Two stroke engine ban

[old man emu]

Sorry to hear that Spacey. The RFS can't seem to win; if they don't do hazard reduction burns they are blamed for disastrous fires. I don't have a solution, other than removing all homes from near bush land.

Therein lies the problem. Several millions of Sydneysiders have to put up with increased air pollution and an inability to see clear blue skies because a few hundred thousand want to live in bushfire prone areas. Councils won't allow residential development to occur on the identified floodplains around Sydney, so why should they allow something similar, albeit with less density, in bushfire zones.

 

The State governments don't do much to alleviate the problem by putting big dollars into promoting the development of rural areas for industry and residence. I think it's time Australia had another look at coastal river diversion schemes like the Snowy to turn the water that runs to waste down coastal rivers back under the Great Divide to maintain flow in the inland rivers. Hydro-electric generation would help to fund such projects.

 

Coastal people wouldn't get flooded out. Initially agriculture would boom, to replaced as time goes by with industry as rural centres grew with the certainty of water supply.

 

OME

 

 

[turboplanner]

Yes those Greenies are the problem. If it wasn't for them we'd still be crippling our kids with lead pollution, clogging our roadsides and waterways with litter and clearing the last of our forests.

No, it started in the US when people in a couple of small towns started getting sick, producing nice cancer clusters as evidence, and it was found that towns upstream were pouring certain chemical wastes into the river,

That started a few scientific heads wondering where else we were being poisoned, and thanks to the Los Angeles smog basin, that led to the realisation that Particulates were so fine that they were getting into the lungs and causing lung cancers.

 

And then it all accelerated.

 

The greenies are particularly keen on preserving our natural land, forests and the liveability of our suburbs.

 

 

[alf jessup]

Alf I actually agree re forestry. Coming from a timber town, I have followed the stupidity of government mismanagement of our forests. Yes, its true that mobs of jobs have been lost due to broad-brush approaches of governments. You can blame the Greens, but you'd also have to blame the average voter who doesn't know the difference between sustainable selective logging and clear felling for woodchips.If you despise the Green minority for having undo influence over governments, then you should absolutely hate the right-wing church and coal-mining lobbies for manipulating of our political system.

Correct Old Koreelah you know me well.

Don't like any church at all, don't believe in fictional characters or like tax avoiding organisations like churches

 

And yes a hatred of lobby's that try to shut down coal fired power stations without a sustainable or reliable replacement

 

 

[turboplanner]

TP is correct, but only partly correct. Caterpillar did temporarily shut down the production of their On-Highway diesel engines in 2009, because they were unable to meet the new, 2010, On-Highway emission regulations.Caterpillar stated it was unwilling to spend the large sums of money required on their On-Highway engines, to meet the new, 2010 On-Highway engine emissions laws, because Cat On-Highway engine sales were not sufficiently large enough to justify the expenditure on re-designing their engines to meet the new, 2010, substantially-tighter, On-Highway engine emissions levels.

Cat's engine useage and sales is primarily off-road, construction equipment, and industrial use. In Off-Highway use, the engine emissions laws are not so strict.

I was right on some details and wrong on others, and have just had a fascinating discussion. What you wrote sounds like it came from a PR version of history, but there is "what is intended to happen", "what screwed up or was over-ruled", "What did happen", "what went into production", "what was changed at the various break points", "what is happening right now", and what is planned to happen in the future", it's a moving target.

 

Cat then went into Joint Venture with Navistar in 2008 to produce "vocational" On-Highway trucks.The Cat/Navistar JV spent some serious money redesigning the Cat On-Highway engines to meet the On-Highway 2010 engine emissions regulations.

One fascinating period of my life started at 5 am one morning in a freezing conference room at the Burke County Inn in Melbourne with a conference call from the US. There was a specialist from Australia, another from South Africa, and myself, who was to be given a brief. We were told about the emission issues, and the proposal to go into a JV to keep the Cat branches going, and I was given the job of coming up with something for Australia which would have synergy with the Cat brand and non-highway product range - a blank sheet of paper, which usually only comes along once in a lifetime!

 

With graders, dozers, dump trucks etc. he only synergy I could think of was tippers for the construction industry, so I started with quad dogs. That then set the power and torque requirement, and then I looked for other applications where this could be used and came up with 23 different truck models.

 

We were free to shop anywhere in the vast Navistar shop for components, including at that time Mahindra from India, which offered potentially lower prices.

 

I had to take the components chosen and make them fit into the very complex Australian regulations, or start again and find another way of solving the problem.

 

I had to design the trucks without a final engine specification, and about all I can say is it took a long time to reach the final specification.

 

Interestingly enough, the Cat/Navistar JV utilised Cummins Diesel emission-control components and technology, to meet the new 2010 emissions levels regulations.

Two of us don't believe that is correct; I think that may have been a writer misunderstanding of the explanation that the engine used Exhaust Gas Recirculation, "like Cummins".

 

The Cat/Navistar JV produced its first Cat On-Highway truck production in 2011, from the Navistar factory in Mexico.

From our start that morning in the Motel, South Africa opted not to get involved in the Cat truck project, and we may have had an influence on what the US started with, but Mexico is a separate market, and while they may have gone ahead, like us, in basing the trucks on the International Pro Star, they build for their market which is huge.

What we did buy from Mexico was the aeroshield for the Australian sleeper cab models, which was more aerodynamic that the US components.

 

We built the trucks at Tullamarine, in Australia. We believe the US trucks were built in the Springfield Ohio Plant.

 

Caterpillar withdrew from the Navistar JV in 2016, but not for any emissions legislation reason - the reason for ending the Cat/Navistar JV, was purely economics.

Navistar have re-entered the Australian market with International ProStars with Cummins engines, and Cat are offering the N13 and N15 engines.

 

Cat are now manufacturing their Cat On-Highway trucks at their factory in Victoria, TX. I understand they are still utilising Navistar cabins in their On-Highway Cat trucks.

This appears to be a different product, and may have ceased production.

Caterpillar to End Production of On-Highway Vocational Trucks

 

Whereas General Motors chose to do virtually nothing about 2-stroke Detroit Diesel emissions - and other diesel engine manufacturers had to be dragged kicking and screaming to meet emission targets, Cummins sought to work pro-actively with regulators to meet diesel engine emissions targets.

The General Motors product was the GM 2 stroke diesel which they were forced to divest, along with Allison automatic transmissions and Frigidaire refrigeration as a result of US anti-trust laws, long before the emission train left the station. Detroit Diesel Allison produced and sold the engines branded Detroit Diesel, and the company is now owned by Roger Penske, producing a six cylinder engine for the on-highway market.

 

Cummins increased R&D by 60% to improve engine design technologies to meet emission targets, and have become leaders in the On-Highway diesel engine field, accordingly.

I vaguely remember Cummins increasing R&D on emissions to around $2 billion a year in the mid 1980's, and it would have increased incrementally since then, so a 60% increase would be a massive amount of dollars, but when you look at the old Cummins 210 hp which pulled 30 tonne semi trailers at 4 mpg and blew black smoke all the way to Sydney and look at today's product, and what Cummins have achieved, there's not doubt that the hybrid and electric industries will have a huge hurdle to overcome for some time yet.

[alf jessup]

So, Alf, you'd wait until air pollution was really bad before phasing in cleaner technology?

We are a minuscule polluter compared to Asian countries, do they give a hoot about polluting???

We are going to make a huge difference our little 24 million inhabitants to the world pollution levels while a majority of the rest of the world don't give a stuff

 

We get cleaner while they get dirtier but we save the world, I think not

 

I'm all for reliable clean cheap energy but until such time we can get it, keep our poxy little coal fired power stations running

 

 

[farri]

Way back when I was a young bloke,one of the towns my parents lived in was, Tully, North Queensland... Tully was and still is a sugar cane growing area, with it`s own sugar mill...Back then the smoke that came out of the mill chimney was full of ash particles so when the harvesting season was on, the town was full of soot...Water used for cooling and other purposes was pumped straight into the Banyan creek, which was the local swimming area for Tully: we couldn`t swim bellow the outlet of the mill, for the slime in the creek,eventually, new regulations and strict guidelines were placed on all sugar mills and form then on, the smoke from a mill chimney, became free of soot and there was no longer slime in the creeks and rivers.

 

If it takes strict new regulations to improve the efficiency of 2 stroke engines, then that must be a positive step forward.

 

Franco,

 

Ps, Now we can`t swim in the creeks and rivers, because of the Crocodiles!.........

 

 

[alf jessup]

Actually, it is the National Party, with its gun to the Liberals' head, that is the blight on government, business and community in Australia (and its states)

Thanks Col for clearing that up

I like the Greens now, Di Natale and Sarah Hanson Young are my faves now

 

So what good do the Greens do for us

 

Oh tha

 

Way back when I was a young bloke,one of the towns my parents lived in was, Tully, North Queensland... Tully was and still is a sugar cane growing area, with it`s own sugar mill...Back then the smoke that came out of the mill chimney was full of ash particles so when the harvesting season was on, the town was full of soot...Water used for cooling and other purposes was pumped straight into the Banyan creek, which was the local swimming area for Tully: we couldn`t swim bellow the outlet of the mill, for the slime in the creek,eventually, new regulations and strict guidelines were placed on all sugar mills and form then on, the smoke from a mill chimney, became free of soot and there was no longer slime in the creeks and rivers.If it takes strict new regulations to improve the efficiency of 2 stroke engines, then that must be a positive step forward.

 

Franco,

 

Ps, Now we can`t swim in the creeks and rivers, because of the Crocodiles!.........

See Franco,

The soot kept the crocs away!!!! Now that it's cleaned up they are back to eat you lot

 

Was a positive out of all that soot after all

 

 

[gibby]

There is one major problem with the worlds environment and its not two stroke engines. Its population growth, population growth means economic growth so no government seems to mention this. Have a look on flight radar at any time of the day all over the world and you will see the massive amounts of airliners in the sky at one time. Calculate the amount of fuel they are burning and a few old two strokes are not going to make much difference.

 

 

[facthunter]

The amount of fuel going through two strokes wouldn't be too significant in the big scheme of things. I'm not talking about 2s diesels. The older GM's could never have been cleaned up. Some of the small 2s petrol generator sets from China a few years ago were terrible things. The outboard oils (TCW3) are environmental orientated.

 

Ask pilots who fly into Beijing what pollution is. Air is better in Sydney and Melbourne than it used to be and over Europe too as far as I can tell.

 

I wouldn't get too stressed out about the greens. The LNP reckon they are the worst of the worst . Plenty of Farmers have found an ally in them when their farmland is threatened with destruction by CSG and open cut mining operations. At least their attitude is not based on being supported by Millionaires who don't clean up the mess they cause after their activities have harmed the environment. The true cost of doing business doesn't mean damage left for others to look after, after they have organised to go insolvent and dodge their responsibilities. . Mines won't employ large numbers of people into the future. They can't go to remote and robotic quickly enough.. Nev

 

 

[Old Koreelah]

Therein lies the problem. Several millions of Sydneysiders have to put up with increased air pollution and an inability to see clear blue skies because a few hundred thousand want to live in bushfire prone areas. Councils won't allow residential development to occur on the identified floodplains around Sydney, so why should they allow something similar, albeit with less density, in bushfire zones.The State governments don't do much to alleviate the problem by putting big dollars into promoting the development of rural areas for industry and residence. I think it's time Australia had another look at coastal river diversion schemes like the Snowy to turn the water that runs to waste down coastal rivers back under the Great Divide to maintain flow in the inland rivers. Hydro-electric generation would help to fund such projects.

 

Coastal people wouldn't get flooded out. Initially agriculture would boom, to replaced as time goes by with industry as rural centres grew with the certainty of water supply.

 

OME

I totally agree with your first paragraph, OME. Our short-sighted governments allow too much development in flood zones and fire-prone areas. Initiatives to develop the inland has been half-hearted.

Unfortunately, any development hammers our natural systems, and those on our continent can be pretty fragile.

 

The water from coastal rivers is not wasted. It carries into the ocean the nutrients which feed our coastal fisheries. Dams on rivers always have unintended consequences- often creating more problems than they solve.

 

 

[SDQDI]

 

Just thought I would put a flying related post in here to keep it all relevant:whistling:

 

Anyway continue on all

 

 

 

[alf jessup]

Just thought I would put a flying related post in here to keep it all relevant:whistling:

 

Anyway continue on all

 

I hope you have a formation rating SDQDI with that squadron of yours

Question, are they 2 or 4 stroke powered? Lol

 

 

[onetrack]

TP - Thanks for the corrections, yes the Cat On-Highway truck and truck engine scenario is certainly somewhat of a moving target.

 

I was wrong on one particular statement, the Cummins emissions equipment was not used on Cat truck engines until 2013 - and the Cummins emission equipment used by Cat, is the Cummins SCR (selective catalyst reduction) system.

 

Cummins have made a whole new market for themselves in selling emission control equipment to other manufacturers, and they now have a separate Cummins Emission Solutions division.

 

The "60% increase in R&D" by Cummins, was for the period between 2002 and 2007, and the reference for that, is in the "Fortune" article below.

 

Cummins: An engine maker bets on clean air — and wins.

 

Yes, I knew Roger Penske owned Detroit Diesel, he purchased 60% of DD on Jan 1, 1988, and increased that to 80% in July that same year - with GM still retaining 20%.

 

Penske Corp sold Detroit Diesel to Daimler-Chrysler AG in 2000, and Detroit Diesel is still a subsidiary of Daimler AG.

 

What I was getting at in my statements above, was that GM did little to try and improve the GM 2-stroke diesel - and in fact, the production quality level of GM diesels fell away in the late 1980's, leading to other engine competitors gains.

 

http://www.encyclopedia.com/social-sciences-and-law/economics-business-and-labor/businesses-and-occupations/detroit-diesel-corp

 

I wish to disagree on your statement that GM was forced to divest itself of Detroit Diesel because of U.S. Anti-Trust laws. I can find no record of that.

 

The only Anti-Trust lawsuit decision against GM that I know of, is the one initiated by U.S. Attorney-General William P Rogers in 1959, filed under the Clayton Act.

 

This Anti-Trust lawsuit charged that GM's business methods had become too dominating in the off-road hauler and earthmover market, and that they had to divest themselves of some product lines in this field.

 

The lawsuit wasn't settled until 1968, when GM agreed to sell their Euclid dump truck division to White Motor Corp, the truck manufacturer.

 

After the sale of Euclid, GM formed the Terex brand, to produce their new range of earthmovers, which initially, only comprised crawler tractors - along with a limited range of dump trucks, due to GM only retaining two overseas factories that were still allowed to produce dump trucks.

 

 

[onetrack]

SQDI - Sorry about the thread drift, but surprisingly, earthmovers and aircraft seem to be quite often closely linked - as many earthmoving equipment owners quite often got into aircraft as a way of ensuring

 

on-the-job management of their many machines - and aircraft were used quite often to ensure rapid parts delivery for earthmoving equipment, particularly in isolated regions.

 

Then we have the issue that the aircraft that won WW2, wouldn't have been able to do that, if there hadn't been the earthmovers on the ground, producing those fine runways, in quick-smart time!

 

Not a lot of people know, that during WW2, the engineers landed on enemy shores with their earthmoving equipment, right up there with the infantry.

 

In the invasion of Italy, the U.S. Engineers held the record for producing a completely new, finished runway, from virgin ground - in just THREE days! (working around the clock).

 

That finished runway was capable of taking B-17's immediately, and speeded up the invasion of Italy by an enormous amount.

 

 

[coljones]

Alf I actually agree re forestry. Coming from a timber town, I have followed the stupidity of government mismanagement of our forests. Yes, its true that mobs of jobs have been lost due to broad-brush approaches of governments. You can blame the Greens, but you'd also have to blame the average voter who doesn't know the difference between sustainable selective logging and clear felling for woodchips.If you despise the Green minority for having undo influence over governments, then you should absolutely hate the right-wing church and coal-mining lobbies for manipulating of our political system.

Most people understand the difference between selective logging and clearfelling, however the timber industry and politicians seem to think that clearfelling is actually selective logging.

 

 

[coljones]

We are a minuscule polluter compared to Asian countries, do they give a hoot about polluting???We are going to make a huge difference our little 24 million inhabitants to the world pollution levels while a majority of the rest of the world don't give a stuff

We get cleaner while they get dirtier but we save the world, I think not

 

I'm all for reliable clean cheap energy but until such time we can get it, keep our poxy little coal fired power stations running

Might be filthy but they produce nothing like our levels of pollution Per head of population. If Asia increased its per capita pollution to our levels the result to the world would be catastrophic.

 

 

[bexrbetter]

Bex, it's not the current, hi-tech 2 stroke that is the problem. It's the 500 billion, polluting 2-strokes of every form, already in use; plus the companies that are still building old-style 2 strokes, that are the problem.

My point was that many bundle them into the old style, hence the very existence of this thread.

 

Well put Mike - When batteries in electric cars can match the range of my car (about 900k per tank) at 110kph .

Yes, range is an issue in terms of cost, not that you can't do it.. There's one electric car here in China that you have 3 options, 200kms, 300kms or 400kms. 100,000, 200,000 and 300,000 RMB price for the extra battery packs..

 

and the capacity to accelerate from 80 to 110 up a 10% grade I may be convinced that an electric car is a viable option. .

Not sure if you are asking or stating, if the latter, you couldn't be further from the truth.

 

A petrol engine can not get anywhere near an electric car for acceleration under circumstance such as that, you barely even notice hills. I note that some of the very latest turbos that have boost coming in by 2000 rpm are pretty good though.

 

Electric motors have 100% of their torque available from 1 rpm on. When you accelerate my 100HP electric car from the lights, it's about the same launch as about 300HP for the first 100 meters (and no gears at all). I just took my car down to the factory for charging, it's raining and it's impossible to accelerate hard or it's just instant wheelspin. I actually just deleted a video a few days ago showing the wonders of an electric car up a very steep car parking ramp and how much grunt they have.

 

On some rivers, in Alaska, outboards must be 4-stroke or 2-stroke (direct) injection.

i don't pretend to know Alaskan law, but some 20 or 30 years ago they banned "2 strokes" in California to which companies threatened lawsuits because just being a "2 stroke" has nothing to do with emissions, Evinrude proved it, so did Honda (a bit of irony there as Honda, famously 4 stroke, was one of the biggest pushers against 2 strokes) and a few others, so the law was changed, and rightfully so, to an emissions based law for which Evinrude passed with flying colours, even heads and shoulders above many 4 strokes.

 

If you consider the lower materials count and energy use in manufacturing them, and later disposal, the Evinrude may even top the tree for overall environmental impact.

 

If it takes strict new regulations to improve the efficiency of 2 stroke engines, then that must be a positive step forward.

.

Yes Frank, that is my position as I just laid per the Evinrude angle, not banning them just because they are a 2 stroke, which is just ignorant.

 

I also know one of the Ford Australia Engineers who was driving around in what was basically a Suzuki 3 cylinder with the Orbital high pressure air over fuel direct injection system (as Evinrude use) in a Ford Falcon and he thought it was great, only 2 problems, hunting at constant throttle, and public acceptance of a 2 stroke Falcon!

 

So, Alf, you'd wait until air pollution was really bad before phasing in cleaner technology?

Do your part, stop flying.

 

I thought this was a flying forum, and politics was moved to whatsup.

There's a lot of 2 stroke Rotax out there that this effects if true.

 

 

[bexrbetter]

and a few old two strokes are not going to make much difference.

This I agree with onetrack, it's not just a few Mate, it's enough to make a serious impact to air quality.

 

Might be filthy but they produce nothing like our levels of pollution Per head of population. If Asia increased its per capita pollution to our levels the result to the world would be catastrophic.

Yuh, the old point the finger at Asia while you're using 7 times the amount of energy per head as they are, and that's the advanced countries, the others use very little.

 

 

[SDQDI]

SQDI - Sorry about the thread drift

To tell you the truth I didn't mind the back and forth between you and turbo, it is actually interesting. Actually I don't mind everyone else going over the pros and cons of 2 strokes either as that is also interesting but I do think we need to leave political back and forths to the what's up Australia site.

 

I remember going to a local aero club meeting a couple of years ago and arriving a little late, getting out of the car I could hear muffled screaming and yelling coming from inside and thought 'oh dear what on earth has happened!' Running inside in a panic I found the whole room at each other arguing over politics. People who were good friends were yelling themselves hoarse to get their point across (this may be a slight exaggeration but isn't too far off the mark.)

 

Anyway my point is politics and religion are two subjects that we all hold strong opinions about and there isn't any other subjects that will divide groups quicker so we do need to be careful otherwise we will have people get upset and this could lead to people leaving this site.

 

I know sometimes that some politics can be relevant to flying but we need to be careful when that happens and keep it respectful and to a minimum.

 

This is of course just my opinion!

 

 

[alf jessup]

SDQDI

 

I like your opinions so keep them coming

 

 

[old man emu]

The water from coastal rivers is not wasted. It carries into the ocean the nutrients which feed our coastal fisheries. Dams on rivers always have unintended consequences- often creating more problems than they solve.

My proposal is based on flood mitigation, and would not cause the fresh water to stop entering the coastal rivers. It would be a means to preventing flooding in those rivers by diverting the excess from storms away from them. I am fully aware of the huge economic importance of those coastal rivers for agriculture, aquaculture, lifestyle and tourism. However, think of the millions of dollars that could be saved if we didn't have to spend it on recovery of infrastructure from flood damage.

 

OME

 

 

[facthunter]

As in Miami etc there are places where rebuilding is foolish. SOME places are not suitable if you have to rebuild infrastructure in a short timespan. Go somewhere more suitable. That MAY get difficult , but the other is not the answer. Nev

 

 

[turboplanner]

As in Miami etc there are places where rebuilding is foolish. SOME places are not suitable if you have to rebuild infrastructure in a short timespan. Go somewhere more suitable. That MAY get difficult , but the other is not the answer. Nev

The problem FH is that corrupt developers fudge documents, sell the land and pay off authorities gambling on no floods in their lifetime. There's one swamp with a massive flood problem affecting about 200,000 people that was the subject of a Royal Commission.

RC records were stolen from the Public Record Office, the swamp removed from Place Name records, height contours faked, decisions approved to build in Urban Flood Zones etc. Someone will make a film about it one day.

 

 

[farri]

I hope you have a formation rating SDQDI with that squadron of yoursQuestion, are they 2 or 4 stroke powered? Lol

That`s another rating, he`ll need!!!!

 

 

[onetrack]

Interestingly, there's a fairly effective solution to fix the old-technology 2 strokes from polluting. A company called Envirofit produced the solution, utilising Orbital Engine Co's air injection.

 

Envirofit were gaining traction back in 2008 by selling their Direct Injection retro-fit kits in the Philippines, for fitting to tuk-tuks and motorcycles. It was economic, as well as reducing pollution substantially.

 

Then the Philippines Govt introduced a law decreeing that all new engines had to be 4 stroke, and the Envirofit 2-stroke retro-fit plan, fell apart.

 

Envirofit now produce a low-pollution stove for 3rd world countries, because apparently, smoke pollution from indoor cooking is also a big killer, and a substantial addition to the worlds pollution load.

 

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