When products are tested for reliability, they are subjected to high teperature, cold temperature, vibration and all kinds of stress in order to try to predict the outcome of life cycle on the car. But the life cycle on a car’s realistic value cannot be possibly predicted because there are too many confounding factors at hand. Some of these confounding factors are the drunk driver or the idiot at the grocery store who slams into your car and never owns up to it. But probably the worst confounding factor is the crap economy right now where financial weapons of mass destruction are wrecking our country. These weapons of financial destruction happened when certain political powers promised homes for everybody for people who could’t afford them. This socialism has failed during FDR’s time as well as Truman’s and will be failing us now as our country tries to spend itself into oblivion and produce alternative energy vehicles.

Mandating automakers to just do it is stupid. Don’t you think that automakers would automatically begin production on such systems if they could see profitability? Do you think that their marketing studies shows that most people want a vehicle that will haul all their junk when they want to go visit grandpa and grandma? Do you think that they want something that won’t fall apart when they’re trying to haul some construction materials to remodel a room on the house or a back yard project for those who still do a little of their own farming?
These little cars offer little for the person that wants to go camping with the family.

I have personally been around my father’s work with alternative fuel engines. I am experienced with natural gas and propane as well as E85. My original concern about alternative fuels have to do with the concept of trying to run an engine on so many different fuels. Optimization with so many different fuels becomes nearly impossible. Yes, they will work somewhat but to optimize the engine performance for such an illogical design is impractical and unreasonable.

As far as I am concerned, electric powered vehicles might be OK on a golf course but I’d have to see actual case histories to believe that they could be practical for most individuals.

A multi fuel engine was developed years ago on a turbine type engine like used for jet engines. It was scrapped because of innefficiency. Yes, it used many different kinds of fuels but when compared to a regular engine it was just plain inefficient.

Light weight, higly efficient, vehicles sound great on paper but when you take into consideration, the reliability, you can definitely have some problems.

Let me cite another example for all the people who are loving the high efficiency energy star rated appliances such as freezers and refrigerators. Do you know what the life cycle on these new items are? Ask most repairmen and they’ll tell you about 10 years. Do you know what the life cycle on the older appliances was ? 20-30 years. I know because I have an old Ammana freezer from the mid 70s that’s still running. I’m not saying I won’t buy a new freezer. But I will be very concerned about the life cycle expectancy on that new purchase. One of the things that has happened with the computer age is the minimizing of design margins so that the lifecycle becomes vastly shortened on many products. The Ford Taurus made in the mid 90s is an excellent example. Somehow, design margins were so minimized that cylinder heads on those vehicles were habitually failing. Look at the auction sites and you’ll never see so many Ford Taurus as there was then during the mid 90s. My friend bought a Taurus. My parents bought a Taurus. They were all a piece of crap. They may have been proven in the engineering room and maybe some even limited testing but they failed the actual usage on the road. Breaches in the head gasket caused engine failures of massive proportions and expense to the consumer.