Mumbai, October 9: Cashing in on the growing fad for green vehicles, Mahindra & Mahindra plans to launch its fuel-efficient SUVs in the United States by early 2009.

“We are planning to launch our commercial vehicles in the United States but we are not ready yet to share the exact date of launch,” Mahindra Group Vice-Chairman Anand Mahindra said in Mumbai.

The Mahindra diesel SUVs have already cleared the tests and fulfilled the stringent emission norms in the US, he said, adding the announcement of the launch would be made shortly.

M&M already sells tractors in the US.

To a question if people there prefer smaller vehicles, Mahindra said Americans are not against large vehicles but are increasingly averse to fuel guzzlers that are not eco-friendly.

“They want fuel efficiency so that they can be guilt-free” of not polluting the environment, Mahindra said.

He said the company was also gearing up to introduce vehicles that could run on bio-diesel, diesel-electric hybrids and other green vehicles.

“We are ready to launch bio-diesel vehicles in India,” he said, adding, “whenever the government gears itself to make available bio-diesel, we will be ready with our vehicles.”

Mahindra said that it is not true to say that diesel vehicles cause pollution but it is the quality of fuel used that is critical.

Delivering fuel to the fire was every early engine designer’s worst headache. In the 1890s, Rudolf Diesel proved the merits of his engine during four years of research. But it was Robert Bosch who made diesels practical by developing the first fuel-injection system, a fifteen-year effort.

On the gasoline side, when Henry Ford was anxious to get an experimental engine running on Christmas Eve in 1893, he assigned his wife carburetion duty. While Henry whirled the flywheel, Clara dripped gas into the intake pipe.

Their collaboration worked: Ford’s single-cylinder engine shot flames from its exhaust and shook the kitchen sink it was clamped to until Henry signaled Clara to cease fuel delivery.

After more than a century of these headaches, an ideal means of getting fuel to the fire is finally gaining production applications. Direct injection-squirting pressurized fuel straight into each cylinder-is the key to keeping internal-combustion engines relevant in the future.

For enabling a major step forward in gas and diesel engine power, efficiency, and cleanliness, direct fuel injection is AUTOMOBILE MAGAZINE’s 2009 Technology of the Year.

During World War II, direct injection enabled German fighters powered by Daimler-Benz V-12s to fly inverted, a maneuver that left their British Spitfire rivals’ carbureted Rolls-Royce engines sputtering. After peace resumed, Mercedes-Benz brought direct injection down to earth, making the 300SL and SLR sports cars the scourge of both street and track.

Gasoline direct injection began trickling into the United States five years ago on BMW V-12s and Isuzu V-6s. While injecting fuel into the combustion chamber requires approximately fifty times the pressure used with port injection and additional electronic control sophistication, significant benefits are delivered. Since no fuel is deposited on intake-port walls, the air/fuel mixture can be more precisely maintained, benefitting both mileage and emissions.

In addition, the cooling effect of gasoline droplets changing to vapor inside the combustion chamber facilitates a higher compression ratio without incurring detonation. Squeezing the mixture harder during compression and allowing it to expand longer on the power stroke wrings additional power out of every ounce of gasoline.

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Americans’ affection for monstrous SUVs might be withering in the face of rising gas prices, but no one’s really sure whether they’ll readily accept the little Smart ForTwo as a remedy for fuel-pump woes.

More than 750,000 ForTwo units have been sold throughout Europe over the past eight years, DaimlerChrysler says. The car is also available in Canada.

The ForTwo isn’t a hybrid, nor is it actually “smart” in the high-tech sense–i.e., it doesn’t contain any fancy chips that let it talk or fly or automatically know where its driver wants to go–but the pod-shaped car certainly gets impressive gas mileage, averaging 46.3 miles per gallon in cities and 70.6 on the highway, according to DaimlerChrysler.

And the Smart ForTwo is tiny; the two-seater (hence the name–there’s also a Smart ForFour in Europe) is less than nine feet long, slightly less than five feet wide, and a smidgen over five feet tall. Compare that with the Mini Cooper, the vehicle most Americans think of when “subcompact car” is mentioned. The Mini is about three feet longer and six inches wider, not to mention more than 900 pounds heavier.

But like any car, the ForTwo has its drawbacks. With a top speed of 84 miles per hour, the vehicle will leave speed enthusiasts unimpressed. And it may prove impossible for the ForTwo to convince American consumers that anything that small doesn’t automatically equal foreign. After all, even Hollywood has contributed to a thoroughly Euro image for the car: Tom Hanks rode in one through the streets of Paris in the film adaptation of “The Da Vinci Code,” as did Steve Martin in this year’s remake of “The Pink Panther.”

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The nephew of singer and actress Jennifer Hudson was found dead in the back of an SUV on Monday. Hudson’s mother and brother were found shot to death 3 days earlier. (Oct. 27)

Source: youtube

An online contest to promote Chevy trucks and the TV show “The Apprentice” has instead been used by environmentalists to condemn General Motors for building vehicles they believe contribute to global warming.

Last month, General Motors launched a contest to see which member of the public could craft the best commercial for the Chevy Tahoe, a sports utility vehicle. At ChevyApprentice.com, visitors could choose from a range of soundtracks and video clips of the Tahoe traveling through different terrains. They also had the option of writing their own text to accompany the video and music.
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Video: Chevy gets trashed in commercial contest

Chevrolet let users make ads for the Chevy Tahoe, but a couple slipped by depicting SUV as a gas-guzzling machine.

One of the videos circulating around the Web featured shots of the Tahoe zooming through snow, mountains and desert. Over the video appeared the words: “Global warming isn’t a pretty SUV ad. It’s a frightening reality.”

Another commercial entry read: “Temperatures are rising. The polar ice caps are melting. Global warming is happening now. What will you tell your kids that you drove?”

Article source: Cnet news