SuperTruck hauls goods, sips fuel

[Xist]

Originally Posted by Xist

Nope, but you are welcome anyway!

I went back and fixed my previous post. I was trying to not start a conversation about it.

[aerohead]

Originally Posted by jcp123

Being that I'm in trucking school...

...I love it. But the auto trans irks me.

The automatic may be the only way to get the mpg rating,as it takes the driver out of the equation.
Also,the automatic doesn't require a clutch or any of the supporting hardware which wear out,which 'could' save owners over the life of the truck.(An uncle owned a modest trucking company in Joplin,Missouri,and some drivers would beat the trans out of the semi,and abandon the rig,never to be seen again).
We have so much gridlock now in North Texas that OTR drivers would probably welcome the loss the of left pedal and right arm gymnastics;as many Porsche owners eventually did in Southern California.Ford gave up on Manuals for their pickups.School buses.Transit buses.
Also,many companies are doing active telemetry with their rigs by satellite link and auto trans set points are something that can be altered on the fly.

[aerohead]

Originally Posted by Xist

So, we do not have anything else to say about the truck? My first thought was exactly what Spacemanspiff wrote.

13.4 MPG.


12.2 MPG.
9.8% better.

Do the images appear squished to anyone else?

They seen okay to me.

[Xist]

Having driven a school bus, and avoiding automatic transmissions on all but one of my vehicles, I would not have wanted my esteemed colleagues to drive buses with manual transmissions. I personally kept the mechanics busy and I tried to know what I was doing!

[aerohead]

Originally Posted by darcane

Heavily modding the trailer seems like cheating to me. Unless the truck is always going to be paired to that trailer, you won't be getting that benefit.

I wonder what it gets for mileage with a conventional box trailer. That's far more "real world" in my book.

Also, how much cost is added to build a truck like this?

I can't address the 'pairing' issue,but active suspension ought to be in the future.
*The rig doesn't need ground clearance when she's on the highway.
*Frontal area is reduced,that's good.
*The center of gravity is lowered,reducing rollover tendency.
*Splash and spray will be severely reduced,a great safety advantage to all motorists operating near the rig in foul weather.
*If they're forced into a jack knife by Barbie and Ken,there'll be less tendency to go over a side rail on overpasses.
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I would expect a price premium (as we do today with hybrids),as this is all about business,but payments may stay similar,but with longer payouts.
With economies of scale,the rigs will be valued by the pound,just as today.
With industry-wide adoption,and rationalization of hardware,as soon as the cost of the original R&D and tooling is amortised,the costs (prices) of components will fall markedly.

[aerohead]

Originally Posted by elhigh

I was hoping you'd show up, Shepherd. I didn't think that 12.2 number was right for the Bullet.

Frankly any improvement on those fuel suckers is good, since they rack up more miles in a month than some cars do all year. Modest savings on big trucks means a huge reduction in fuel usage, period.

It's worth pointing out that the costs associated with modifying the Bullet are for MODIFYING. That's starting with a truck that was already built and then dropping more money into it. That cost is completely out of line with what it would take to build the truck more in line with aerodynamic and efficiency ideals on the assembly line, there are enormous economies of scale to be realized which aren't present in the Bullet.

$115M, really? Somebody got jobbed. Seriously, if we, the taxpayers, are paying for this research, $115M is pretty damned expensive considering a lot of the data already existed and a perfectly viable example had already been built by independent research and then posted on an open forum.

I look forward to seeing more about the Starship! Great things coming down the pike - literally.

Thanks, Shepherd.

It cost each man,woman,and child in the USA 36-cents to finance the govt. portion.

[jcp123]

Originally Posted by Xist

Having driven a school bus, and avoiding automatic transmissions on all but one of my vehicles, I would not have wanted my esteemed colleagues to drive buses with manual transmissions. I personally kept the mechanics busy and I tried to know what I was doing!

So, automatics are cheaper to repair?

Ok, I am biased. I am a manual fanboy to begin with, plus I am putting in a fair bit of effort at truck school to get better (I fake my double clutches, I go full float and get praised for it). But everything about automatics is expensive.

Local buses would eat up transmissions or clutches though. Long-haul trucks get shifted a few times, run on the freeway, then repeat. Less wear per mile.

My understanding is that truck companies tried automatics and are switching back because fuel costs didn't reach parity. Unless this one is much better, I see a lot of 10-speeds still being on the road for a long time.

[Shepherd777]

Originally Posted by jcp123

So, automatics are cheaper to repair?

Ok, I am biased. I am a manual fanboy to begin with, plus I am putting in a fair bit of effort at truck school to get better (I fake my double clutches, I go full float and get praised for it). But everything about automatics is expensive.

Most Class 8 trucks don't use fully automatic transmissions. But Allison just recently introduced an automatic transmission for them. But again, it's currently a very small, minuscule percentage.

The other non-manual transmissions are called Automated Manual Transmissions, or AMT's for short. AMT's are just an old 10, or 13, or 18 speed manual transmissions with robotic shifting and clutch actuation. Our new truck has an 18 speed Eaton AMT, and no clutch pedal.

[user removed]

Automated manual transmissions are the future, until they get efficiencies of other designs to be competitive with manuals. In a big rig, the minuscule amount of energy it takes to perform the hydraulic functions is far surpassed by the precision of operation, especially when combined with gps and predicted future operations based on knowledge of altitude and traffic conditions looking over the next hill and through the next intersection beyond our line of sight.

Freeing the operator from those predictable and redundant motions and thinking mean more attention can be focused on anticipating those things that need analysis beyond the capabilities of a reactive system (sitiational awareness), transitioning to proactive operation, with virtiual elimination of collisions.

[jcp123]

Ah, interesting. I figured they were regular ol torque converter automatics.