From Ars Technica: New catalyst enables cleaner diesel without the platinum

Enlarge / A Volvo D13A diesel engine, used in trucks.

Modern diesel engines are more fuel efficient than gasoline engines. Cleaning up their exhaust is a bit more challenging, though, due to the large amount of oxygen involved in the combustion. In particular, removing the nitrogen oxides (NOx) formed as oxygen and nitrogen in the air reacting at high temperatures requires specialized systems and expensive catalysts like platinum. While everyone would like to get rid of the platinum, no materials have been found that match its catalytic performance in diesel engine exhaust.

Until now, apparently. Research published recently in Science describes a new catalyst, a complex mixture of metal oxides including manganese, mullite, and the rare earth metals samarium and gadolinium (Mn-mullite (Sm, Gd)Mn2O5, to be precise), that actually performs better than platinum. And it’s cheaper.

The work was performed by scientists at the nanotechnology startup Nanostellar, with collaborators at the Huazhong University of Science and Technology, University of Kentucky, and the University of Texas at Dallas.

 

from Ars Technica

From Autoblog: Study: U.S. has fewer cars per person than Europe, but still uses twice as much energy

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l'Arc de Triomphe

Here’s a shocking statistic: The United States has fewer cars per capita than Italy, Germany, France, Spain, Belgium, Japan, Australia, New Zealand and 16 other countries. Even more dramatic is one of the potential causes: A declining American middle class.

According to an Atlantic report on a new study conduct by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, we’re ranked just 25th in the world in per-person car ownership. The actual number stands at 439 cars per 1,000 Americans. Further, the U.S. is an outlier when you compare the number of vehicles per capita to household consumption. While we have one of the highest rates of household spending, car buying is in decline here. It is this disparity that points to the widening income gap in the U.S. as a potential cause of our low rate of car ownership. Indeed, car ownership rates track with the size of a nation’s middle class, according to the report.

To add insult to injury, despite our low rates of car ownership, Americans still consume roughly twice as much energy as most Europeans.

 

from Autoblog

From Autoblog: Report: Fisker Flambé: Second Karma spontaneously combusts

Fisker Karma on fire

By all accounts, the Fisker Karma is one hot car. For a couple of owners though, perhaps it’s too hot.

Similar to a situation in May, when a Karma caught fire for no apparent reason in a Texas garage, another has burst into flames in a Woodside, CA parking lot. Rudy Burger was returning to his car after grocery shopping when he caught in the act of self-immolation. According to Jalopnik, he immediately called Fisker, which, in turn, advised him to call 911.

Firefighters arrived quickly and the flames were subdued before much more than just the front driver’s side was consumed. Considering that the A123 Systems‘ battery runs down the center of the car under the passenger compartment, it is possible that the pack was not responsible for the blaze. Wired got a statement from Fisker, which furthers this line of thought. It reads, in part:

Fisker understands damage was limited to the driver’s side front corner of the car, away from the lithium ion battery and electric motors. The car was not being charged at the time.

In an electric vehicle, immediate suspicion is focused on the battery and high voltage components. The location of the damage to the vehicle in this incident appears to rule out that suspicion. Fisker has not had any battery or high voltage fire incidents with any of its vehicles.

Fisker has hired “an independent fire expert to assist the investigation” and says that once the probe is complete and the cause pinpointed, it will issue a statement on the matter. Fisker’s current statement – and a video of the Karma conflagration – is posted below.

 

from Autoblog

From Autoblog: Report: Researchers developing washless coating for cars

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We could have easily filed this under “Too Good to Be True” or “Snake Oil,” but it sounds legit, and certainly has our attention. Researchers in The Netherlands’ Eindhoven University of Technology (TU/e) have developed a self-healing vehicle coating, meaning that one day, you may not have to wash your car.

Catarina Esteves of the department of Chemical Engineering and Chemistry at TU/e and her team claims to have invented a solution to the problem of minor scrapes. Apparently the nano-capsule technology features special chemical groups that are able to re-orient themselves in the event that a surface with this compound is scratched.

The potential automotive use for this technology is obvious; it allows for the development of coatings that are not only water-resistant, but scratch resistant. A minor rain shower is all it would take to keep the car clean.

The implementation of this technology is not limited to the automotive world – it can also be employed on contact lenses, smartphone screens, and solar panels.

The benefit it could provide to the aviation industry would be two-fold. A plane employing this coating would not only need less frequent cleaning, but the inability for algae and dirt to build up means that the aircraft would allow for less wind resistance, resoling in more fuel efficient flying.

 

from Autoblog

From Autoblog: Report: New iPhone 5 may come with incompatible connector for cars

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Nearly the entire auto industry has finally caught up with the world of consumer electronics, offering a way to connect the iPod/iPhone – be it via USB, Bluetooth or official Apple connector – in most new cars. The 30-pin Apple connector was first incorporated in a car by BMW in 2004 and was significant because it meant inclusion of a connector that only works for a single brand’s products.

Automakers like Audi and Volkswagen also offer an iPhone-spec cable, allowing access to your music through the car’s own audio system and changing tracks on the steering wheel controls.

Now, prepare to be frustrated.

Now that everyone finally offers the same cable for the iPhone, Apple may reportedly move to a 19-pin connector that is smaller than the current 30-pin cable. If the reports are true, then the new iPhone 5 will be instantly incompatible with the built-in 30-pin connectors that come equipped in Kia, Hyundai and Nissan vehicles.

It may not be cause for a total freak out, as most vehicles on the market offer integrated USB ports, which can accept any cable where at least one end is USB. As long as Apple doesn’t decide to piss everyone off and move away from as USB on the non-iPhone end, you will still be able to connect the next-gen iPhone this way.

Additionally, most new vehicles come equipped with Bluetooth, and an increasing number of these vehicles allow for streaming music. If all else fails, you can tell the new 19-pin connector to take a hike and stream your music wirelessly.

 

from Autoblog

From Autoblog: Official: Mercedes-Benz debuts Beltbag airbag for rear seatbelts

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Mercedes-Benz can be credited with more technological firsts in the automotive industry than perhaps any other company, but it cannot lay claim to being the first automaker to offer a seatbelt airbag. Nor can it claim to be the second. Those two spots go to the Ford Explorer and Lexus LFA, both of which came out with seatbelt airbags in 2010.

Nevertheless, Mercedes isn’t the sort of company to let the glory of being first get in the way of doing something worthwhile, and so its new Beltbag system for rear seat occupants will be coming to a luxury car near you soon. Our best guess is that the inflatable straps will debut on the redesigned S-Class that bows in the first half of next year, and then quickly proliferate throughout the brand’s lineup.

Like the Fordsystem, Mercedes’ Beltbag system is relegated to rear seats only and powered by charged gas that inflates the strap to nearly three times its normal width, thus increasing the surface area across which to distribute the impact forces of a crash. Unlike the Ford system, Mercedes says only a frontal impact will trigger its belts to inflate, whereas the Explorer’s inflatable bags are triggered by both frontal and side impacts.

 

from Autoblog