In The News Today...

Quote: Fleastiff

Australian girl's travel insurance policy won't pay her medical expenses for her Las Vegas coma due to being intoxicated while crossing the strip at grade level instead of using pedestrian overpass thirty feet away.

well, what did the insurer expect a 20 year girl in Vegas to be at 4:00am....sober?

Negligence on her part. At 20 she is an adult.

Looks like Volkswagen has deleted a whole bunch of their clean diesel videos from YouTube. Trying to hide something?

Amatuers. They'll need to do a more thorough job: lot of the videos are still viewable on the websites of local VW dealers nationwide.

Quote: reno

Looks like Volkswagen has deleted a whole bunch of their clean diesel videos from YouTube. Trying to hide something?

Amatuers. They'll need to do a more thorough job: lot of the videos are still viewable on the websites of local VW dealers nationwide.

They just admitted today that they have been faking the emissions on their vehicles. Software settings for the test and another for normal use. Talk is that the US regulators might charge them a 18B fine.

Quote: reno

Looks like Volkswagen has deleted a whole bunch of their clean diesel videos from YouTube. Trying to hide something?

Amatuers. They'll need to do a more thorough job: lot of the videos are still viewable on the websites of local VW dealers nationwide.

This VW thing is going to be huge. VW is on a roll and the kind of company the feds like to take down. What they did was so totally willful there is no chance of an "ooops" factor.

The $18 Billion will probably be knocked down to 5 or 6. But then comes the real no-win. They can fix the chips easy, just remove the gaffe. But the cars will not run as well. Class action coming. But you have to get people to bring the cars in. In states with emission tests easy, no fix, no registration/emission sticker. But in other states? Do you really think I will bring in my car so it will not run as well all for some molecules coming from the tailpipe I don't care about? I for one would only bring it back if I had to.

I figure the negotiated fine and lawsuits will end up at $10-12 billion or so. Lots of zeros down the drain.

Market punished VW yesterday with a $15B hit. Stay tuned...

11,000,000 million cars worldwide, 500,000 in the US.

I don't know how the cars that are out there now can be fixed, even in states with emission tests.

With the current software, they will pass the tests. With the 'fixed' software, they will pass the tests. If they wanted to catch these vehicles in emission-testing states, they'd have to add tests to verify the software in the car.

To get all of the cars fixed, they'd have to add laws - add and require a software check for licensing, or title transfer, or something.

I suspect the government will just make them issue a recall and take money in fines, then let the cars stay out there, leaving it up to the consumers as to whether or not they'll have the recall dealt with.

I suppose they could tell the dealers that whenever they worked on a car, that they had to make sure the fix was in, but I think that's more laws that would need to be passed.

The effect on the cars is going to be worse fuel economy and worse power. So now the car owners will have a car that doesn't perform like it was advertised to perform.

so, VW has allocated 7 Billion to fix the cars. That's just to fix the cars. Then there will be the US fines (18B?), and the class action lawsuits on behalf of the consumers. the US consumers sure won't see any of that 18B, that's just for the EPA. There are real consumer costs and damages here - higher fuel costs, lower resale costs, and the fact that they didn't get all that they paid for in terms of performance.

VW has stopped selling these cars now in the US. I wouldn't be surprised if the whole company was banned from US sales by the government for a time.

Quote: Dalex64

Then there will be the US fines (18B?), and the class action lawsuits on behalf of the consumers.

Any possibility that the local VW auto dealers will also sue the corporation? Their sales are taking a beating.

Quote: Dalex64

To get all of the cars fixed, they'd have to add laws - add and require a software check for licensing, or title transfer, or something.

I suspect the government will just make them issue a recall and take money in fines, then let the cars stay out there, leaving it up to the consumers as to whether or not they'll have the recall dealt with.

I suppose they could tell the dealers that whenever they worked on a car, that they had to make sure the fix was in, but I think that's more laws that would need to be passed.

In some states (CA) you cannot register a car unless it has been taken in for any outstanding recall. Most states do not care. But any recall issued has to have a certain verified number corrected. This has led to weird things, like Chrysler once "fixing" cars in junkyards, removing the offending part and leaving the replacement part on the seats. Car would never be driven again, but we have to keep the consumer safe!

As I said above, the issue is when you get your car "fixed" it will not run or handle as well as before. So who in the know would bring it in?

Quote:

VW has stopped selling these cars now in the US. I wouldn't be surprised if the whole company was banned from US sales by the government for a time.

That seems extreme, no history of the feds doing that. But VW's image in the USA at least will take a huge hit. Currently the USA is a drag on VW. They still remain a "quirky" company for nonconformists here. They nearly had to pull out in the early 1990s sales had collapsed so bad. One thing for sure, Don and Peggy will be working nights on the PR.

It's perplexing that VW didn't think they'd get caught. Surely they knew about the $1 billion penalty that the Justic Dept levied against Caterpillar, Inc., Cummins Engine Company, Detroit Diesel Corporation, Mack Trucks, Inc., Navistar International Transportation Corporation, Renault Vehicules Industriels, s.a., and the Volvo Truck Corporation for cheating on diesel emissions tests in 1998:

Quote: Jalopnik

The suit alleged these companies’ heavy trucks were “equipped with devices that defeat the engines’ emissions control system, resulting in the emission of illegal amounts of oxides of nitrogen.”

The engines met the requirements when run on the EPA’s 20-minute test procedure, but had three times the legal NOx emissions in highway driving.

VW thought they would outsmart everyone and not get caught? They didn't know the punishment would be in the billions?

Their stupidity is stunning.

She almost got away by dying.

Quote:

German prosecutors have charged a 91-year-old woman who allegedly worked at the Nazis’ Auschwitz camp with 260,000 counts of accessory to murder.

http://time.com/4045628/woman-charged-auchswitz-deaths/