Start Stop Technology

Botus

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Stop/Start saves around 8% of fuel (and therefore pollution and saved costs).

The reduction in pollution was the aim as multiple vehicles stopped at traffic lights or other traffic blockages .

isn't it intriguing that now they can sell more cars (having inventing a new way to break them) your government has instructed every local authority to remove free flowing roundabouts and replace them with cleverly set up traffic lights that create so many more opportunities to use the start stop.

Of course we are told this "needless stopping" is combated with intelligent lights. What this really means is you can introduce far more congestion for 6 months whilst you place wires in the road, and then implement special opportunities to keep traffic waiting by creating a clam zone where all traffic stops allowing pedestrians free rein to take back the streets.

This has happened near me. Before the workman got involved they turned off the lights and put in a temporary roundabout for 6 weeks. The bad congestion vanished overnight and many locals doing a 30 min school run could do it inside 10 minutes (by removing just one terribly set up set of traffic lights). I can vouch the 200m que in every direction vanished and instead of building heavily from 15:30 until 19:00, there was nothing at all even during the 17:30 to 18:10 peak.

Then bob the builder put silly kerbs in all the wrong places, removed turning lanes and generally screwed it from a layout perspective. And then got busy wiring up the new lights where they fine tuned the light sequence and have quadrupled the previous bad congestion from the old lights.

Even at nights and weekends the school arrival / leaving time calm zone remains active. Creating mega congestion in 5 directions when before you could often navigate this on a bicycle without seeing a single car.

You are being managed... start stop won't resolve it. In fact tolerating it is part of the problem...
 

steveq

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a. Is there an anti-car policy in place widely? I think we know the answer.

b. Are we all suffering because of the lunatic fringe who persist in disregarding the fact that they are (loosely) in control of a lethal weapon? Same answer as above.

c. Would it all pale into insignificance if some school kid we know was seriously injured or worse due to point b above? I guess that answer trumps the lot.


The bad congestion vanished overnight and many locals doing a 30 min school run could do it inside 10 minutes (by removing just one terribly set up set of traffic lights).

P.S. -- why can't the locals just walk?
 

Blobcat

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Pretty much always have been for one thing or another.
Yes, as something gets popular rule makers come along and stop it...
 

S500 Pete

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It's more about pollution.
It's about pollution measures when testing to keep the official emissions low. Helps the manufacturers with the average consumption of their overall range and reduces the benefit in kind for the business owner.
 

Tony Dyson

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Stop/Start saves around 8% of fuel (and therefore pollution and saved costs).
The reduction in pollution was the aim as multiple vehicles stopped at traffic lights or other traffic blockages belching out exhaust fumes causes serious pollution 'blackspots'. Of course these are usually in urban areas which are densely populated.

Ignoring the moral duty to reduce pollution and just looking at the cost aspect alone, saving 8% is significant over the lifetime of the car.
If the 'lifetime' is 150,000 miles at an average of, say, 35 MPG, that would mean about 4,300 gallons of fuel (or 19,500 litres) is used.
If fuel costs £1.35 per litre that works out at over £26,000 for fuel costs for the life of the car.
8% of that is £2,100.
The car lifetime, mpg and fuel costs are, of course, subjective and unique to each individual.

I leave the Stop/Start switched on at all times. I find that traffic blockages are somehow less frustrating when the engine stops automatically.
One of my cars is automatic and it is a bit silly that it switches off when I can see that the traffic is starting to move off in a few seconds, but that is rare and I live with it.
The other car is manual and simply dipping the clutch ensures that the engine stays running in a similar situation.
I think 8% is very ambitious, especially when most of your driving is on major roads and/or motorways, figures I have seen are between 0.1 and 0.3 Gallons/Hour and that doesn't extrapolate to anything near 8% !
 

LostKiwi

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It depends on usage. Someone driving 95 miles on motorways with maybe a mile each end in light traffic will save near nothing (that was my daily commute for 5 years). Someone driving in central London in continuous stop start traffic will save more.
Personally I'd say 8% is a very high figure for the average motorist.
 

steveq

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It depends on usage. Someone driving 95 miles on motorways with maybe a mile each end in light traffic will save near nothing (that was my daily commute for 5 years). Someone driving in central London in continuous stop start traffic will save more.
Personally I'd say 8% is a very high figure for the average motorist.
I agree with what you say and 8% does seem high. However that is the figure I found in a number of articles on the internet.

Here is a sentence from Wikipedia (so it must be true):-
"For non-electric vehicles fuel economy gains from this technology are typically in the range of 3-10 percent, potentially as high as 12 percent. In the United States, idling wastes approximately 3.9 billion gallons of gasoline per year."

From the air pollution perspective, which is the real target for the technology, stop/start largely only occurs in urban environments. They are exactly the locations which are densely populated and where air pollution is at its worst.
 

400ixl

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Basically, the amount of fuel saved for the average person is low. The amount of toxic emissions saved will also be low, but anything is good. The chances of any mechanical issues occurring as a result of using it are extremely low.

So, if it doesn't annoy you to use it and you want the small benefits, then use it. If it annoys you and you don't care about the benefits then switch it off.

Its pretty simple and personal choice.
 

js190d

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The chances of any mechanical issues occurring as a result of using it are extremely low.

I would love to see the research that states that turning an engine off and on continually and then accelerating hard (which is what drivers do at traffic lights after the start up delay) will result in no additional engine wear over time. Ever heard of friction?

Manufacturers simply have no motivation in making a product that will be durable (and hence environmentally friendly) as that will hinder aftersales.
 
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400ixl

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No one has said it will result in NO additional wear, everything mechanical has wear, however if the mean time to fail is sufficient then that wear rate is not an issue. Have you every been involved in automotive research and testing? It doesn't sound like you have and have little idea of the levels of motivation they have to produce products where the MTTF is in the hundreds of thousands of miles.

There is no evidence that it is causing any marked additional failures over those that were happening before the technology was introduced. Starter motors, cam chain issues have been around since they were invented. You will on the whole be unlucky though to suffer either with modern cars.

There is huge amounts of internal research on exactly this. Not that they are going to show you their internal R&R and testing work as it is all their IP.

There equally is no evidence of any major issues either, which in a way speaks volumes to that research and testing being accurate.

If you don't have the evidence to the contrary and there is no evidence of it being a systemic problem then its just FUD to be continuously talking it up and scare mongering people.

Fine you don't like it. Switch it of if you want to but telling people who are most likely not mechanically minded that their car is likely to dismantle itself if they use it is just causing people unnecessary distress.
 

LostKiwi

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Of course we have the Indy's on here to tell us their real world experience. I seem to recall several of them indicating start stop in their experience/view was a bad thing and led to early timing chain failure on OM651s.

Manufacturers do a lot of testing that's true but even so they regularly get things wrong (r129 engine wiring harness, m271 cam sprockets, m272 balance shaft sprocket, rear subframes, fire opal red paint, NOx sensors, OM642 swirl flaps, actuators and oil seals, NOx emissions,the list just keeps going. It's often not until these cars are released into the real world that we the customer find what they missed.
 
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400ixl

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Yes, it does sometimes go wrong and those are well known systemic issues, which is exactly my point.

Every Indie I have spoken to directly has never stated there is a systemic issue around stop start. I have seen some anecdotal comments on here from some members, but all hear say, not from an indie or dealer.

I get that there are people who don't like it, and I agree its a bit of a solution to fix a regulatory problem, with fairly little real impact on the environment. But scaring people into thinking the must not use it else suffer eternal doom is just such an over reaction and scares some people unnecessarily.

Said my piece so will shut up, as I'm sure the next thread about Stop Start not working on their car will result in the same messaging of implosion of the combustion engine is nigh.
 

LostKiwi

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Yes, it does sometimes go wrong and those are well known systemic issues, which is exactly my point.

Every Indie I have spoken to directly has never stated there is a systemic issue around stop start. I have seen some anecdotal comments on here from some members, but all hear say, not from an indie or dealer.

I get that there are people who don't like it, and I agree its a bit of a solution to fix a regulatory problem, with fairly little real impact on the environment. But scaring people into thinking the must not use it else suffer eternal doom is just such an over reaction and scares some people unnecessarily.

Said my piece so will shut up, as I'm sure the next thread about Stop Start not working on their car will result in the same messaging of implosion of the combustion engine is nigh.

Halfway down the page:
https://forums.mercedesclub.org.uk/...p-start-kills-cam-chains.166395/#post-1591154
 

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