Apr
7
Toyota and Mitsubishi lose weight
April 7, 2008 |
One of the critical factors in the pure nuts and bolts of fuel consumption is of course weight. How heavy your vehicle rests on its tires obviously directly affects the power required to get it rolling and pull it up hills. This fundamental relationship has been at the heart of car design for a long time, as car manufacturers who seek to make ever faster production models have traditionally gone for ever-lighter body shells and components.
Now, not in the pursuit of speed, Toyota and Mitsubishi are both seeking to lighten their vehicles to gain an edge - this time in the field of mpg. Rising fuel prices in particular have brought the reality of an ‘average’ cars miles per gallon home to most drivers. The unpleasant truth being that even cars which manufacturers used to claim were ‘economical’ are often true gas guzzlers - economical simply in relation to the true 10mpg cars of this world. Europeans have been no strangers to high fuel prices for many years. Here fuel economy has been a selling point for vehicles that manufacturers have taken note of and it is commonly used as an advertising punchline - especially for smaller cars. Now these two traditionally high-tech manufacturers are aiming to raise the bar for fuel consumption.
Increasingly it looks like the big companies with the R+D budgets to match will be turning to ever-more space age technology to get the weight down in their cars. Carbon fibre has been used in small quantities in car manufacture for years, but could it be something more? Well, unlikely given its price at the moment - but who has ever been able to accurately predict what we will be driving in 10, 20, 50 years?
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