting it idle for the average stoplight interval. Back then it was common practice to pump the gas pedal, which squirted lots of raw (not atomized) fuel into the manifold. Plenty of that fuel never got burned, and literally went out the tailpipe.
Today's cars are completely different. Now it's feasible to do something like that without the problems of the past. OTOH newer cars have more and more engine-driven accessories that we aren't willing to do without, not even for a minute. The solution for most of these is simple: power them with electricity. We already have electric motors pumping fuel, opening throttles, modulating and boosting brakes etc. Just try to find a car without power windows, electric wipers and other things that were either manual or powered by engine vacuum.
The problem is that our sleek, modern cars still have an ancient 12V DC power system at their heart. We need higher power and more voltage to support the increasing number of electrical components. Although so-called "hybrid" cars are only feel-good, CAFE-cheating scams, the technology being developed for them is ideal for all modern cars.
Why have a separate starter and alternator when one device can do the job of both? That's what hybrids are doing. What if, instead of burying this starter/alternator in the drivetrain, we set it up so that it can turn the A/C compressor when the engine isn't turning? If you're in bumper to bumper traffic, why not have the S/A move your car a few feet every few minutes, and not even start the engine?
No, this doesn't have to kill your battery. Cars can monitor those things. If the battery gets too low, the engine can start and run just like a regular car as it recharges the battery. Deep cycle battery technology can enable longer battery operation. But I suspect that we'll be seeing secondary batteries as options before long. For example, the stop and go commuter in a hot climate might be able to order a special A/C battery that pre-cool a hot car in the parking lot, keep the A/C going longer while still keeping high CAFE numbers, and who knows what else...
