Fiat/Chrysler: We Didn't Cheat On Diesels, But Will Recall Them And Make Cleaner

Fiat Chrysler Automobiles said it planned to do a voluntary recalibration to all its new diesels to make them cleaner in real-word conditions.

The Volkswagen cheating revelations triggered an emissions quest all over the automotive industry. Global regulators have initiated inquiries to hunt over polluting cars, while the automakers have also begun to take a thorough look into their own back yard. Following the Volkswagen scandal, Fiat Chrysler made an internal review of its cars and decided that it needs to take some action to update their diesel technology to make it cleaner.

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PUGPROUD - 2/3/2016 1:59:49 PM

+2 Boost

Something smells fishy here. FCA didn't cheat, its cash poor and up to its ears in debt but it will voluntarily take on extra expense to recalibrate. There must be more to it than meets the eye.

MDarringer - 2/3/2016 8:09:25 PM

+1 Boost

Pretty simple really. It's potentially brilliant public relations.

They are saying "We didn't cheat, but we hear the real question: why are diesels dirtier in real-life situations? We will address the spirit of the law in addition to the letter."

If they can convince buyers of that, they have a shot at stealing the title of the "go to" company for mainstream diesels away from Volkswagen who shat all over themselves.

TomM - 2/4/2016 4:11:59 PM

+2 Boost

MDarringer - the problem with your scenario is that no car buyer is going to believe that is what they are doing.

This will be seen as a cover your ass situation. Remember - what diesels did FCA sell in the USA - certainly nothing that competed with the problem VWs. Virtually all of them are trucks - and only that VAN is really a FIAT product.

And as far as replacing VW for diesels - they don't have the PRODUCT in those areas - and do not even have the product in Europe to compete in those areas. ANd they are planning to stop producing mainstream cars for the USA (I assume the Fiat 500 is not mainstream here). So they have little to gain -

TheSteve - 2/3/2016 2:03:58 PM

+2 Boost

This is one example of a manufacturer that deliberately created vehicles that:
(1) Meet regulatory emissions during in-lab tests,
(2) Without technology that qualifies as a "cheat device", and yet
(3) Emits many times beyond-legal levels of emissions in normal use on the road (out of the lab).

I don't believe this is an isolated case. Nice of them to do this voluntarily, as I believe no law compelled them to do so. It's perfectly legal to produce 40x (or more) the legal in-lab limits while on the road.

mre30 - 2/3/2016 3:14:40 PM

+2 Boost

This is what VW should have done. They should have quietly migrated to the "ad-blue" technology starting with the model changeovers in 2011/12/13 then no one would have been the wiser. They could have brought themselves to be "near-compliant" and then if somebody complained they could have just did a software patch to fix it.

But no - they got greedy and arrogant and they got themselves screwed.

MorePower - 2/3/2016 3:44:38 PM

+2 Boost

Translation:

We met/meet current U.S. guidelines on emissions, but there is some software in a few retail units that we would like to erase . . . no reason