probably not, since that would trigger a fault code.
There are easy ways around that. You could physically remove the sensor from whatever it connects to in the steering in such a way that it is still sending a signal, but because it has been disconnected the signal doesn’t change. From a more electronic standpoint, you would just need to find out what kind of signal the sensor sends to the computer (voltage/resistance) and send a continuous signal within the acceptable range.
The problem you have with messing with the system in a live driven car is that the sensors are there for legitimate purposes. And the car will still use them for these purposes. If the car really was watching the steering angles, and deciding that the car was on a dyno, and not the road, you would need to continue to tell the car the steering was at dead ahead. This might be more than a little troublesome if the sensor for steering angle is part of the electric steering power assist system. Even more so as many of these cars have automatic parking capability based upon access to the electric power assisted steering. The anti-skid system will also have access to steering angles. So here too you would be messing with safety critical systems. It is very unlikely there is a simple hack to engage the disable mode.
Would the computer need to be reprogrammed to run in EPA mode then? In some of the threads about the issue, people have said that if VW’s fix is to change the programming, people will go get it reprogrammed to disable it.
I’m not familiar with what that type of programming entails. Could the custom shops who do the reprogramming enable the EPA mode? Or would they need access to the original source code or something?
VW didn’t equip many of the cars in question with urea injectors. Competitors were always curious how they got their small diesel engines to pass without them.
From:
“VW has been the sales leader in this arena and I suspect many other manufacturers have been quietly wondering how the f*$k they have been able to do this. The answer - in a nutshell is cheating. They never would have been able to sell these cars with the 40+ mpg ratings, without SCR aftertreatment - at affordable prices - without cheating.”
Wired has an article speculating on the fix VW will have to provide. Either make the affected cars always run in EPA pass mode, which will cost the owners fuel economy and performance, or add a urea injector to cars that were never originally designed to have one, stealing trunk space and adding dozens of new expensive parts.
If you were to get the fix applied to your VW and then disabled it you would be in the same situation that VW is in now. Depending on your location you may be in violation of municipal, state and federal laws.
If someone wanted to flaunt the law and go back to the old version all they would need to do is save the old code somewhere and then reload it. Cars don’t have much security (or any security) built into them to stop people from doing that. No need to rewrite code.
But if some custom programmer shop wanted to try out EPA mode now and drive it around, could they do it? Could they take the compiled code or whatever and set EPAmode=True and then drive the car? Or is the programming code in a car not really available to be tweaked like that.
We have a lot of people saying that EPA mode would make the car drive poorly. It would be interesting if people could actually drive the car around like that now and see what the performance is really like.
Used to be, but no longer. I can’t speak for VWs, but I know for a fact that Fords have a counter that is stepped each time the PCM is flashed. Ford keeps a database with their number of the same counter. If you have the PCM flashed at a dealer to fix a problem, the car’s counter as well as Ford’s central counter is stepped. Flash it yourself and your car has a higher number than Ford does.
Ford used this because it turned out you could get more power out of Ford V8s if you leaned the air/fuel mixture. Unfortunately a leaner mixture also produces more heat. The heat expanded the piston rings until they jammed in the cylinders and hilarity ensued (think massive engine damage). Hot rodders flashed the stock calibration back and claimed warranty for their blown engines. Claims were denied as Ford could prove the PCM had been reflashed.
What amazes me is that VW said they were sorry and it would never happen again. ( I guess they will be more careful next time and not get caught)
I’m, also, surprised that their CEO resigned, although, he did use the Sgt. Schultz defense
( I know nothing, I see nothing)
There must have been no way they could lie their way out of it.
Of course, all the other car makers say that they would never do such a thing. Yeah, and politicians care about us and water’s wet.
yep, PCM “tunes” are popular in the Mustang community, and are becoming incredibly popular due for the Focus and Fiesta STs. Gives them a hedge against idiots who blow up their engines, then flash back and try to say “d00d, I dunno what happened.” especially since leaning out a turbocharged engine can kill it quickly.
I found this recent article:
Here’s how much power Volkswagen’s cheating engines could lose without trick software
It lost about 2hp at normal driving and about 15 hp at low speeds. They say the major effect is a much less peppy feeling car at lower speeds.
We now hear in the UK that VW owners will not be required to have their cars modified.
Any speculation as to why the UK gov’t would NOT Require the owners to literally ‘clean up their acts’?
The UK can’t be that blase (no funny letters, sorry) about their air quality.
Or are there too few cars affected to justify not spending the money requuired to track compliance?
dup post -nm
Are you sure about this?
I always thought the reverse was true - I went and poked around a little, and the cites I found were rather mixed on the matter -
Some say 25,000 km service interval is fine (vs 15,000 for a similar petrol) others said intervals were the same, still others claimed shorter…
You need to look also at the oil capacity of the engines. A 7.3l Ford/Navistar DI diesel requires 14.5 quarts of oil per change vs. 5 quarts for 7.5l (460ci) spark ignition engine that is supplied in similar trucks. The high oil capacity is specifically intended to extend the oil change intervals to those similar to gasoline engines.
Diesels do have much lower fuel consumption at fractional load conditions, due mostly to greatly reduced pumping losses, but also due to higher thermal efficiency as reflected by lower exhaust temperatures. Because passenger cars cruise at perhaps 1/3-1/2 of available power, this can result in greatly improved economy. Mitigating the poor throttled economy of SI engines is the driving factor behind hybrid vehicle development.
It’s even less than that. I few years ago I saw a Ford Explorer on a chassis dynamometer cruising at 70 MPH while using only about 40 hp (the engine would have been rated for about 200 hp). Smaller sedans will have smaller engines, but they’ll also be more aerodynamic, so I wouldn’t expect cruise power (expressed as a fraction of rated power) to vary too much.
Pumping loss at part throttle is responsible for most of the gain, while the rest is higher compression ratios resulting in the increase in thermal efficiency you mention. Asmall bit may also be due to the lower piston speeds in spite of the generally longer strokes.
The 6.0 and 7.3 power strokes also hold more oil because they use engine oil to operate the fuel injectors. So some of the engines oil capacity is tied up in the high pressure circuit.