#DieselGate Scandal Ready To Expand Beyond Volkswagen And Become Industry Wide

AND YOU drive an American Car - the Camry is a car specially produced for the USA and is made in the USA. Width taxes in Japan prevent it from being sold there in any great numbers. THe Camry in Japan is an entirely different vehicle from the one made and sold in the USA.

As far as Opel - I would be greatly surprised to see them waiting this long regarding cheating software - and not admitting it - Before - the authorities caught them. The Diesel in the Mid Size Trucks already passed the emissions standards retest. And - real world tests are not the same as the lab test that they must pass - so My guess is that they are comparing apples to oranges.

From the articles I have read from multiple sources originating from the United States and Europe, it appears that numerous authorities have taken it upon themselves to perform their own emission tests on a number of manufacturers' vehicles, examining both diesel and gasoline (petrol) engines. Initial findings assert that "irregularities" were discovered, and they are NOT exclusive to Volkswagen vehicles. No details were provided with respect to affected brands, models, engine types (diesel and/or gasoline), or the specific nature of those alleged irregularities.

As details come out -- and I've said it before on 'Spies lots of times -- I'll be surprised if they report that VW/Audi Group (VAG) is the sole offender. It should come to us as no surprise. Does anyone remember the manufacturers' horsepower numbers reported in the 1970s, when they measured HP at the crank, with all belts removed, and engine oil replaced with an extremely thin lubricant, all to get the published HP numbers as high as possible?

GM ....GM... GM.... GM... GM.... BIGGEST DIESEL POLLUTING COMPANY IN THE UNIVERSAL!

VW IS SMALL FRIES...COMPARED TO GM DIESEL TRUCKS.

jameswisrik: Just as a data point, did you know the oil producing/refining industry generates MORE pollution than all the vehicles that consume their products? Neither do most environmentalists or legislators.

VW and Audi desperately wanting to share the blame with others.

car ... the difference with any other manufacturer that may have irregularities is that they are a normal occurence. VW, Audi actually admitted to Fraud in regards to trying to Cheat. There is a big difference.

carsnyc writes "VW and Audi desperately wanting to share the blame with others"

Nope. To the best of my knowledge Volkswagen Audi Group (VAG) has NOT made any assertions such as "well, everybody else is doing it." Discoveries of "irregularities" in other brands and models, with diesel and gas engines, have been made by various government agencies throughout the US and Europe. They're the ones who are saying, "hang on... looks like VAG isn't the only culprit."

This contradicts your assertion.

steve ... Last time I checked VW/Audi/porsche actually used a "Cheat Software" and admitted to actual Fraud. The difference is now every car manufacturer emmissions are being scrutinized as they should be for fluctuations in the tests. That is not saying that anyone else is Cheating, just that there are some irregularities due to enviroment and more strict policies.

BMWm4 wrote "...some irregularities due to enviroment and more strict policies..."

According to one recent article (on 'Spies and others), the UK government, in recently performing their own real-world emissions tests on diesels, identified Mercedes, GM, Mazda, and others as generating several times the legal limits of various NOx gasses. Tests are still being conducted by various governments and agencies in a number of countries, and they have indicated they have identified emission "irregularities" in other (non-VW) brands and models, but so far, they haven't provided any details on (a) who the offenders are, and (b) the nature of those irregularities. So it does NOT appear legitimate to dismiss these reports as "due to enviroment and more strict policies".

One more time. Is it the fact that the government tests don't correlate with real world experience, or are the manufacturers deliberately setting the vehicles up to cheat during the test? Huge difference. VW did the latter and are cheating. If others pass the test without cheating yet still emit above standards in the real world then the government tests set up to enforce regulations are in error and the government needs to change it's procedures. Huge difference. A real "journalist" which Schmitt claims to be, would make that distinction clear and seek to separate real scientific testing from bogus methods.

Vette71: Unless you propose that all other offenders ACCIDENTALLY got their vehicles to pass emissions tests and they ACCIDENTALLY exceed legal limits in real-world conditions, then your "huge difference" assertion leaks like a sieve.

Here's an analogy:

(1) Dr. A passed his medical exam by bringing in "cheat notes". In the real world, 80% of his patients die.

(2) Dr. B passed his medical exam by studying ONLY the material that will be covered during the exam. In the real world, 80% of his patients die. (Same real world conditions as Dr. A)

Some people assert that ONLY Dr. A is a problem because he brought in his cheat notes. They claim what we see with Dr. B is a "huge difference." Other people note that both guys focused their effort ONLY on passing the exam, and both do really badly in the real world. They feel *that's* the problem.

What each observer believes is entirely a matter of their perspective, but the outcome is identical in both cases. And that identical outcome makes the "huge difference" argument a moot point.


(NOTE: What I'm saying does not diminish VAG's guilt one iota.)

Steve. I spent a career in the scientific, medical, food safety and law enforcement measurement businesses selling products to multiple industries. When governments set performance standards they develop some methodology to test that those standards are met. The EPA develops specific laboratory tests that they publish so everyone knows what they have to perform to. In something as complex as a vehicle the operating environment and usage conditions add up to an infinite set of variables and outcomes. Therefore meeting the published Laboratory test becomes the measure of an acceptable product. Pass the test with an unadulterated (i.e. not VW) product and you are legit. If the EPA wants to insure that the standard is met in all conditions then they need to require a continuous measurement and recording/transmitting system be installed in every vehicle. The cost if that is likely prohibitive; a Corolla would sell for the price of an S class. Plus a manufacturer would have to design something that would be extremely expensive to make sure it never violated a standard in any way. As Air Malaysia 370 demonstrated, even the aviation industry and governments make trade offs in what they do.

Vette71:

The big issue at hand, and the big question most people are missing is this: Is the INTENTION of emissions regulations ONLY to pass a test in a lab, and do whatever you want outside of the lab? If yes, then great... every production car passed that test. If no, then we have a problem with a number of brands and vehicles, because they've been gaming the system through various means (VW included).

But many people don't address this big question at all. They adopt one of two perspectives:

The popular perspective: Current laws require that cars emit no more that specified levels of polluting gasses, ONLY when tested under laboratory conditions, and they must do so WITHOUT a "defeat device." The laws don't address how polluting you are in the real world, so that doesn't matter. With this perspective, VW's crime is they used an illegal defeat device, and NOT that they emit 40x legal levels in the real world. The solution here is to force VW to pass the lab tests without a defeat device, and let them continue emitting 40x legal levels in the real world. That way, they don't violate the current emission laws.

Another perspective, the less popular one, is this: The *intention* of the legislation was to reduce air pollution. The method we use to determine if a car is "clean" is absolutely useless, because we've seen it's 100% meaningless when you can pass a test ONLY in a lab -- regardless of how you do it -- while you pollute beyond legal limits as you operate under real world conditions outside of the lab.

When someone adopts the second, less popular perspective, they realize: (a) the current law and the lab tests are 100% useless (or nearly so) in reducing air pollution, (b) VW is not the only brand that exceeds legal emission limits under real world conditions, (c) it *appears* (but is not proven) that real world "beyond in-lab legal limit" emissions are widespread in the auto industry, (d) our current laws and enforcement do nothing (or very little) to actually reduce real world pollution levels. In laymen's terms, the current laws are ineffective at achieving the intended outcome -- reducing air pollution -- so they should be changed, as should the criteria for determining if a vehicle qualifies. This VW Dieselgate scandal has opened a big can of worms, for sure.


So Vette71, I'm not telling you you're wrong, or that your perspective is invalid. I just have a different perspective on the matter than you do, and I acknowledge mine is the less popular one!

Steve nothing happened because the EPA et.al. would have to admit that their way of doing things isn't working. Hard for a bureaucrat to do. The EPA is focused on lab testing for everything. Do some sample collection in the field, but test in the lab using defined methods.

Is it just me or did anyone really expect that VAG would be the only one challenged by the standard?

The automotive sector, like most others, is highly incestuous. If they struggled to get there from here and everyone else was breezing through, let's face it, they would have hired a few engineers with the relevant knowledge and/or they would have licensed relevant technology.

It's reasonable to expect every manufacturer were in the same boat from a performance standpoint.

How they passed the tests, well, that might be a different story. However, let's face it, it couldn't again be a true exception... Same hiring and licensing practices would prevail.

ATrain: You're not alone on this. Reports started surfacing over 6 years ago in which VW's published numbers didn't make sense, and were questioned by various organizations and companies. Private emissions testers also conducted their own real world tests of VW's 2.0 liter (and smaller diesels), noted much higher than legal levels in real world use, reported it to various authorities, but it appears nothing happened.

One issue that has to be addressed in the tests of all diesel manufacturers is how do the vehicles that use urea (ad blue) systems stack up versus VW? VW had licensed the Mercedes urea technology back around 2006 or so, but decided (or Piech ordered) not to use it. Too expensive. It is tricky complex technology. It took FCA a couple of years to get the VM diesel through the EPA, and even then the 2014 Jeep GC diesels had lots of problems with the systems. Jeep has been fixing them and the 2015s don't have the issues. There may even be differences in the urea performance from one manufacturer to another. Interesting VW started using the urea system on some 2015 small engines but kept the questionable software.

Vette71 wrote "...[VW] decided (or Piech ordered) not to use [urea injection in their diesels..."

*Some* of VW's diesel engines, especially the 1.6 liter ones, *some* of their 2.0 liter don't have urea injection. All their recent 3.0 liter diesels do. The 1.6 and 2.0 liter diesels have been implicated in Dieselgate, both with and without urea injection. Some 3.0 liter V6 diesels (all with urea injection) have been said to have emission "irregularities," though the nature of those irregularities has not been released, and VW asserts no defeat devices was used there.