Gen V News
07-05-2012, 04:53 PM
#1
Drifting
Thread Starter
Member Since: Feb 2002
Location: Chapel Hill NC
Posts: 1,260
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Gen V News
"The announcement of Stephens' retirement comes as talk in Detroit said GM upper management scuttled an investment in the company's next-generation small-block V8 and a fully developed "premium" V8 dubbed the UV8 remains on the shelf, perhaps never to be salvaged. The fifth-generation small-block will be upgraded with direct fuel injection, as GM confirmed late in 2010, but a high-tech valvetrain innovation long believed to be penned into the Gen V program reputedly was rejected as a bad investment as rigorous new Corporate Average Fuel Economy standards take hold beginning in 2016 and engine downsizing is rampant in the industry."
IMHO, the government appointed idoit in charge of GM is back at it again.
IMHO, the government appointed idoit in charge of GM is back at it again.
07-05-2012, 05:05 PM
#2
The Consigliere
Member Since: May 2006
Location: 2023 Z06 & 2010 ZR1
Posts: 22,288
Received 5,475 Likes
on
2,278 Posts
Not sure what this means on the Gen V. Doesn't seem real clear other than possibley hinting at variable valve timing getting axed. Tho, it wouldn't seem that would be a huge investment.
The shelving of the hi tech V8 was well known months ago.
I do worry very much about Corvette in the next few years under CAFE. It ramps up hard.
The shelving of the hi tech V8 was well known months ago.
I do worry very much about Corvette in the next few years under CAFE. It ramps up hard.
Last edited by OnPoint; 07-05-2012 at 05:08 PM.
07-05-2012, 06:33 PM
#3
Race Director
I don't think it's VVT. GM (and other car companies) have been working on electronic solenoid valvetrains. They have great promise, but are very costly to implement and require significant electrical system upgrades, which would effectively require a re-design of peripheral components. Cost not worth the benefit at this time.
07-05-2012, 06:38 PM
#4
The Consigliere
Member Since: May 2006
Location: 2023 Z06 & 2010 ZR1
Posts: 22,288
Received 5,475 Likes
on
2,278 Posts
That could be it.
07-06-2012, 12:24 AM
#6
The Consigliere
Member Since: May 2006
Location: 2023 Z06 & 2010 ZR1
Posts: 22,288
Received 5,475 Likes
on
2,278 Posts
07-06-2012, 09:23 AM
#7
Team Owner
I don't think it's VVT. GM (and other car companies) have been working on electronic solenoid valvetrains. They have great promise, but are very costly to implement and require significant electrical system upgrades, which would effectively require a re-design of peripheral components. Cost not worth the benefit at this time.
An electronic valve train would be well worth the $$$. A fully electronic valve train would be a game changer. The parasitic losses would drop significantly. The entire top half of the engine goes away. No timing chains to snap. You get the benefit of the VVT/DOHC config without all of the associated parts dragging on the engine, none of the extra weight and the packaging as good as, if not better than, an OHV motor.
The new CAFE requirements would be a slam dunk and then some.
07-06-2012, 10:08 AM
#8
Le Mans Master
Member Since: Jul 2000
Location: North Dallas 40 TX
Posts: 6,476
Received 4,387 Likes
on
2,074 Posts
Everyone is making Hybrids. They have the higher voltage electrical systems that would be needed, so the peripheral components should have already been designed.
An electronic valve train would be well worth the $$$. A fully electronic valve train would be a game changer. The parasitic losses would drop significantly. The entire top half of the engine goes away. No timing chains to snap. You get the benefit of the VVT/DOHC config without all of the associated parts dragging on the engine, none of the extra weight and the packaging as good as, if not better than, an OHV motor.
The new CAFE requirements would be a slam dunk and then some.
An electronic valve train would be well worth the $$$. A fully electronic valve train would be a game changer. The parasitic losses would drop significantly. The entire top half of the engine goes away. No timing chains to snap. You get the benefit of the VVT/DOHC config without all of the associated parts dragging on the engine, none of the extra weight and the packaging as good as, if not better than, an OHV motor.
The new CAFE requirements would be a slam dunk and then some.
If an engine design life is now 240,000 miles then a actuators would MTBF of ~600 million cycles. Are we there yet?
With power of magnets necessary to open the valves in a controlled fashion in less than 16 thousandths of a second, you may have electromagnetic fields that have to be damped to avoid interence with all the electronics in a car in a relatively small space.
It is a formidible engineering challenge.
07-06-2012, 10:38 AM
#10
Team Owner
If it were easy, cheap, and reliable and made the CAFE standards a slam dunk it would already be done.
If an engine design life is now 240,000 miles then a actuators would MTBF of ~600 million cycles. Are we there yet?
With power of magnets necessary to open the valves in a controlled fashion in less than 16 thousandths of a second, you may have electromagnetic fields that have to be damped to avoid interence with all the electronics in a car in a relatively small space.
It is a formidible engineering challenge.
If an engine design life is now 240,000 miles then a actuators would MTBF of ~600 million cycles. Are we there yet?
With power of magnets necessary to open the valves in a controlled fashion in less than 16 thousandths of a second, you may have electromagnetic fields that have to be damped to avoid interence with all the electronics in a car in a relatively small space.
It is a formidible engineering challenge.
07-06-2012, 11:38 AM
#12
Le Mans Master
So this goes back to January of this year. Good find. The next paragraph may soothe some worry:
"If true, the move could signal GM plans for a future in which V8s will be offered only for pickup trucks and the Chevrolet Corvette, both of which have seen relatively drastic declines in demand in recent years."
So they're not planning to drop the V8 completely, just drop it from... what? Holdens and Camaros, I suppose. But Camaro can't survive against Mustang without a V8... We presume Mustang is under similar pressure; perhaps the V8 Mustang will go upmarket to survive. Camaro can't follow without killing Corvette. Fun times. Remember the Code 130R?
What's weird about this is that it's atypical for GM. Several times in the past GM made big investments in pickup trucks (and their full-size SUV brothers), improving the efficiency (and market competitiveness) of their most profitable and highest-volume product.
Now they're going to hold back on V8s? Why?
Does the high-tech thing not improve efficiency?
It almost certainly makes the V8 more expensive, but how could that not pay for itself avoiding CAFE problems... unless they're just going to limit the number of V8 cars so that it's cheaper to take the CAFE hit than make the investment.
Maybe it's just a question of timing. Maybe the actual decision happened two years ago and we're just now hearing about it. Maybe it'll be greenlit again when trucks are up against the wall. Maybe GM is holding on to see if the government blinks.
.Jinx
"If true, the move could signal GM plans for a future in which V8s will be offered only for pickup trucks and the Chevrolet Corvette, both of which have seen relatively drastic declines in demand in recent years."
So they're not planning to drop the V8 completely, just drop it from... what? Holdens and Camaros, I suppose. But Camaro can't survive against Mustang without a V8... We presume Mustang is under similar pressure; perhaps the V8 Mustang will go upmarket to survive. Camaro can't follow without killing Corvette. Fun times. Remember the Code 130R?
What's weird about this is that it's atypical for GM. Several times in the past GM made big investments in pickup trucks (and their full-size SUV brothers), improving the efficiency (and market competitiveness) of their most profitable and highest-volume product.
Now they're going to hold back on V8s? Why?
Does the high-tech thing not improve efficiency?
It almost certainly makes the V8 more expensive, but how could that not pay for itself avoiding CAFE problems... unless they're just going to limit the number of V8 cars so that it's cheaper to take the CAFE hit than make the investment.
Maybe it's just a question of timing. Maybe the actual decision happened two years ago and we're just now hearing about it. Maybe it'll be greenlit again when trucks are up against the wall. Maybe GM is holding on to see if the government blinks.
.Jinx
07-06-2012, 11:47 AM
#13
Melting Slicks
So this goes back to January of this year. Good find. The next paragraph may soothe some worry:
"If true, the move could signal GM plans for a future in which V8s will be offered only for pickup trucks and the Chevrolet Corvette, both of which have seen relatively drastic declines in demand in recent years."
So they're not planning to drop the V8 completely, just drop it from... what? Holdens and Camaros, I suppose. But Camaro can't survive against Mustang without a V8... We presume Mustang is under similar pressure; perhaps the V8 Mustang will go upmarket to survive. Camaro can't follow without killing Corvette. Fun times. Remember the Code 130R?
What's weird about this is that it's atypical for GM. Several times in the past GM made big investments in pickup trucks (and their full-size SUV brothers), improving the efficiency (and market competitiveness) of their most profitable and highest-volume product.
Now they're going to hold back on V8s? Why?
Does the high-tech thing not improve efficiency?
It almost certainly makes the V8 more expensive, but how could that not pay for itself avoiding CAFE problems... unless they're just going to limit the number of V8 cars so that it's cheaper to take the CAFE hit than make the investment.
Maybe it's just a question of timing. Maybe the actual decision happened two years ago and we're just now hearing about it. Maybe it'll be greenlit again when trucks are up against the wall. Maybe GM is holding on to see if the government blinks.
.Jinx
"If true, the move could signal GM plans for a future in which V8s will be offered only for pickup trucks and the Chevrolet Corvette, both of which have seen relatively drastic declines in demand in recent years."
So they're not planning to drop the V8 completely, just drop it from... what? Holdens and Camaros, I suppose. But Camaro can't survive against Mustang without a V8... We presume Mustang is under similar pressure; perhaps the V8 Mustang will go upmarket to survive. Camaro can't follow without killing Corvette. Fun times. Remember the Code 130R?
What's weird about this is that it's atypical for GM. Several times in the past GM made big investments in pickup trucks (and their full-size SUV brothers), improving the efficiency (and market competitiveness) of their most profitable and highest-volume product.
Now they're going to hold back on V8s? Why?
Does the high-tech thing not improve efficiency?
It almost certainly makes the V8 more expensive, but how could that not pay for itself avoiding CAFE problems... unless they're just going to limit the number of V8 cars so that it's cheaper to take the CAFE hit than make the investment.
Maybe it's just a question of timing. Maybe the actual decision happened two years ago and we're just now hearing about it. Maybe it'll be greenlit again when trucks are up against the wall. Maybe GM is holding on to see if the government blinks.
.Jinx
Last edited by DREAMERAK; 07-06-2012 at 11:51 AM.
But this is the right place for it!
07-06-2012, 12:10 PM
#15
"The announcement of Stephens' retirement comes as talk in Detroit said GM upper management scuttled an investment in the company's next-generation small-block V8 and a fully developed "premium" V8 dubbed the UV8 remains on the shelf, perhaps never to be salvaged. The fifth-generation small-block will be upgraded with direct fuel injection, as GM confirmed late in 2010, but a high-tech valvetrain innovation long believed to be penned into the Gen V program reputedly was rejected as a bad investment as rigorous new Corporate Average Fuel Economy standards take hold beginning in 2016 and engine downsizing is rampant in the industry."
IMHO, the government appointed idoit in charge of GM is back at it again.
IMHO, the government appointed idoit in charge of GM is back at it again.
Maybe he was standing in the way of an even better idea for Gen V. Maybe it was just his time to retire.
Based on the actual article, I see this Stevens guy oversaw development of the XV16 that totally disappeared soon after it was introduced in 2003.
IMHO, it sounds like he was yet another GM executive idiot who was using bad judgement, wasting a lot of money and time on a "flight-of-fancy", 700lb, 1000hp, naturally aspirated turd that would never see the light of day while GM was circling down the economic toilet. Don't forget that GM posted a $10+ billion dollar loss in 2005.
07-06-2012, 12:21 PM
#16
Le Mans Master
The XV16 was a show-car engine. They bolted two Chevy smallblock V8s together to stuff in a show car and then wrote a press release about how hard that was.
Why you gotta be so harsh?
Why you gotta be so harsh?
07-06-2012, 12:40 PM
#17
Not harsh, just truthful.
I get tired of people making it sound like GM execs were so great before the bankruptcy and that since then, they are just a bunch of government-appointed idiots.
I get tired of people making it sound like GM execs were so great before the bankruptcy and that since then, they are just a bunch of government-appointed idiots.
07-06-2012, 01:06 PM
#18
Le Mans Master
07-06-2012, 01:13 PM
#19
http://www.motortrend.com/future/con...n/viewall.html
07-06-2012, 01:17 PM
#20
Melting Slicks
Maybe, sounds like and IMHO don't = the truth. Also it's really helpful to know what your talking about when making a post, especially if your trashing a persons reputation, i.e. the V16 show car ect.