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Green Design & Manufacturing

Toyota’s 'Trigger' for Innovation

“SAE is the ‘engineers’ foundation,’” reflected Seiya Nakao. “When I was a young engineer, we learned a lot from SAE, and personally this is a good opportunity for me to return something to it.”...

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Propulsion

New York Auto Show 2016: Toyota Prius Prime Amps up Plug-In Capabilities

In a slight reboot of its hybrid marketing approach, Toyota used the 2016 New York auto show unveil the 2017 Prius Prime, the plug-in hybrid version of the...

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News
Automotive

New York Auto Show 2016: Mazda Reveals Retractable-Hardtop MX-5 RF

Moving quickly to expand the appeal of the all-new, fourth-generation MX-5 Miata roadster introduced last year, Mazda revealed prior to the 2016 New York auto show a folding...

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News
Transportation

C'mon Jeep, Walk the Walk

I stopped counting the marketing presentations I’ve attended that included a slide with the alleged Henry Ford quote regarding the folly of soliciting customer opinion: “If I had asked people what they wanted,...

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News
Green Design & Manufacturing

Diesel Market Steady Despite VW Issues, Industry Group Says

The Volkswagen diesel emissions scandal has taken a number of passenger-vehicle diesels temporarily off the market. But "circumstances involving a single manufacturer do not define...

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Global Vehicles
Transportation

2017 Cadillac XT5 Brings Superior Dynamics to Luxo-Crossover Segment

Almost bizarrely for a car brand—and for a nation renowned for its predilection for large vehicles—GM's Cadillac is far behind its German premium-brand rivals in...

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News
Automotive

Cadillac XT5’s New Platform Cuts Weight—at less Cost

It now practically goes without saying that a newly introduced vehicle will tout a weight savings compared with not just the predecessor model, but also with competitor vehicles that...

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News
Automotive

Ferrari's CTO Details Patented Torque-Vectoring AWD with Rear-Wheel Steer

At first, reading the words “Ferrari” and “all-wheel drive” (AWD) seem as compatible as “oil” and “water,” but with the company's original FF entering...

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News
Transportation

Mr. Bond, Your DB11 Is Ready with Aston Martin's Latest Aero Advancements

The new Aston Martin DB11 2+2 unveiled at the Geneva Show introduced a number of new features in an evolution of the V12-powered DB9. Aston Martin speaks of a new...

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News
Automotive

Audi Claims First Production E-Boosting on 2017 SQ7

Audi is renowned for winning races and it announced another first at its Annual General Meeting at Ingolstadt, Germany, last week: The first application of an electric-powered compressor...

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News
Power

2017 Hyundai Ioniq Offers Three Electrified Powertrains

Hyundai unveiled the 2017 Ioniq at the Geneva Show, a car only available with an electrified powertrain. There will be three variants of the car, offering a conventional parallel...

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News
Software

PSA's E-TENSE Shows Design Cues for Future DS Models

According to the DS E-TENSE design team, the E-TENSE is not really a concept car because it offers a glimpse of design features that will be seen on future production models. One of the...

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News
Automotive

2017 Audi Q2 Design Inspired by American Football

Audi unveiled the 2017 Q2, its smallest SUV to date, at the 2016 Geneva Show. Riding on VW Group's MQB modular architecture and fitting into the company’s Q-series SUV models below the Q3,...

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News
Transportation

How Porsche Met Cooling Challenges on the New 4-Cylinder Boxster

New engines always bring fresh design and engineering challenges, but Porsche’s switch to a turbocharged flat 4-cylinder for the latest generation 718 Boxster created one...

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Product Briefs
Mechanical & Fluid Systems

Miniature Relief Valve

The Lee Company’s miniature, poppet-style pressure relief valve provides a faster opening rate and more stable flow than typical ball-style relief valves. Measuring 5.5 mm (0.2 in) in diameter and 19 mm (0.75 in)...

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Articles
Transportation

Agility Training for Cars

As personal mobility moves toward the perhaps inevitable singularity of automatically piloted pods able to totally isolate passengers from any sensation of the surrounding world, today’s manually piloted cars are adding systems to aid with guidance and improve isolation from bumps in the road. Read on to learn more.

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Articles
Software

Cars Poised to Become ‘A Thing’

The Internet of Things (IoT) will be the next transformational aspect of connectivity, enabling machines to communicate with each other without human intervention. Autos are becoming a major player in...

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Articles
Materials

Multi-material Structures Move mpg Upward

Multi-material vehicles are nothing new. Aluminum, plastics, and other “exotic” materials have long joined steel in the material mix of road-going cars and trucks, notably in powertrain and...

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News
Propulsion

GKN Puts Electric-Drive TV System for 2019 on Ice

GKN Driveline systems integration engineer Rainer Brüning was a little disappointed.

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News
Green Design & Manufacturing

EPA's 2021 A/C Refrigerant Rules Accelerate R-1234yf Changeover

The industry transition to a low global-warming-potential (GWP) air conditioning refrigerant, already underway in Europe, moves into high gear in the U.S., as CAFE (Corporate...

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News
Manned Systems

SAE Standards Point Way to Service of R-1234yf Systems

The automotive air-conditioning industry changeover to low global warming R-1234yf involves a lot more than new fittings and a more robust evaporator to prevent leakage of the...

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News
Green Design & Manufacturing

Mainstreaming Hybrids and EVs

Will the inefficiency of the automobile ultimately doom the automobile? Big questions like this one, posed by Ford Technical Fellow Dr. Michael Tamor, hit February’s SAE Hybrid & Electric Vehicle Symposium...

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News
Manufacturing & Prototyping

3D-Printed High-Temperature Ceramics

Heat-resistant ceramics are useful for making components such as engine hot parts, rocket nozzles, and nose cones that have to contend with high temperatures or extreme environments. The trouble is...

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News
Automotive

GM Rechristens Powertrain Unit as ‘Global Propulsion Systems’

In its latest break from its storied but perceptually stodgy past, General Motors has renamed its Powertrain division—since 1992 the unit responsible for design,...

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News
Automotive

Nissan Readies Light-Duty Version of Titan Pickup

At February’s Chicago auto show, Nissan revealed the 2017 light-duty (half-ton) version of the Titan pickup as the promised follow-up to the 2016 Titan XD quasi-commercial model that...

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Global Vehicles
Transportation

2017 Nissan Armada Steps onto Patrol Platform

No longer sharing its platform with the Titan full-size pickup truck, the all-new 2017 Nissan Armada full-size SUV is now attached to one of the automaker's most iconic nameplates that...

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News
Transportation

Kia's 2017 Niro Hybrid CUV Targets Sub-90 G/km CO2 Emissions

A novel hybrid-electric powertrain debuting on the 2017 Kia Niro subcompact CUV targets sub-90 g/km CO2 emissions and combined highway/city 50 mpg fuel economy.

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News
Transportation

Volvo's New Plug-In XC90 Is Really a Tri-Motor

Unusually for an OEM, Volvo Cars is being a bit modest about its new XC90 plug-in hybrid, describing it as the T8 Twin Engine. But technically the 2016 PHEV is, in aerospace parlance, a...

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Product Briefs
Aerospace

Composite Cooling Circuit Parts

Cooling circuit parts installed by automotive manufacturers consist of a direct composite comprising the special polyphthalamide (PPA) VESTAMID HTplus R1033 by the Resource Efficiency segment of Evonik, and a...

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