So they continue to pimp their new processor power in their phones (we have an A4 in this! That's right, A4, the chip we just invented! Oh wait, now we have the A5, now the A6, A7.) And then keep bogging it down with new features in iOS that really shouldn't make that much of a difference in performance, but grind old phones to a halt, and the difference is a wash comparing new iPhone +new iOS with old iPhone + old iOS?
Your premise that newer phones don't have features that make a difference is simply false.
Basic OS operations like switching apps, bog down compared to old versions. Why does the addition of fingerprint scanner, copy & paste, Siri, or removal of Skeuomorph suddenly require a significantly more powerful processor to check email, change applications, and text? I'm not saying new features introduced are without use, but there seems to be a disproportionate increase in CPU horsepower required.
Apple stop providing older iPhones with OS updates when they are no longer powerful enough to support current OS release. They got it wrong once, by providing one two many OS updates for the iPhone 3G
So they continue to pimp their new processor power in their phones (we have an A4 in this! That's right, A4, the chip we just invented! Oh wait, now we have the A5, now the A6, A7.) And then keep bogging it down with new features in iOS that really shouldn't make that much of a difference in performance, but grind old phones to a halt, and the difference is a wash comparing new iPhone +new iOS with old iPhone + old iOS?
At least with Microsoft, while there is a system requirement increase from XP (12.5 years ago) to Vista (7 years ago). The system requirements have been flat for the past 7 years through Win7, 8, 8.1. Third party applications may have bloated in that time, but the base OS hasn't.
I remember reading about a vehicle made in Europe that was completely drive-by-wire with no mechanical linkages whatsoever. Of course, some vehicles had glitches, and when they did, there was nothing to do but hope the wreck didn't kill you.
You know how many criminal organizations would love to be able to use an assist motor to jam a steering wheel at will? With how interconnected vehicles are, it might just take a bluetooth hole to get on the CANBus, then go from there.
I wouldn't blame Ford specifically, but I do worry about things like GM's OnStar being a prime target for hackers. Get control of that, disable all GM cars, tout the accomplishment, and win immense street cred. Same with getting motor-assisted steering to start jerking the wheel at random to cause crashes, it would put an organization on the map and give them respect worldwide.
Car makers have been good, but in general, most companies feel that security has no ROI, so don't do much than lip service, and coupled with all the crap that can take over a vehicle's ECM [1], it can be concerning.
[1]: I was reading about a "tattle" device by one insurance company which apparently something over the OBD 2 connector, so if the device was removed, the vehicle wouldn't start. Is this real? Doubtful, but it is concerning.
Even without steer by wire, this can be accomplished with electric power steering. As an example, look at "Active Park Assist". The system will command the steering wheel to turn, pretty much to full lock, based on what the sensors see. I assume (maybe?) if it detects resistance on the steering wheel it won't over power it, but the technology is already there for the wheels to turn as the computer sees fit. Electronic Throttle Control means the gas pedal is really just a suggestion to the computer, and hybrids with regenerative braking, the brakes are (somewhat?) brake by wire.
Plus with push button start, to kill power for have to hold the power button for several seconds if you need an emergency shut down due to a malfunction. Cars are also moving to electronic parking brakes too.
Talking about power factor maybe? If a motor is a slightly inductive load, you can put a capacitor to cancel out the inductance and bring power factor closer to unity. You will get the same "real power" out of the system, but your incoming current (amps) will be lower, because the phase angle will shift to be in line with voltage.
However residential customers are charged energy in kWh, so the "Amps", kVA, and power factor have no impact on the bill. Commercial / industrial can get hit with power factor penalties, as well as demand charges in kVA, so controlling power factor is important.
A bad power factor will impact the grid as a whole because the system has to be sized to handle the apparent power kVA, not just kW, increased current (even at a bad power factor) will increase I^2*R losses in the lines, but the mechanical energy in the generator makes real power.
In Canada most places use lined glasses. The bartender is almost never going to actually look at the line, so you always get a bit extra. The point is that you know you're going to get a minimum amount of beer. Crappy bartender who pours a giant amount of head? No problem.
Fuel economy is the same thing. You can't tell if the inflated numbers for one car are more or less inflated than the numbers for another car. Not to mention you can't actually do any planning based on them.
At the microbrewery near me, the beer is sold in refillable 1.89L growlers. The proprietors always fill it as close to the top as possible, well in excess of 1.89L.
Except the Yanks have smaller gallons 3.78 litres vs 4,54litres.
While a UK and Yank litre is the same 1000ml/cc
It's worse in Canada. Before Metrication, a gallon in Canada was the 4.54L Imperial gallon. And unless clarified, an unspecified gallon is still (supposed to be) assumed to be a Imperial Gallon. NRCan fuel consumption ratings are given in L/100lm, with ImpMPG still on the sticker for old farts. TV ads still push "MPG" ratings, and a lot of people still report their fuel economy in MPG even though distances aren't registered in miles, nor fuel sold in gallons (even young people who never bought gas in gallons!) It's even worse when they insist on using obsolete (for this country) units, yet don't even know which gallon they are using. In other cases they are too stupid to understand why Canadian MPG ratings are 20% larger than US MPG ratings.
You're referring to an exceedingly small number of cases here. If you look at fuelly's numbers, only 55 out of 1879 Corollas tracked average more than 40 MPG (2.9%), while only 178 out of all 2930 Prii tracked get *less than* 40 MPG (6%). In the overwhelming majority of cases, the Prius gets better fuel efficiency than Corollas.
That, and the Prius' chief advantage is in city driving, which taxis operate in virtually exclusively. Since you're claiming Corollas beat them in their home environment, I call bullshit on your argument.
Not just city driving, but taxis do a lot more idling and waiting than a normal passenger car.
Stranger things have happened. Initially the city of Toronto failed to see as large of savings on Hybrid transit buses (seeing 10-20% vs. promised 20-30%), largely because they operated on suburban routes instead of stop and go urban routes.
Whilst you highlight some of the advantages of electric over diesel, I don't buy that that's the whole reason for diesel electric trains. I suggest the advantages include efficiency, just as with hybrid cars.
Why? Because the first diesel electric locomotives were shunters, and they don't power up the bogies or a train, they just push or pull. So your explanation wouldn't cover it.
Boggies = trucks = wheels. Grandparent is talking about getting power from the engine to the wheels is simpler using diesel electric tech than a pure diesel tech. You still need to get power to the wheels of the locomotive when you're shunting. However with diesel electric you don't need a 1000HP clutch.
Interestingly I see things like this around for shunting (eg: at a processing plant), which are not diesel electric: http://www.trackmobile.com/com...
It's the charging time that's the problem. I make a 550 mile trip on a regular basis (work). I fly sometimes, and take the motorcycle sometimes, depending on weather and other factors. The bike has perhaps 200 miles capacity, so the Tesla already beats me on range. But the bike's refueling time is perhaps four minutes if I don't take a potty break. The tesla is what, six hours? That's turning a one day trip into two, both ways, unless I want to drive through the night.
Electric cars don't just need to get longer range. They also need to get significantly faster refueling times. For trips beyond the single charge range, there may never be a practical solution. (Yes, I've heard of the battery swap idea. I don't expect that to become widespread for a number of reasons.)
Check out Tesla Supercharger. Not quite 4 minutes, but 150 miles of range added in 30 minutes. Sit down for supper or a coffee break while it charges.
2. I've got to push some dash start button, which seems to have some kind of timer control. It's not a temporary switch to the starter motor. You can just tap it and it will engage thee stater. I worry what happens when my fuel pump or battery is a few years older and it takes a little longer to start.
This is just the way things are headed, even for key ignitions. My car has a key, but you don't have to hold it in the start position to start the engine. You just turn it quickly and then let it go and the engine cranks by itself.
Usually in these systems the car monitors the engine and keeps the starter engaged until the engine has started, usually up to a maximum of ~10 seconds. Try holding to the accelerator to the floor to engage "flood clear mode", where no gas is injected in the cylinders, and press start. The engine should keep cranking until: -You release the pedal and fuel starts flowing -10 seconds is up and it stops to prevent overheating the motor -Some push button systems might stop if you take your foot off the brake.
This. My wife's car is completely keyless. She has to have the fob to open the doors or turn it on. This past winter she came out of work and couldn't get into her car let alone turn it on because the battery in her fob died. Fortunately it was at work and she had a warm place to go back to and call me to bring her the spare fob. If she had been somewhere without such recourse when it was -15 wind chill she very well could have died.
My Chevy Volt has keyless entry, remote start, and a keyless start option, but it still has a physical key. If the battery in the Fob dies I can still get in it. My old Chevy Impala I kept a spare key in my wallet. It wouldn't start it, but would open the door or trunk in case I locked the keys in the car or I could get to the emergency supplies I kept in the trunk.
You name the model car you have, and your old one. Why don't you name the one your wife has that's apparently a deathtrap in the winter?
Q: How do you give a prolonged crank, if the car fails to start (e.g. poor fuel, or cold weather)? A: You have to let the computer attempt 3 failed starts. After that, the behaviour of the start/stop sequence changes. After the 3rd attempt, a momentary push of the button, will make the computer crank the engine for up to 30 seconds, for as long as the brake pedal remains depressed.
Strange. In my Ford a momentary move of the key to start will leave the engine cranking for as long as required (up to 10 seconds). Is ~10 seconds what a "failed start" is considered? Most manuals don't recommend cranking for more than 10 seconds, and recommend cooldown periods between attempts.
SURE you can buy the key for under $25, but it's going to cost you $75 to have the dealer program the ECU or that key will not be able to start your car.
If you're trying to program an immobilizer key, and already have two that are programmed for the car, it's usually a matter of sticking one authenticated key in, turning the ignition to RUN, then sticking the second in and turning the ignition to RUN, then sticking the new key in and turning the ignition to RUN. I got two immobilizer keys from eBay for $14, Home Depot cut them for free, and I programmed them myself.
Now, my car is an automatic, so I have not tried the roll/start on a manual transmission with a push button ignition, but it seems to me that with all of the accessories and instrumentation turned on, I don't see why it wouldn't work.
That might work if the battery at least had enough juice to power the accessories. If it was really dead, it most likely wouldn't recognize your button pushes, so it wouldn't know it was in position 2.
In which case any car from the past 25 years wouldn't have sufficient juice to power the ECU, EFI, and electric fuel pump for a push start either (which would be somewhere from 6-9V on a 12V system). Older carbureted cars requiring spark power only can be push started with less.
Personally, I'm neutral. On one hand, the Prius and Nissan keyfobs that just sit in a pocket are cool with one less thing to flip open. On the other hand, having to stick the physical key in the vehicle with a very low power transmitter handling the passive anti-theft access gives a bump in security.
There's no transmitter in my key. You're thinking of the RFID keys, which are pretty good security: coupled with a decent quality alarm with multiple immobilizers it makes a car pretty much unstealable unless you have a flatbed.
But there's no reason you can't simply put the RFID into the alarm keyfob instead of the key. In fact, most of the pushbutton starters I've seen in recent years work exactly like that -- there's an RFID in your keyfob, and if you don't have the keyfob in your pocket (or within a few feet of the car), the car simply won't start. If the car gets out of range of the keyfob, it'll trip the fuel line immobilizer.
Most push button systems have an active RFID transmitter in the fob to give the range (key can be in your pocket and allow you to unlock the door, or start the car). If the battery in the fob dies there's the emergency key to open the drivers door, then usually the fob is held by the ignition button, or there's a hidden slot, to allow passive RFID to authenticate the fob and allow you to start the car. Most cars from the past 7+ years include RFID immobilizers (passive in the case of standard keys).
With a key, you switch it to 1 and can run accessories. You switch it to 2 and the ignition computer is powered. Switch and hold it to 3 and you crank. You decide exactly how to start your engine.
With the newer systems, you just push the button and it decides what to do. You lose the control. What if you want to crank for a while because it won't start? What if you want to switch it to position 2 and push-start a manual transmission car? You can't.
I like the standard keys. And really, just because one manufacturer happened to use a defective part, we lose them? Key switches have been around for decade and are reliable. Just fix the reliability issue in that one model and that's it.
With many cars with keys from the past ~7 years the "START" position is a request at best. The key only has to be momentarily moved to START, and the engine will keep cranking for as long as required to start the engine (usually up to a maximum of like 10 seconds). This can be tested by holding the accelerator to the floor (which will put the car in "clear flood mode" where no fuel is injected to the engine), and turning the key to start, and it will keep cranking the engine after you release the key, until you release the pedal. This logic already being there makes remote start or push button start a dead simple change.
Hold the key to START longer than required to start the engine, and the car will ignore you and the starter will disengage after the required time anyways.
Although I can appreciate your concern about not having full control of your car, many people are stupid, even when it comes to such things as starting a car. I remember once hearing a guy outside the building trying to start his crappy old Chev Lumina.
You should be able to turn the car off. I don't think most automatic cars will let you remove the key without being in park. Some will if it's in neutral with your foot on the brake. It's part of the inter-lock system
You're mixing three interlocks. -Usually you can't take the key out (or lock the steering) in any position other than park. -To shift from park requires depressing the brake (or activating an override hidden in the console). -To start the engine it has to be in park or neutral.
The steering in my car does not lock until I remove the key from the ignition. Just turning off the ignition does not lock the steering. However, this was probably improved in the 32 years since my car was made so modern cars probably lock the steering if the engine is turned off (or dies on its own).
Power brakes would still work with the engine off and car in gear, since the engine is being turned by the wheels and is producing vacuum.
In any modern Automatic I've driven, with the transmission in any position other than park, the key will only go back one click, enough to shut off the engine, but not lock the steering wheel. Manuals sometimes / frequently require some additional movement to move the key back more than one position.
In modern electronic automatics when you kill the ignition, it will kill power to the controls for the transmission. The shift solenoids will release, transmission will go to neutral, engine will coast to a stop, and you will have no assist. In an unintended acceleration case, with Wide Open Throttle there is minimal vacuum anyways, and you lose stored vacuum assist after a couple pumps, which is part of what makes it worse. With electronic throttle, killing the ignition may or may not return the throttle to idle, that will be left as an exercise for the reader.
In my old car with a Chrysler 31TH Hydraulic transmission, turning off the ignition with the car rolling in gear rolling would keep the engine turning. Thus power brakes and power steering kept working. Given it was completely hydraulic controls (other than the lock up torque converter), if you floored the accelerator it would actually downshift. Once you're done fooling around, one click back to RUN and you're ready to drive off, since the engine is still spinning, no restart needed. Hydraulic power for the controls is fed off the input shaft, so once the car stopped (or close enough to stopping with torque converter losses), the engine would stop turning, hydraulic pump would stop turning, gears would release and default to neutral, and thus you can't push start an automatic.
should have a kill switch that mechanically cuts off the power. Industrial machines are required to have those, so why should land missiles mostly operated by amateurs be exempt?
I'm a fan of emergency kill switches, but only if it's a mushroom e-stop, or pull cable like Industrial machines
How about the ability to turn to "off" to stop an engine affected by a stuck accelerator? Until the start button has a toggle or push button next to it to stop the engine, I don't want one anywhere near my car. And, when I say a button to stop the car, I mean a real kill switch that will ground out the ignition coil(s) or shut off the fuel pump or something similar, or for a diesel shut a fuel solenoid so the engine WILL die.
If I lose power steering or braking I just have to steer or brake harder - ok, it sucks, but if you can't do that you shouldn't be driving. But then, I'm a firm believer that somewhere around 30% of the people on the road should have their licenses taken because they're either physically or mentally unfit to be in control of a vehicle.
One of the things I hate since ATX power supplies came out is the lollygag force power off (and moreso disappearance of "Reset" buttons). Press and hold 1...2...3...4...5...OFF. The only thing worse is being in an out of control car having to do the same sequence. At least with a stuck accelerator you should be able to shift to neutral or de-clutch. Not only do modern cars have rev limiters to keep from overrevving the engine, many times if the car is in neutral or park it will limit revs to something like 3-4k, not the actual redline.
And nobody reviews the source code. People download, use the library/code or whatever and be on their merry way.
This "you can't get anything bad through because the source is freely available" has proven to be horseshit.
Some people are under the assumption if you release something open source, you will get hundreds of volunteers lining up to work on it. And when they do, they will work on EVERYTHING. Truth is unless your project is "sexy" it's hard to get developers. Look at Linux kernel, a lot of the development is done by paid developers (not a lot sexy about the kernel). Look at where projects spend their focus: Firefox reinventing the UI again, Compiz Wobbly windows, usually any application that can be skinned, has 400 skins for every useful plugin. Meanwhile things like performance, or user documentation gets neglected.
Don't get me wrong, I think there's benefits to Open Soruce development models, I just don't think open sourcing something means hundreds of people are looking at it.
Slashdot Mirror
When will they have 3-D all in one machines? Scan, copy, and print.
So they continue to pimp their new processor power in their phones (we have an A4 in this! That's right, A4, the chip we just invented! Oh wait, now we have the A5, now the A6, A7.) And then keep bogging it down with new features in iOS that really shouldn't make that much of a difference in performance, but grind old phones to a halt, and the difference is a wash comparing new iPhone +new iOS with old iPhone + old iOS?
Your premise that newer phones don't have features that make a difference is simply false.
Basic OS operations like switching apps, bog down compared to old versions. Why does the addition of fingerprint scanner, copy & paste, Siri, or removal of Skeuomorph suddenly require a significantly more powerful processor to check email, change applications, and text? I'm not saying new features introduced are without use, but there seems to be a disproportionate increase in CPU horsepower required.
Apple stop providing older iPhones with OS updates when they are no longer powerful enough to support current OS release. They got it wrong once, by providing one two many OS updates for the iPhone 3G
So they continue to pimp their new processor power in their phones (we have an A4 in this! That's right, A4, the chip we just invented! Oh wait, now we have the A5, now the A6, A7.) And then keep bogging it down with new features in iOS that really shouldn't make that much of a difference in performance, but grind old phones to a halt, and the difference is a wash comparing new iPhone +new iOS with old iPhone + old iOS?
At least with Microsoft, while there is a system requirement increase from XP (12.5 years ago) to Vista (7 years ago). The system requirements have been flat for the past 7 years through Win7, 8, 8.1. Third party applications may have bloated in that time, but the base OS hasn't.
I remember reading about a vehicle made in Europe that was completely drive-by-wire with no mechanical linkages whatsoever. Of course, some vehicles had glitches, and when they did, there was nothing to do but hope the wreck didn't kill you.
You know how many criminal organizations would love to be able to use an assist motor to jam a steering wheel at will? With how interconnected vehicles are, it might just take a bluetooth hole to get on the CANBus, then go from there.
I wouldn't blame Ford specifically, but I do worry about things like GM's OnStar being a prime target for hackers. Get control of that, disable all GM cars, tout the accomplishment, and win immense street cred. Same with getting motor-assisted steering to start jerking the wheel at random to cause crashes, it would put an organization on the map and give them respect worldwide.
Car makers have been good, but in general, most companies feel that security has no ROI, so don't do much than lip service, and coupled with all the crap that can take over a vehicle's ECM [1], it can be concerning.
[1]: I was reading about a "tattle" device by one insurance company which apparently something over the OBD 2 connector, so if the device was removed, the vehicle wouldn't start. Is this real? Doubtful, but it is concerning.
Even without steer by wire, this can be accomplished with electric power steering. As an example, look at "Active Park Assist". The system will command the steering wheel to turn, pretty much to full lock, based on what the sensors see. I assume (maybe?) if it detects resistance on the steering wheel it won't over power it, but the technology is already there for the wheels to turn as the computer sees fit. Electronic Throttle Control means the gas pedal is really just a suggestion to the computer, and hybrids with regenerative braking, the brakes are (somewhat?) brake by wire.
Plus with push button start, to kill power for have to hold the power button for several seconds if you need an emergency shut down due to a malfunction. Cars are also moving to electronic parking brakes too.
Still not making any sense.
Talking about power factor maybe? If a motor is a slightly inductive load, you can put a capacitor to cancel out the inductance and bring power factor closer to unity. You will get the same "real power" out of the system, but your incoming current (amps) will be lower, because the phase angle will shift to be in line with voltage.
However residential customers are charged energy in kWh, so the "Amps", kVA, and power factor have no impact on the bill. Commercial / industrial can get hit with power factor penalties, as well as demand charges in kVA, so controlling power factor is important.
A bad power factor will impact the grid as a whole because the system has to be sized to handle the apparent power kVA, not just kW, increased current (even at a bad power factor) will increase I^2*R losses in the lines, but the mechanical energy in the generator makes real power.
In Canada most places use lined glasses. The bartender is almost never going to actually look at the line, so you always get a bit extra. The point is that you know you're going to get a minimum amount of beer. Crappy bartender who pours a giant amount of head? No problem.
Fuel economy is the same thing. You can't tell if the inflated numbers for one car are more or less inflated than the numbers for another car. Not to mention you can't actually do any planning based on them.
At the microbrewery near me, the beer is sold in refillable 1.89L growlers. The proprietors always fill it as close to the top as possible, well in excess of 1.89L.
Except the Yanks have smaller gallons 3.78 litres vs 4,54litres.
While a UK and Yank litre is the same 1000ml/cc
It's worse in Canada. Before Metrication, a gallon in Canada was the 4.54L Imperial gallon. And unless clarified, an unspecified gallon is still (supposed to be) assumed to be a Imperial Gallon. NRCan fuel consumption ratings are given in L/100lm, with ImpMPG still on the sticker for old farts. TV ads still push "MPG" ratings, and a lot of people still report their fuel economy in MPG even though distances aren't registered in miles, nor fuel sold in gallons (even young people who never bought gas in gallons!) It's even worse when they insist on using obsolete (for this country) units, yet don't even know which gallon they are using. In other cases they are too stupid to understand why Canadian MPG ratings are 20% larger than US MPG ratings.
You're referring to an exceedingly small number of cases here. If you look at fuelly's numbers, only 55 out of 1879 Corollas tracked average more than 40 MPG (2.9%), while only 178 out of all 2930 Prii tracked get *less than* 40 MPG (6%). In the overwhelming majority of cases, the Prius gets better fuel efficiency than Corollas.
That, and the Prius' chief advantage is in city driving, which taxis operate in virtually exclusively. Since you're claiming Corollas beat them in their home environment, I call bullshit on your argument.
Not just city driving, but taxis do a lot more idling and waiting than a normal passenger car.
Stranger things have happened. Initially the city of Toronto failed to see as large of savings on Hybrid transit buses (seeing 10-20% vs. promised 20-30%), largely because they operated on suburban routes instead of stop and go urban routes.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com...
I'm reminded of the movie Idiocracy:
http://lonniewest.com/wp-conte...
Whilst you highlight some of the advantages of electric over diesel, I don't buy that that's the whole reason for diesel electric trains. I suggest the advantages include efficiency, just as with hybrid cars.
Why? Because the first diesel electric locomotives were shunters, and they don't power up the bogies or a train, they just push or pull. So your explanation wouldn't cover it.
Boggies = trucks = wheels. Grandparent is talking about getting power from the engine to the wheels is simpler using diesel electric tech than a pure diesel tech. You still need to get power to the wheels of the locomotive when you're shunting. However with diesel electric you don't need a 1000HP clutch.
Interestingly I see things like this around for shunting (eg: at a processing plant), which are not diesel electric:
http://www.trackmobile.com/com...
It's the charging time that's the problem. I make a 550 mile trip on a regular basis (work). I fly sometimes, and take the motorcycle sometimes, depending on weather and other factors. The bike has perhaps 200 miles capacity, so the Tesla already beats me on range. But the bike's refueling time is perhaps four minutes if I don't take a potty break. The tesla is what, six hours? That's turning a one day trip into two, both ways, unless I want to drive through the night.
Electric cars don't just need to get longer range. They also need to get significantly faster refueling times. For trips beyond the single charge range, there may never be a practical solution. (Yes, I've heard of the battery swap idea. I don't expect that to become widespread for a number of reasons.)
Check out Tesla Supercharger. Not quite 4 minutes, but 150 miles of range added in 30 minutes. Sit down for supper or a coffee break while it charges.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T...
2. I've got to push some dash start button, which seems to have some kind of timer control. It's not a temporary switch to the starter motor. You can just tap it and it will engage thee stater. I worry what happens when my fuel pump or battery is a few years older and it takes a little longer to start.
This is just the way things are headed, even for key ignitions. My car has a key, but you don't have to hold it in the start position to start the engine. You just turn it quickly and then let it go and the engine cranks by itself.
Usually in these systems the car monitors the engine and keeps the starter engaged until the engine has started, usually up to a maximum of ~10 seconds. Try holding to the accelerator to the floor to engage "flood clear mode", where no gas is injected in the cylinders, and press start. The engine should keep cranking until:
-You release the pedal and fuel starts flowing
-10 seconds is up and it stops to prevent overheating the motor
-Some push button systems might stop if you take your foot off the brake.
This. My wife's car is completely keyless. She has to have the fob to open the doors or turn it on. This past winter she came out of work and couldn't get into her car let alone turn it on because the battery in her fob died. Fortunately it was at work and she had a warm place to go back to and call me to bring her the spare fob. If she had been somewhere without such recourse when it was -15 wind chill she very well could have died.
My Chevy Volt has keyless entry, remote start, and a keyless start option, but it still has a physical key. If the battery in the Fob dies I can still get in it. My old Chevy Impala I kept a spare key in my wallet. It wouldn't start it, but would open the door or trunk in case I locked the keys in the car or I could get to the emergency supplies I kept in the trunk.
You name the model car you have, and your old one. Why don't you name the one your wife has that's apparently a deathtrap in the winter?
Q: How do you give a prolonged crank, if the car fails to start (e.g. poor fuel, or cold weather)?
A: You have to let the computer attempt 3 failed starts. After that, the behaviour of the start/stop sequence changes. After the 3rd attempt, a momentary push of the button, will make the computer crank the engine for up to 30 seconds, for as long as the brake pedal remains depressed.
Strange. In my Ford a momentary move of the key to start will leave the engine cranking for as long as required (up to 10 seconds). Is ~10 seconds what a "failed start" is considered? Most manuals don't recommend cranking for more than 10 seconds, and recommend cooldown periods between attempts.
SURE you can buy the key for under $25, but it's going to cost you $75 to have the dealer program the ECU or that key will not be able to start your car.
If you're trying to program an immobilizer key, and already have two that are programmed for the car, it's usually a matter of sticking one authenticated key in, turning the ignition to RUN, then sticking the second in and turning the ignition to RUN, then sticking the new key in and turning the ignition to RUN. I got two immobilizer keys from eBay for $14, Home Depot cut them for free, and I programmed them myself.
Now, my car is an automatic, so I have not tried the roll/start on a manual transmission with a push button ignition, but it seems to me that with all of the accessories and instrumentation turned on, I don't see why it wouldn't work.
That might work if the battery at least had enough juice to power the accessories. If it was really dead, it most likely wouldn't recognize your button pushes, so it wouldn't know it was in position 2.
In which case any car from the past 25 years wouldn't have sufficient juice to power the ECU, EFI, and electric fuel pump for a push start either (which would be somewhere from 6-9V on a 12V system). Older carbureted cars requiring spark power only can be push started with less.
Personally, I'm neutral. On one hand, the Prius and Nissan keyfobs that just sit in a pocket are cool with one less thing to flip open. On the other hand, having to stick the physical key in the vehicle with a very low power transmitter handling the passive anti-theft access gives a bump in security.
There's no transmitter in my key. You're thinking of the RFID keys, which are pretty good security: coupled with a decent quality alarm with multiple immobilizers it makes a car pretty much unstealable unless you have a flatbed.
But there's no reason you can't simply put the RFID into the alarm keyfob instead of the key. In fact, most of the pushbutton starters I've seen in recent years work exactly like that -- there's an RFID in your keyfob, and if you don't have the keyfob in your pocket (or within a few feet of the car), the car simply won't start. If the car gets out of range of the keyfob, it'll trip the fuel line immobilizer.
Most push button systems have an active RFID transmitter in the fob to give the range (key can be in your pocket and allow you to unlock the door, or start the car). If the battery in the fob dies there's the emergency key to open the drivers door, then usually the fob is held by the ignition button, or there's a hidden slot, to allow passive RFID to authenticate the fob and allow you to start the car. Most cars from the past 7+ years include RFID immobilizers (passive in the case of standard keys).
With a key, you switch it to 1 and can run accessories. You switch it to 2 and the ignition computer is powered. Switch and hold it to 3 and you crank. You decide exactly how to start your engine.
With the newer systems, you just push the button and it decides what to do. You lose the control. What if you want to crank for a while because it won't start? What if you want to switch it to position 2 and push-start a manual transmission car? You can't.
I like the standard keys. And really, just because one manufacturer happened to use a defective part, we lose them? Key switches have been around for decade and are reliable. Just fix the reliability issue in that one model and that's it.
With many cars with keys from the past ~7 years the "START" position is a request at best. The key only has to be momentarily moved to START, and the engine will keep cranking for as long as required to start the engine (usually up to a maximum of like 10 seconds). This can be tested by holding the accelerator to the floor (which will put the car in "clear flood mode" where no fuel is injected to the engine), and turning the key to start, and it will keep cranking the engine after you release the key, until you release the pedal. This logic already being there makes remote start or push button start a dead simple change.
Hold the key to START longer than required to start the engine, and the car will ignore you and the starter will disengage after the required time anyways.
Although I can appreciate your concern about not having full control of your car, many people are stupid, even when it comes to such things as starting a car. I remember once hearing a guy outside the building trying to start his crappy old Chev Lumina.
Rrr. . .
Rrrr-rrr. . .
Rrr. . .
Rrr-rrr. . .
Rrr. . .
Rrr-rr. . .
Clearly he was too stupid to just hold the key at start:
Rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr-vroom!
You should be able to turn the car off. I don't think most automatic cars will let you remove the key without being in park. Some will if it's in neutral with your foot on the brake. It's part of the inter-lock system
You're mixing three interlocks.
-Usually you can't take the key out (or lock the steering) in any position other than park.
-To shift from park requires depressing the brake (or activating an override hidden in the console).
-To start the engine it has to be in park or neutral.
The steering in my car does not lock until I remove the key from the ignition. Just turning off the ignition does not lock the steering. However, this was probably improved in the 32 years since my car was made so modern cars probably lock the steering if the engine is turned off (or dies on its own).
Power brakes would still work with the engine off and car in gear, since the engine is being turned by the wheels and is producing vacuum.
In any modern Automatic I've driven, with the transmission in any position other than park, the key will only go back one click, enough to shut off the engine, but not lock the steering wheel. Manuals sometimes / frequently require some additional movement to move the key back more than one position.
In modern electronic automatics when you kill the ignition, it will kill power to the controls for the transmission. The shift solenoids will release, transmission will go to neutral, engine will coast to a stop, and you will have no assist. In an unintended acceleration case, with Wide Open Throttle there is minimal vacuum anyways, and you lose stored vacuum assist after a couple pumps, which is part of what makes it worse. With electronic throttle, killing the ignition may or may not return the throttle to idle, that will be left as an exercise for the reader.
In my old car with a Chrysler 31TH Hydraulic transmission, turning off the ignition with the car rolling in gear rolling would keep the engine turning. Thus power brakes and power steering kept working. Given it was completely hydraulic controls (other than the lock up torque converter), if you floored the accelerator it would actually downshift. Once you're done fooling around, one click back to RUN and you're ready to drive off, since the engine is still spinning, no restart needed. Hydraulic power for the controls is fed off the input shaft, so once the car stopped (or close enough to stopping with torque converter losses), the engine would stop turning, hydraulic pump would stop turning, gears would release and default to neutral, and thus you can't push start an automatic.
should have a kill switch that mechanically cuts off the power. Industrial machines are required to have those, so why should land missiles mostly operated by amateurs be exempt?
I'm a fan of emergency kill switches, but only if it's a mushroom e-stop, or pull cable like Industrial machines
How about the ability to turn to "off" to stop an engine affected by a stuck accelerator? Until the start button has a toggle or push button next to it to stop the engine, I don't want one anywhere near my car. And, when I say a button to stop the car, I mean a real kill switch that will ground out the ignition coil(s) or shut off the fuel pump or something similar, or for a diesel shut a fuel solenoid so the engine WILL die.
If I lose power steering or braking I just have to steer or brake harder - ok, it sucks, but if you can't do that you shouldn't be driving. But then, I'm a firm believer that somewhere around 30% of the people on the road should have their licenses taken because they're either physically or mentally unfit to be in control of a vehicle.
One of the things I hate since ATX power supplies came out is the lollygag force power off (and moreso disappearance of "Reset" buttons). Press and hold 1...2...3...4...5...OFF. The only thing worse is being in an out of control car having to do the same sequence. At least with a stuck accelerator you should be able to shift to neutral or de-clutch. Not only do modern cars have rev limiters to keep from overrevving the engine, many times if the car is in neutral or park it will limit revs to something like 3-4k, not the actual redline.
Just don't spend too much time talking about old systems.
Back in my day, we had to program in Machine code.
....the 'many eyes' phenomenon,....
And nobody reviews the source code. People download, use the library/code or whatever and be on their merry way.
This "you can't get anything bad through because the source is freely available" has proven to be horseshit.
Some people are under the assumption if you release something open source, you will get hundreds of volunteers lining up to work on it. And when they do, they will work on EVERYTHING. Truth is unless your project is "sexy" it's hard to get developers. Look at Linux kernel, a lot of the development is done by paid developers (not a lot sexy about the kernel). Look at where projects spend their focus: Firefox reinventing the UI again, Compiz Wobbly windows, usually any application that can be skinned, has 400 skins for every useful plugin. Meanwhile things like performance, or user documentation gets neglected.
Don't get me wrong, I think there's benefits to Open Soruce development models, I just don't think open sourcing something means hundreds of people are looking at it.
Some don't even seem to read the headline.