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Speaker 1: Get in technic technology with tech Stuff from Half Stuff.

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Speaker 1: Hey there everybody, and welcome to Tech Stuff. I am

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Speaker 1: Jonathan Strickland and joining me once again half of the

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Speaker 1: Amazing Car Stuff team. Scott, Benjamin, welcome back to the show.

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Speaker 1: How do everybody? Scott, It's great to have you here.

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Speaker 1: We just finished recording a show. I think these are

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Speaker 1: actually gonna play out of sequence. But I just finished

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Speaker 1: recording a show with your co host Ben Bolan, who

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Speaker 1: was spectacular, So I I expect you will do no

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Speaker 1: less in this episode. The pressure is on. But unlike

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Speaker 1: Ben's Ben, Ben didn't have to prepare anything. I specifically

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Speaker 1: told him not to prepare, whereas you, uh, fortunately have

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Speaker 1: talked a lot about this particular topic. We are going

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Speaker 1: to talk about the Volkswagen scandal. What happened, uh, what

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Speaker 1: the actual technical details are. Maybe get some information about

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Speaker 1: diesel versus gasoline cars, you know, kind of get an

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Speaker 1: understanding of what exactly happened and what will what what

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Speaker 1: the fallout is looking like so far? And spoiler alert, folks,

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Speaker 1: this is an ongoing story. It's not like we have

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Speaker 1: an end where we can say, and then they were

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Speaker 1: charged this much money and find no exactly, because even

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Speaker 1: now with the fixed information that we we now have

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Speaker 1: that we just got a few days ago, there are

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Speaker 1: still some unanswered questions in this in this fixed plan,

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Speaker 1: they say they've got the plan, but they're not quite

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Speaker 1: exactly telling us what they're going to do with it.

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Speaker 1: And only that, but they've also recently announced a a

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Speaker 1: different emissions possible subterfuge trick thing that's going to be

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Speaker 1: in the two thousands, or was supposed to be in

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Speaker 1: the two thousand and sixteen models, which currently are not

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Speaker 1: available here in the United States. They're quarantined at US ports.

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Speaker 1: Right there's a hold on all sales of Volkswagen diesel

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Speaker 1: vehicles from and some yours are being held back. You

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Speaker 1: can't get one right now exactly. And I'll talk about

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Speaker 1: what that particular possibly shady technology does. But before we

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Speaker 1: get into that, one of the things I wanted to

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Speaker 1: do is kind of lay the groundwork. I usually take

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Speaker 1: the first part of any episode to kind of talk

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Speaker 1: about what what were the conditions that led up to

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Speaker 1: this point, and really to look at this one. I

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Speaker 1: wanted to go way way way back, all right, because

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Speaker 1: I wanted to talk about the conditions that led up

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Speaker 1: to things like the Clean Air Act. So in order

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Speaker 1: to do that, you have to look at the dependence

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Speaker 1: upon the internal combustion engine as the primary means of

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Speaker 1: powering vehicles. Now, Scott, I know you are very well

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Speaker 1: aware that electric vehicles proceeded internal combustion vehicles. Their electric

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Speaker 1: cars were around before we had and internal combustion cars. Yes, yes,

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Speaker 1: they were in fact very prevalent. I mean taxi taxi

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Speaker 1: companies operated on all electric platforms at a certain point

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Speaker 1: in history. You can look at photographs of New York

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Speaker 1: and I don't know, we're talking to turn of the

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Speaker 1: century stuff, the turn of the twentieth century, where you know,

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Speaker 1: it's all every car that you see in the shot

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Speaker 1: is all electric. Um. Yeah, there was a point when

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Speaker 1: there were far more electric vehicles on the road than

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Speaker 1: there were gasoline vehicles. And they were efficient, they were fast.

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Speaker 1: One thing they were not was they didn't have incredibly

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Speaker 1: long driving ranges. But at first that didn't really matter.

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Speaker 1: And the reason it didn't matter is because with the

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Speaker 1: development of the automobile also came the development of the

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Speaker 1: road system in the United States. So here in the US,

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Speaker 1: at least, the place you were most likely to encounter

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Speaker 1: roads that were suitable for driving on were in cities,

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Speaker 1: which meant that your driving range didn't have to be

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Speaker 1: that far. You weren't doing miles and miles of driving

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Speaker 1: every single day. You might be doing a few miles

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Speaker 1: of driving, which was important for electric vehicles because there

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Speaker 1: was no real way to recharge once you hit the road. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: In fact, they had the uh, the the original idea.

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Speaker 1: I guess you know where Tesla is getting his battery

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Speaker 1: swap idea from. I'm sorry, Mosco. I guess I always

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Speaker 1: refer to him as Tesla, but that's not correct. Of course,

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Speaker 1: I'm sure he would love that. Actually, well, the Tesla,

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Speaker 1: the Tesla models that are proposing that, you know, they'll

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Speaker 1: be these battery swap situations where you can drive up

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Speaker 1: and leave your old battery, pick up a brand new one.

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Speaker 1: So that's a quick change, a relative quick change, and

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Speaker 1: then you're on your way and you have to return

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Speaker 1: for that battery. Uh you know, it's like a rental almost,

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Speaker 1: you have to come back and get it. But uh,

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Speaker 1: that idea is nothing brand new. Of course, these these

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Speaker 1: old taxis that I'm talking about would drive into a

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Speaker 1: station and they would swap the batteries and they're back

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Speaker 1: out on the road to collect the next fair. It

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Speaker 1: had as little downtime as possible. Yeah, and they ran

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Speaker 1: constantly around the clock, but you know they were constantly

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Speaker 1: getting new batteries as well. Right. And if you look

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Speaker 1: at the development of the roads. Once we got to

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Speaker 1: a point where roads were being built out beyond the cities,

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Speaker 1: where they were connecting different cities together, a lot of

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Speaker 1: people had the desire to travel those roads. The roads

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Speaker 1: were there by necessity, but now people are like, I

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Speaker 1: have an opportunity to go places I couldn't go before.

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Speaker 1: But the problem was the electric vehicles weren't the vehicles

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Speaker 1: that could get them there, because if it was further

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Speaker 1: away than say eighteen miles, you weren't going to reach

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Speaker 1: your destination. So the internal combustion engine had an advantage

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Speaker 1: over that, and that you could have fueling stations along

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Speaker 1: the way. And the other huge advantage was because Henry

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Speaker 1: Ford figured out how to do mass production, and through

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Speaker 1: mass production they were able to dramatically reduce the price

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Speaker 1: of a vehicle. So a an internal combustion engine car

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Speaker 1: cost about a third of what an electric vehicle did.

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Speaker 1: So you have this mass adoption of the internal combustion engine. Now,

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Speaker 1: this is why, the reason why I even lay that

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Speaker 1: groundwork is as the United States in particular becomes a

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Speaker 1: car culture, and as more and more people start driving

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Speaker 1: vehicles that use internal combustion, you have more and more

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Speaker 1: emissions from those vehicles, and it begins to accumulate over time.

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Speaker 1: And depending upon the type of fuel you're using, if

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Speaker 1: it's diesel, you get a lot of emissions that contribute

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Speaker 1: to smog. And then we start seeing super smoggy cities

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Speaker 1: in different parts of the country. And by the nineteen

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Speaker 1: fifties and nineteen sixties, you had people concerned about the

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Speaker 1: quality of air. True, and the cities are inherently bad

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Speaker 1: about this because they containe, they capture all this, they

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Speaker 1: get it all in place. And not only that, but

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Speaker 1: you've also got some cities that geographically kind of hold

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Speaker 1: on to that material it's expelled from these vehicles. Los

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Speaker 1: Angeles is the classic example here in the United States.

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Speaker 1: Exactly right. You can look at some old photographs of

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Speaker 1: smog in Los Angeles and you can't see buildings. So yeah,

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Speaker 1: it's it's like a heavy, heavy fog that hung over

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Speaker 1: the city and it eventually blow away. It would it

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Speaker 1: would go away, but um you know, not long you know,

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Speaker 1: not long after it blows out of there, it would

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Speaker 1: come right back again because there are so many vehicles

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Speaker 1: that were emitting so many um uh you know, bad

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Speaker 1: things for the environment. But the noxious gases, right, yeah,

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Speaker 1: stuff that was bad for the environment. It could cause

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Speaker 1: health issues if if it was really like if it's

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Speaker 1: a really smoggy day to this day, in certain cities,

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Speaker 1: when it's really smoggy, you will hear warnings on the news,

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Speaker 1: like limit your amount of time outdoors, especially on hot

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Speaker 1: days where it can be aggravated, because it can end

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Speaker 1: up either causing or aggravating health issues. Sure, and you

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Speaker 1: can see examples of this in China today, really really heavy.

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Speaker 1: I mean they're there's still um and in parts of

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Speaker 1: Europe too, you know, exactly right, Yeah, there's you can

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Speaker 1: look at modern day Beijing and see what you know,

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Speaker 1: Los Angeles look like several decades ago here in the States, right, So,

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Speaker 1: by the nineteen fifties and nineteen sixties, different regions in

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Speaker 1: the US, we're looking at ways of improving air quality

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Speaker 1: and limiting pollution. And it was really patchwork, you know,

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Speaker 1: for a long time until about nineteen sixties seven. That's

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Speaker 1: when the US Congress passed the Air Quality Act. Now

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Speaker 1: this was the predecessor to the Clean Air Act. The

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Speaker 1: Air Quality Act had a disadvantage in that it was

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Speaker 1: meant to have kind of a centralized organization headed by

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Speaker 1: the Secretary Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare to designate

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Speaker 1: air quality regions around the United States, and then the

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Speaker 1: states that those air quality regions were within were supposed

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Speaker 1: to come up with a plan for pollution control. So,

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Speaker 1: in other words, the federal government was saying, here are

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Speaker 1: the areas we have to be worried about, all right, Georgia, California, Texas.

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Speaker 1: You guys take care of those places. And this lack

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Speaker 1: of a cohesive approach meant that it was pretty much

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Speaker 1: doomed to not meet its its goals. And in fact,

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Speaker 1: after three years by they had fewer than thirty six

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Speaker 1: regions defined, less than three dozen of the had had

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Speaker 1: been defined at all, and no state had any sort

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Speaker 1: of pollution control uh comprehensive plan. And so the solution

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Speaker 1: then was to bring it all under the control of

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Speaker 1: the U. S. Congress. Right, Yes, that was when the

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Speaker 1: Congress ray convened and started to say, all right, well,

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Speaker 1: this this plan was noble in its intention. We wanted

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Speaker 1: to make sure we weren't imposing the federal will on

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Speaker 1: the states. But it's not working. So that's where the

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Speaker 1: Clean Air Act to tie all this together so that

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Speaker 1: you understand what's happening at that particular time. This is

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Speaker 1: this is well, well, you know, the I guess the

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Speaker 1: term that we're gonna throw around here a little bit

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Speaker 1: today maybe as the cafe standards and cafe standards were

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Speaker 1: enacted somewhere around nineteen seventy five, I think the regulations.

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Speaker 1: These are set of regulations that were enacted by Congress,

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Speaker 1: and nineteen seventy five, you're you're talking about like the

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Speaker 1: tail end of the arab oil embargo, so that you

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Speaker 1: know the fuel crisis. You know where um you see

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Speaker 1: the lines of people and you know the no gas

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Speaker 1: today rationing and all the rad with the odd even

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Speaker 1: system and all that. Um, that is that's the environment

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Speaker 1: that we're talking about. Yeah, so this was, um, you know,

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Speaker 1: this was a serious situation for multiple reasons. Also in

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Speaker 1: nineteen seventy that's when uh, you know, you had the

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Speaker 1: introduction of Earth Day. So you had this growing support

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Speaker 1: for a conservation and UH and and concern about the environment. Uh.

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Speaker 1: In at the same time where you have things like

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Speaker 1: the oil crisis. I mean, all this stuff is coming

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Speaker 1: to a head. So it's all fueling this. And we were, well,

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Speaker 1: we were starting to understand the effects on the human body. Yes,

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Speaker 1: just just exactly what that that smog was doing to

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Speaker 1: people that are walking around in the next cloud of

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Speaker 1: of you know, just awful stuff X in there and saying, hey,

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Speaker 1: you know, it's weird. We're seeing a lot more people

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Speaker 1: with asthma these days that kind of stuff, or or

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Speaker 1: bronchitis or things of that. People are dying of respiratory illness.

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Speaker 1: We can't quite put our finger on exactly what's causing it,

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Speaker 1: but it's happening frequently and and and even if you

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Speaker 1: were to argue that the pollution may not cause it,

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Speaker 1: it's certainly exacerbated it. So UH. This ended up creating

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Speaker 1: the Cleaner Act, which set the national standards for pollution

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Speaker 1: emissions eventually and created a timeline for it, which had

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Speaker 1: to be adjusted multiple times because, as it turned out,

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Speaker 1: the standards were uh the standards to make the engines

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Speaker 1: operate in what had been determined to be a safe

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Speaker 1: uh set of parameters meant that manufacturers couldn't find a

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Speaker 1: way to meet that and also make a car that worked.

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Speaker 1: So so those those um, those goals kept getting pushed.

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Speaker 1: There was there were uh they they started to look

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Speaker 1: at pushing the deadline back in seven. They pushed it

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Speaker 1: back again in um mainly because the technology to create

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Speaker 1: something that was able to operate under these standards and

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Speaker 1: do its job was not really an achievable goal for

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Speaker 1: something that wouldn't cost an astronomical amount of money. And

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Speaker 1: you know, one thing that I don't think we've even

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Speaker 1: mentioned yet is we say cafe standards that means corporate

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Speaker 1: average fuel economy, and that's across the line of vehicles,

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Speaker 1: across the whole fleet of vehicles. It's not like one

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Speaker 1: particular vehicle has to meet the standard. It has to

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Speaker 1: be an average of all vehicles produced. And I know

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Speaker 1: there's other there's other stuff that goes into this. There's

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Speaker 1: there's this big Vinn diagram that makes this all work.

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Speaker 1: But um, the standards are very very uh tough to meet.

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Speaker 1: I mean they're they're they're a strict set of set

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Speaker 1: of standards that especially the latest round which was UM

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Speaker 1: announced and I think it was two thousand eight, all

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Speaker 1: the way through the model year, and when manufacturers see

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Speaker 1: the list of what they have to meet, the goals

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Speaker 1: that they have to meet in order to be in

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Speaker 1: compliance with this agreement, to sign this agreement and say, yeah,

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Speaker 1: we agree to sell vehicles in the United States, we

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Speaker 1: have to meet these goals. Uh. It is a steep

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Speaker 1: set of standards. And I find it interesting that looking

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Speaker 1: back now, you know the agreement, the initial agreement in

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Speaker 1: two thousand eight, UM all those it was very stringent,

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Speaker 1: very very tough. UM major auto manufacturer signed that agreement.

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Speaker 1: You know, a bit begrudgingly. You know that they say, well, okay,

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Speaker 1: we can probably meet these but there's a lot of

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Speaker 1: back and forth. Volkswagen and Mercedes Benz had the biggest

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Speaker 1: objection to it. And I don't know if Volkswagen ever

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Speaker 1: signed that agreement. I I don't know how. I've been

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Speaker 1: looking all day trying to find out if they actually

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Speaker 1: signed the agreement, but I can only find information that

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Speaker 1: goes back into two two th eight where they say

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Speaker 1: Volkswagen has as of now not signed this agree. Interesting. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: one of those things where you can't find any definitive

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Speaker 1: update about whether they did or did not sign. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: and the reason was they said that it's UM and

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Speaker 1: i'll just paraphrase this is because they said that UM

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Speaker 1: it places an unfair, unfairly high burden on passenger cars

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Speaker 1: well allowing a greater flexibility to let's say, a heavier

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Speaker 1: light truck. So we're saying it's not exactly the way

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Speaker 1: that we'd like to see it happen, and it's penalizing

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Speaker 1: in all things, penalizing people that make UM passenger vehicles

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Speaker 1: with diesel engines. It's not fair to them. Its white

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Speaker 1: Mercedes and Volkswagen said, I don't know about this agreement.

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Speaker 1: I don't think we're gonna sign it, and I will

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Speaker 1: still dig into that and see if they actually ever did.

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Speaker 1: But around two eight that was kind of the talk

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Speaker 1: around the circles was why is not why is b

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Speaker 1: W NET signing this? And you know it's we'll get

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Speaker 1: more into the diesel stuff in a minute to explain,

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Speaker 1: you know, some of the issues that manufacturers run into,

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Speaker 1: like the scandal is pretty awful. That being said, I

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Speaker 1: also have at least some sympathy for the difficulty that

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Speaker 1: engineers face to make things that are satisfying to drive,

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Speaker 1: that operate within the the fuel economy and efficiency that

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Speaker 1: is dictated by the government, as well as work within

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Speaker 1: the emission standards. Okay, you just said the magic three. There,

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Speaker 1: that's the three things. It's it's fuel economy, performance and

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Speaker 1: emissions and you can it's have you ever heard the

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Speaker 1: phrase you can have it done quickly, you can have

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Speaker 1: it done well, or you could have it done cheaply.

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Speaker 1: You can pick two out of the three. Yeah, yeah,

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Speaker 1: and you're never going to find all three. R Well,

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Speaker 1: somehow folks I can manage to do all three with

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Speaker 1: their diesel engines back in two thousand. Oh wow, it

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Speaker 1: was magical too, as it turns out. But before we

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Speaker 1: jump ahead to that a little bit more just to

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Speaker 1: kind of cover our bases, uh, The Environmental Protection Agency

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Speaker 1: has given been given a lot of control as well

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Speaker 1: when it comes to the emission standards. They were able

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Speaker 1: to establish the National Ambient Air Quality Standards or in

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Speaker 1: a a q S. The next I gotta say, that's

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Speaker 1: a new one to me. Yeah, that's the one that

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Speaker 1: where the deadline had been extended a couple of times,

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Speaker 1: Like where where it was clear the states could not

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Speaker 1: meet that deadline. So I mean, what do you do, Like,

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Speaker 1: do you what's the well? I guess what's the fine?

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Speaker 1: And how do you define how much each place pays?

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Speaker 1: I mean based on what the offense is. Yeah, you

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Speaker 1: measure that again. And you know, because pollution also doesn't

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Speaker 1: doesn't necessarily obeyed geography. You could have pollution that is

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Speaker 1: produced in one place, but it's another place that's dealing

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Speaker 1: with it. Uh. And and in states where you have

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Speaker 1: big cities that are close to the border, it maybe

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Speaker 1: that one city is actually producing the pollution, but the

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Speaker 1: other city is the one that's really suffering from it.

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Speaker 1: Dumping into rivers is a great example. Yeah, you know

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Speaker 1: stuff like that where it flows downstream, Yeah, exactly, or

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Speaker 1: trucked into a different region. Just simple air patterns exactly.

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Speaker 1: You know, weather patterns can push it. So, uh, you know,

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Speaker 1: they they pushed the deadlines a couple of times. It

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Speaker 1: made me think of like if you're if you're a

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Speaker 1: parent of a kid and you say I need you

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Speaker 1: to pick up all these toys before five o'clock and

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Speaker 1: you're coming there and it's all the toys aren't picked up,

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Speaker 1: and you're thinking, well, all right, you need to pick

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Speaker 1: up all these toys before six o'clock because you're like,

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Speaker 1: I don't really want to punish you, but I really

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Speaker 1: do want you to pick up these toys where it's done.

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Speaker 1: But they've just thrown them in their brother's closet. Yeah, see,

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Speaker 1: pushing it down the road. Yeah, for me, it was

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Speaker 1: it was all just shoving it into the closet like

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Speaker 1: that's that. If it's out of sight, that means it's clean. Um.

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Speaker 1: So one of the things about the Clean Air Act

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Speaker 1: is that it it did have standards for what kinds

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Speaker 1: of emissions and how much how many you know, types

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Speaker 1: of emissions could be created by a car carbon dioxide

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Speaker 1: by the way, non that list carbon dioxide, didn't. You know?

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Speaker 1: That's the greenhouse gas, and it's something that we're concerned about,

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Speaker 1: but not on the list of the emissions that the

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Speaker 1: Clean Air Act was concerned with. Instead, it was things

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Speaker 1: like carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxide, and hydrocarbon emissions greenhouse gasses. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: except for carbon dioxide. That was the only one that

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Speaker 1: was kind of left out, But yeah, these are all

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Speaker 1: greenhouse gases. Yeah, and and diesel in particular is pretty

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Speaker 1: bad about um nitrogen oxides, and that's the kind of

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Speaker 1: stuff that contributes to smog uh formation. Yeah. You often

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Speaker 1: see it written is like n O X yes, and

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Speaker 1: of people yep. Yeah, hard knocks in that case. Uh

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Speaker 1: So the standards of the emission centers themselves. When I

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Speaker 1: say standard, it sounds like I could easily quote you.

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Speaker 1: You know, here's how much uh nitrogen ox side the

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Speaker 1: car is allowed to emit over a given amount of time.

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Speaker 1: Not that simple. It all depends on the type of vehicle,

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Speaker 1: like you were saying, between light trucks and passenger cars

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Speaker 1: for example, or the age of the vehicle that that

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Speaker 1: plays a factor as well. Um so, and also whether

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Speaker 1: it's a gasoline powered vehicle or a diesel powered vehicle,

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Speaker 1: because the emissions will be different depending upon those. So

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Speaker 1: it's a little complicated, and I'm not going to be,

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Speaker 1: you know, spouting off specific numbers because it's just not

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Speaker 1: there's no point to it. A different podcast. Yeah, that's

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Speaker 1: that's the that's the the incredibly tiny standards podcast. I'm

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Speaker 1: not gonna get down to that. But to go to sleep,

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Speaker 1: yes the evening, and I don't mind if you guys

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Speaker 1: fall asleep to me. I don't do the listener mail

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Speaker 1: thing anymore. So at least you're not gonna be woken

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Speaker 1: up by a clackson. Um. So, like we said, the performance,

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Speaker 1: the energy efficiency or fuel efficiency, I should say, and

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Speaker 1: the emissions are these three things, and it is very

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Speaker 1: hard to meet the expectations of all three of those

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Speaker 1: at the same time because um As it turns out,

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Speaker 1: a lot of the emissions control mechanisms have an effect

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Speaker 1: on performance. Um they have an effect on and they

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Speaker 1: can have an effect on fuel efficiency. For example, it's

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Speaker 1: correlation is kind of a weird word, but there is

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Speaker 1: an association between a very fuel efficient diesel engine and

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Speaker 1: high production of nitrogen oxide. So you if you're an

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Speaker 1: auto manufacturer, you have to make an engine to make

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Speaker 1: your cargo, and you're using you know, you want it

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Speaker 1: to be a diesel powered engine. You have specific standards

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Speaker 1: you have to meet for fuel efficiency, that's one of

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Speaker 1: the things you've got to you know, you one of

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Speaker 1: the boxes you have to check off. But you also

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Speaker 1: have standards you have to meet for emissions. That's the

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Speaker 1: other box you've got to check off. And in this relationship,

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Speaker 1: as one goes up, the other goes down. In a

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Speaker 1: in the bad way, right, Like, as as one improves,

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Speaker 1: the other one is getting worse. So how do you

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Speaker 1: balance that out? Plus make sure that the car performs

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Speaker 1: in such a way that it's not just drivable that

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Speaker 1: people want to drive, that a consumer would actually want

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Speaker 1: to drive that vehicle. Because when you start playing around

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Speaker 1: with these three things that you've mentioned, Um, I'll argue

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Speaker 1: that consumers are and I know that this is I

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Speaker 1: guess maybe controversial, and that you know, some people say, no,

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Speaker 1: that's what I care about most. It's always gonna be

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Speaker 1: someone like that. But um, I would say that most

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Speaker 1: people care less about the actual emissions of the vehicle

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Speaker 1: than they do about the fuel economy and the way

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Speaker 1: that the car performs. Are fuels and drive right, because

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Speaker 1: the fuel efficiency is going to impact your wallet, right,

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Speaker 1: you know, it's how much fuel you're gonna have to

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Speaker 1: buy to get your car to go from place to place,

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Speaker 1: and performance obviously the way the car feels emissions. I

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Speaker 1: would argue for most people, they want the emissions to

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Speaker 1: be at a level that is acceptable for the region

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Speaker 1: their end. Well what I mean by that, and I

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Speaker 1: don't I don't mean to you know, spark any kind

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Speaker 1: of big controversy or anything. But what I'm saying is

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Speaker 1: that when you buy a new vehicle off the lot,

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Speaker 1: you assume that it's going to be compliant with current

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Speaker 1: CAFE or not cafe, but rather emission standards in that

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Speaker 1: area and in the U S in general. It's going

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Speaker 1: to pass. It's going to be a clean vehicle, and

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Speaker 1: it wouldn't be sold as a new car otherwise it

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Speaker 1: wouldn't be allowed to Well no, but I mean you

401
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Speaker 1: pick up a you know, and seven year old used car,

402
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Speaker 1: you take it in for the emissions test, you know,

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Speaker 1: as most people have to do now around big cities

404
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Speaker 1: at least um, you know, yearly before you get the

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Speaker 1: renewal of your tags or whatever. Um, there's always that

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Speaker 1: chance that they're gonna say, sorry, you're just over on

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Speaker 1: on this and UM here's the recommended fix. You've got

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Speaker 1: thirty days to make that fix. Otherwise you're not allowed

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Speaker 1: to drive this vehicle on Georgia Highways Georgia Rhodes and

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Speaker 1: UH and and you know, I think there's limits to

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Speaker 1: that too. You know, you can spend a certain dollar

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Speaker 1: amount on the fixes that I think you're limited, like,

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Speaker 1: you don't have to spend ten thousand dollars to get

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Speaker 1: your car client with whatever. But but you might have

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Speaker 1: to spend you know, a minimum or a maximum rather

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Speaker 1: of three dollars or whatever it happens to be. I

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Speaker 1: don't know the number, but they don't want you to

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Speaker 1: go crazy, you know, to have to make to make

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Speaker 1: the car twice as expensive as I find it's all

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Speaker 1: very funny. I find the whole emissions game kind of funny.

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Speaker 1: But yeah, because it's it's a balance between what is

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Speaker 1: supposed to be environmentally responsible, what is supposed to cause

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Speaker 1: the least amount of harmful effect on other people, but

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Speaker 1: also not supposed to break the bank. Yeah, I know,

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Speaker 1: but but you see what I mean though, And I

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Speaker 1: find this funny and we can talk about this maybe

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Speaker 1: in another podcast. I don't know, it seems to fit

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Speaker 1: here a little bit. But it's funny that if the

429
00:22:40,800 --> 00:22:43,119
Speaker 1: car doesn't pass, they say, well, you can spend three

430
00:22:43,520 --> 00:22:45,360
Speaker 1: dollars on it, and if it doesn't pass again, we'll

431
00:22:45,400 --> 00:22:47,600
Speaker 1: just kind of give you okay for this year. It's

432
00:22:47,600 --> 00:22:50,480
Speaker 1: like we're we're accepting that, you know, it's still not

433
00:22:50,640 --> 00:22:52,760
Speaker 1: compliant with our with our rules and regulations. And then

434
00:22:52,800 --> 00:22:55,359
Speaker 1: also your car can age out of this, so that

435
00:22:55,480 --> 00:22:57,960
Speaker 1: after ten years or fifteen years or whatever happens to me,

436
00:22:57,960 --> 00:23:00,040
Speaker 1: I think it's ten you don't have to have a

437
00:23:00,119 --> 00:23:02,879
Speaker 1: car emissions tested anymore to get your tags. And that

438
00:23:02,920 --> 00:23:04,879
Speaker 1: seems kind of stillyed me too, because at that point,

439
00:23:05,440 --> 00:23:07,359
Speaker 1: most of that stuff on your car is where and

440
00:23:07,400 --> 00:23:09,439
Speaker 1: out to the point where it's going to probably not

441
00:23:09,480 --> 00:23:12,480
Speaker 1: pass anyways. Right, the emissions are gonna be all right,

442
00:23:12,560 --> 00:23:14,560
Speaker 1: it's going to be beyond the emission standard. And those

443
00:23:14,600 --> 00:23:16,439
Speaker 1: are the heavy polluters, those are the ones that you know,

444
00:23:16,560 --> 00:23:18,840
Speaker 1: do admit more. So maybe they're thinking at that point

445
00:23:18,840 --> 00:23:21,639
Speaker 1: that you're not driving it as heavily as I don't know.

446
00:23:21,680 --> 00:23:23,800
Speaker 1: I mean, I'm I really when I look at this

447
00:23:23,840 --> 00:23:28,080
Speaker 1: from several different angles, the emissions testing thing, it's really confusing. Well,

448
00:23:28,119 --> 00:23:30,680
Speaker 1: I mean, and when we get into the Volkswagen stuff

449
00:23:30,680 --> 00:23:34,159
Speaker 1: in particular, it gets a little confusing because ultimately you

450
00:23:34,200 --> 00:23:37,399
Speaker 1: hear the news from the government saying, all right, if

451
00:23:37,440 --> 00:23:40,320
Speaker 1: you own Volkswagen, don't worry, you're not we're not going

452
00:23:40,359 --> 00:23:42,600
Speaker 1: to penalize you for that because it's not your fault.

453
00:23:43,280 --> 00:23:46,960
Speaker 1: So you're like, well, but it's still producing the pollution.

454
00:23:47,320 --> 00:23:50,200
Speaker 1: Let's say that I'll say I drove a Fiat from

455
00:23:50,320 --> 00:23:51,840
Speaker 1: I don't know. I'm gonna make this up ten years

456
00:23:51,880 --> 00:23:54,000
Speaker 1: ago or seven years ago, So it still has to

457
00:23:54,000 --> 00:23:57,560
Speaker 1: be emissions compliant. If that car doesn't pass, like I

458
00:23:57,600 --> 00:24:00,440
Speaker 1: just said, if it doesn't pass emissions, you have thirty

459
00:24:00,480 --> 00:24:02,879
Speaker 1: days to make the fixes. Otherwise you're not legally allowed

460
00:24:02,920 --> 00:24:06,840
Speaker 1: to drive that car. So they're saying, we're giving all

461
00:24:06,880 --> 00:24:09,080
Speaker 1: these Volkswagen vehicles that are on the road right now,

462
00:24:09,119 --> 00:24:11,560
Speaker 1: we that we know will pass the test, but they're

463
00:24:11,600 --> 00:24:14,840
Speaker 1: passing it. They're cheating, they're cheating, but we know that

464
00:24:14,880 --> 00:24:17,800
Speaker 1: they're not compliant, but we're allowing you the time until

465
00:24:17,880 --> 00:24:19,680
Speaker 1: Volkswagen comes back with a fix. So there's going to

466
00:24:19,760 --> 00:24:22,800
Speaker 1: be like this year or two years maybe where they

467
00:24:22,840 --> 00:24:27,000
Speaker 1: know what's happening. And again another confusing angle in this

468
00:24:27,040 --> 00:24:29,160
Speaker 1: whole thing. Yeah, because you know, it's like they're giving

469
00:24:29,160 --> 00:24:33,360
Speaker 1: a free pass. Yeah. And and I have some sympathy

470
00:24:33,400 --> 00:24:35,760
Speaker 1: for the for the government side of this, because how

471
00:24:35,800 --> 00:24:38,399
Speaker 1: do you deal with this otherwise do you just tell

472
00:24:38,640 --> 00:24:40,960
Speaker 1: I mean, you can't go and confiscate everyone's vehicle. You

473
00:24:41,000 --> 00:24:43,360
Speaker 1: can't take the keys from everybody's car and say this

474
00:24:43,400 --> 00:24:46,639
Speaker 1: is part until b W comes up with fix. Congratulations,

475
00:24:46,680 --> 00:24:49,680
Speaker 1: you've spent all that money on something that you can't use. Yeah,

476
00:24:50,160 --> 00:24:53,160
Speaker 1: it's it's a it's a complicated situation, all right. We

477
00:24:53,160 --> 00:24:56,840
Speaker 1: we talked about emissions. How do cars control emissions in

478
00:24:56,840 --> 00:24:59,959
Speaker 1: the first place, where the systems in a car, specifically

479
00:25:00,119 --> 00:25:04,399
Speaker 1: diesel engine car that are are designed in order to

480
00:25:04,520 --> 00:25:07,879
Speaker 1: reduce emissions of this nitrogen nitrogen oxide in particular, but

481
00:25:07,920 --> 00:25:10,160
Speaker 1: other stuff as well. And there are lots of things,

482
00:25:10,440 --> 00:25:13,680
Speaker 1: um that are part of this. Uh, there's their combustion

483
00:25:13,760 --> 00:25:16,840
Speaker 1: chambers that have been designed so that they can process

484
00:25:16,960 --> 00:25:19,480
Speaker 1: the fuel better before it gets released or burn it

485
00:25:19,520 --> 00:25:23,560
Speaker 1: off in a way where you're not gonna have nitrogen

486
00:25:23,600 --> 00:25:27,960
Speaker 1: oxide anymore as complete it burn as possible. Yeah, there

487
00:25:28,000 --> 00:25:31,720
Speaker 1: are some that are designed to use catalysts that will

488
00:25:31,880 --> 00:25:34,639
Speaker 1: make the nitrogen oxide break apart so as you get

489
00:25:34,720 --> 00:25:37,920
Speaker 1: nitrogen and oxygen, which that's there's no problem. There are

490
00:25:37,920 --> 00:25:41,240
Speaker 1: Our atmosphere is primarily nitrogen. Sure, and you're talking right now,

491
00:25:41,280 --> 00:25:46,400
Speaker 1: you're talking about after after it's gone through combustions, right. Yeah,

492
00:25:46,440 --> 00:25:48,560
Speaker 1: there are some that are in the combustion phase too,

493
00:25:48,640 --> 00:25:51,399
Speaker 1: like just the combustion chamber and fuel systems. Uh, lube

494
00:25:51,400 --> 00:25:53,679
Speaker 1: oil consumption can have an effect to if you if

495
00:25:53,720 --> 00:25:56,040
Speaker 1: you design your car so that it's much more efficient

496
00:25:56,080 --> 00:25:58,320
Speaker 1: with that or your engine, I should say, if it's

497
00:25:58,359 --> 00:26:00,600
Speaker 1: much more efficient than that. But there's also like particulate

498
00:26:00,640 --> 00:26:04,000
Speaker 1: filters on the on the end of it, Um, the

499
00:26:04,080 --> 00:26:07,920
Speaker 1: catalysts which can break up the nitrogen oxide into nitrogen

500
00:26:07,920 --> 00:26:11,800
Speaker 1: and oxygen. Are you talking about the the urea injection

501
00:26:11,840 --> 00:26:15,280
Speaker 1: systems which further burns the soot and so did the

502
00:26:15,320 --> 00:26:19,000
Speaker 1: particular filters those are those are kind of neat. Particular

503
00:26:19,000 --> 00:26:21,159
Speaker 1: filters are interesting to maybe because um, when I was

504
00:26:21,400 --> 00:26:25,480
Speaker 1: with Chrysler doing U technical training for you know, the

505
00:26:25,520 --> 00:26:30,880
Speaker 1: service people, um, the technicians there rather, UM, we were

506
00:26:31,040 --> 00:26:34,960
Speaker 1: talking about Dodge Ram pickup trucks that had a diesel

507
00:26:34,960 --> 00:26:39,120
Speaker 1: particular filter that would regenerate itself. So some of these

508
00:26:39,160 --> 00:26:42,080
Speaker 1: are single use where they fill up and one of

509
00:26:42,080 --> 00:26:45,399
Speaker 1: the byproducts of burning diesel fuel is soot. You get

510
00:26:45,440 --> 00:26:47,439
Speaker 1: a lot, there's a lot of soot that's left over,

511
00:26:47,480 --> 00:26:49,760
Speaker 1: and it's almost like an like an ash type product.

512
00:26:49,960 --> 00:26:52,920
Speaker 1: And you don't see ash really coming out of the

513
00:26:53,040 --> 00:26:56,760
Speaker 1: tailpipe of of diesel powered vehicles. So where does it

514
00:26:56,800 --> 00:26:58,720
Speaker 1: all go? Well, goes to these big filters and they're

515
00:26:58,760 --> 00:27:02,200
Speaker 1: called particular filters as you said, and the single use

516
00:27:02,240 --> 00:27:04,159
Speaker 1: ones that's pretty simple. I mean, the idea is that

517
00:27:04,200 --> 00:27:06,000
Speaker 1: it just fills up and eventually if you get it

518
00:27:06,040 --> 00:27:08,480
Speaker 1: emptied or replaced, kind of like a filter on a

519
00:27:08,880 --> 00:27:12,200
Speaker 1: on a like an air conditioning system. That's relatively rare

520
00:27:12,240 --> 00:27:14,879
Speaker 1: now I mean relatively there's still out there. But the

521
00:27:14,920 --> 00:27:17,240
Speaker 1: ones that really you're interesting to me. And oh the

522
00:27:17,280 --> 00:27:19,640
Speaker 1: other the other version of this would be the urea injection,

523
00:27:19,680 --> 00:27:22,680
Speaker 1: which further burned allows it to be further burned. Um,

524
00:27:22,720 --> 00:27:25,959
Speaker 1: and you have to refill that system every let's say,

525
00:27:26,000 --> 00:27:28,520
Speaker 1: every ten thousand miles or I think every five thousand miles,

526
00:27:28,520 --> 00:27:30,640
Speaker 1: and that's part of the fix will talk about. But um,

527
00:27:30,840 --> 00:27:34,040
Speaker 1: the regenerative ones. These things heat up to something like,

528
00:27:34,359 --> 00:27:37,520
Speaker 1: you know, six hundred degrees celsius or twelve hundred degrees celsius.

529
00:27:37,640 --> 00:27:39,840
Speaker 1: It gets really really hot, and it's it's hot enough

530
00:27:39,880 --> 00:27:43,240
Speaker 1: to burn soot. And when it happens is very interesting.

531
00:27:43,240 --> 00:27:45,560
Speaker 1: It happens on the highway when you're driving, because I mean,

532
00:27:45,600 --> 00:27:48,359
Speaker 1: imagine something underneath your vehicle that heats up to the

533
00:27:48,359 --> 00:27:51,840
Speaker 1: point where it's twelve hundred degrees Celsius's pretty If you

534
00:27:51,840 --> 00:27:55,320
Speaker 1: were parked on you know, grass like dry grass somewhere,

535
00:27:55,800 --> 00:27:58,240
Speaker 1: it would ignite the grass below. Parked on an asphalt,

536
00:27:58,240 --> 00:28:00,359
Speaker 1: you would melt it. If you're standing next to it,

537
00:28:00,520 --> 00:28:02,320
Speaker 1: I mean it would it would burn your leg. And

538
00:28:02,480 --> 00:28:04,280
Speaker 1: it's a it's a hot, hot thing. I mean that's

539
00:28:04,359 --> 00:28:08,080
Speaker 1: it's twice the temperature of a of a pizza oven. Um,

540
00:28:08,080 --> 00:28:10,359
Speaker 1: it's it's really really hot. And it was interesting to

541
00:28:10,359 --> 00:28:14,200
Speaker 1: see how they developed a way to to decide exactly

542
00:28:14,200 --> 00:28:17,680
Speaker 1: when it happens. And it's all electronically controlled. It's all

543
00:28:17,920 --> 00:28:19,639
Speaker 1: very precise in the way they do it. And it

544
00:28:19,680 --> 00:28:21,840
Speaker 1: has to be, obviously because if it if it weren't,

545
00:28:21,840 --> 00:28:24,600
Speaker 1: it wouldn't be safe for anybody you put in your garage.

546
00:28:24,600 --> 00:28:27,640
Speaker 1: And if it's still doing this regenerative thing, your house

547
00:28:27,720 --> 00:28:31,200
Speaker 1: is up in flames. Yeah, it's something we generally considered

548
00:28:31,200 --> 00:28:33,040
Speaker 1: to be a bad thing. Yeah, that would be. So

549
00:28:33,119 --> 00:28:34,800
Speaker 1: they had to be very careful about how they designed it,

550
00:28:34,840 --> 00:28:37,439
Speaker 1: but also very precise. And that's and that shows you

551
00:28:37,480 --> 00:28:42,280
Speaker 1: how um carefully they can decide when things happen electronically

552
00:28:42,360 --> 00:28:45,520
Speaker 1: in your car. So just one example, I guess. Yeah,

553
00:28:45,560 --> 00:28:47,800
Speaker 1: And so the the These systems are obviously the things

554
00:28:47,880 --> 00:28:53,640
Speaker 1: that allow a diesel well really any any engine for cars,

555
00:28:53,680 --> 00:28:56,200
Speaker 1: but we're specifically focused on diesel. These are the sort

556
00:28:56,240 --> 00:28:59,040
Speaker 1: of things that allow diesel engines to operate within those

557
00:28:59,080 --> 00:29:02,800
Speaker 1: emission standard parameters. But they do have an effect on

558
00:29:03,240 --> 00:29:07,120
Speaker 1: fuel efficiency and on and really on performance. And so

559
00:29:07,960 --> 00:29:10,680
Speaker 1: here's where we get into what Volkswagen did and where

560
00:29:11,000 --> 00:29:16,480
Speaker 1: the scandal comes in. So you've mentioned emission testing. That's

561
00:29:16,520 --> 00:29:19,280
Speaker 1: something that if you are living in certain cities you

562
00:29:19,360 --> 00:29:21,120
Speaker 1: have to go through before you can go and get

563
00:29:21,160 --> 00:29:24,440
Speaker 1: your tags renewed for the next year. I remember growing

564
00:29:24,520 --> 00:29:27,040
Speaker 1: up in rural Georgia that was not a thing. I

565
00:29:27,160 --> 00:29:29,240
Speaker 1: didn't know anything about it until I moved here to

566
00:29:29,280 --> 00:29:33,240
Speaker 1: Atlanta and I saw these kind of tent like structures

567
00:29:33,240 --> 00:29:36,200
Speaker 1: outside of usually you know, like a like a mechanics

568
00:29:36,280 --> 00:29:39,040
Speaker 1: or something you see and say emission testing bucks or

569
00:29:39,040 --> 00:29:41,720
Speaker 1: whatever it is, and I kept thinking like, well, what's

570
00:29:41,760 --> 00:29:44,280
Speaker 1: that for. And it wasn't until we didn't own a

571
00:29:44,360 --> 00:29:45,880
Speaker 1: car at first, to me and my wife, and when

572
00:29:45,920 --> 00:29:48,880
Speaker 1: we finally got one and we found out like, oh, okay,

573
00:29:49,120 --> 00:29:51,000
Speaker 1: that makes sense because you're in a you're in a

574
00:29:51,240 --> 00:29:53,440
Speaker 1: dense populated area where there are a lot of people,

575
00:29:53,520 --> 00:29:56,280
Speaker 1: especially in Atlanta, which is a very car centric city,

576
00:29:56,960 --> 00:29:58,880
Speaker 1: it makes sense for it to be there, but just

577
00:29:59,000 --> 00:30:01,440
Speaker 1: I had never in countered it before. Gets me every time.

578
00:30:01,560 --> 00:30:04,760
Speaker 1: It's your birthday because you're renewing your tags, so there's

579
00:30:04,800 --> 00:30:06,240
Speaker 1: you know, a hundred bucks right there they have to

580
00:30:06,240 --> 00:30:07,800
Speaker 1: pay out or whatever, and then they hit you with

581
00:30:07,800 --> 00:30:10,840
Speaker 1: another twenty dollars for emissions if your car fits that

582
00:30:10,920 --> 00:30:15,080
Speaker 1: certain parameter those you know, the year or whatever. You know, Yeah,

583
00:30:15,120 --> 00:30:17,800
Speaker 1: it's it all depends on like what year you bought

584
00:30:17,880 --> 00:30:20,600
Speaker 1: the car, and what model it was, and and how

585
00:30:20,840 --> 00:30:23,160
Speaker 1: how old is it and all that kind of stuff. Um,

586
00:30:23,240 --> 00:30:24,960
Speaker 1: I always feel like I need a degree to figure

587
00:30:24,960 --> 00:30:27,440
Speaker 1: out whether or not you get get the emissions testing.

588
00:30:27,440 --> 00:30:29,280
Speaker 1: You know, it's even more frustrated to me. I live.

589
00:30:29,360 --> 00:30:32,080
Speaker 1: I live in the extreme northern part of this county

590
00:30:32,520 --> 00:30:35,080
Speaker 1: the Atlanta is in. It's an odd shaped county, so

591
00:30:35,120 --> 00:30:37,440
Speaker 1: it's way way far away. It's like thirty miles away.

592
00:30:38,280 --> 00:30:40,120
Speaker 1: Not I mean, not even half a mile down the

593
00:30:40,200 --> 00:30:42,520
Speaker 1: road is the next county where they don't do emission

594
00:30:42,560 --> 00:30:44,760
Speaker 1: They don't do emissions testing, so I'm not even anywhere

595
00:30:44,800 --> 00:30:46,960
Speaker 1: near the city. But I still have to do this

596
00:30:47,000 --> 00:30:50,560
Speaker 1: emissions testing in the county. Yeah, exactly. Well, uh so

597
00:30:50,720 --> 00:30:52,840
Speaker 1: what was going on with the Volkswagen one was that

598
00:30:53,480 --> 00:30:57,760
Speaker 1: the car quote unquote new when it was being tested,

599
00:30:58,440 --> 00:31:01,560
Speaker 1: and it would turn on all the emissions controls, essentially

600
00:31:01,560 --> 00:31:05,160
Speaker 1: shutting out off emissions for the effectively shutting off emissions

601
00:31:05,200 --> 00:31:08,560
Speaker 1: for the duration of the test, so that during the

602
00:31:08,600 --> 00:31:12,960
Speaker 1: test phase, this clean diesel engine, which is the way

603
00:31:12,960 --> 00:31:17,920
Speaker 1: it was marketed as clean diesel vehicles, was remarkable. It

604
00:31:18,000 --> 00:31:22,040
Speaker 1: had performance, it had it was meeting the emission standard,

605
00:31:22,360 --> 00:31:27,000
Speaker 1: it had fuel economy. This was a miracle machine. Yeah,

606
00:31:27,000 --> 00:31:29,640
Speaker 1: and other manufacturers at the time we're kind of marveling

607
00:31:29,640 --> 00:31:31,959
Speaker 1: and how Volkswagen had done it. Now, Volkswagen have been

608
00:31:31,960 --> 00:31:34,440
Speaker 1: in the diesel game for a long time, so they thought, well,

609
00:31:34,640 --> 00:31:37,800
Speaker 1: this is superior German engineering. They've got some kind of

610
00:31:37,840 --> 00:31:39,680
Speaker 1: idea of how those works, and we just we just

611
00:31:39,720 --> 00:31:42,120
Speaker 1: can't seem to get the performance angle out of this

612
00:31:42,160 --> 00:31:43,680
Speaker 1: whole thing. You know, we can do the emissions, we

613
00:31:43,680 --> 00:31:45,800
Speaker 1: can do the fuel economy, we can't do the performance

614
00:31:46,000 --> 00:31:47,720
Speaker 1: where we can do It's that it's that old you

615
00:31:47,720 --> 00:31:50,040
Speaker 1: can do you know, pick two of those things. But

616
00:31:50,640 --> 00:31:52,440
Speaker 1: they were all scratching their heads like, well, how is

617
00:31:52,480 --> 00:31:56,440
Speaker 1: Volkswagen doing this? And it turns out this this hear

618
00:31:56,480 --> 00:31:59,560
Speaker 1: the term defeat device, and a lot of people will

619
00:31:59,600 --> 00:32:02,640
Speaker 1: picture a physical device you could hold in your hands. Yeah,

620
00:32:02,840 --> 00:32:06,160
Speaker 1: something something you would shove inside the exhaust pipe or something. Yeah.

621
00:32:06,200 --> 00:32:08,640
Speaker 1: So this term defeat device is a little bit deceptive

622
00:32:08,680 --> 00:32:11,480
Speaker 1: and that it's it's really just um, it's a software

623
00:32:11,520 --> 00:32:14,440
Speaker 1: code and that's all it is. It's a very cleverly

624
00:32:14,480 --> 00:32:18,479
Speaker 1: written line of soft incredibly clever because you know, my

625
00:32:18,560 --> 00:32:22,440
Speaker 1: first my first thought when I heard about the scandal

626
00:32:22,920 --> 00:32:27,440
Speaker 1: that they had installed software that would defeat the emissions

627
00:32:27,440 --> 00:32:31,240
Speaker 1: testing by by incorporating the emissions controls during the test

628
00:32:31,320 --> 00:32:33,880
Speaker 1: and then turning them off afterwards. So you get that

629
00:32:34,120 --> 00:32:39,400
Speaker 1: fuel efficiency and performance back, but you're emitting much more pollution.

630
00:32:39,440 --> 00:32:42,600
Speaker 1: At that time, my first reaction was, I wonder if

631
00:32:42,600 --> 00:32:46,360
Speaker 1: it's just when they connect the computer system like it

632
00:32:46,520 --> 00:32:50,200
Speaker 1: it it uh, it detects when the computer system gets

633
00:32:50,240 --> 00:32:52,800
Speaker 1: connected to it. No, it's way more subtle than that,

634
00:32:53,320 --> 00:32:55,560
Speaker 1: because there are other situations where you would use that,

635
00:32:55,640 --> 00:32:58,080
Speaker 1: and we knew that they knew that. You know, people

636
00:32:58,080 --> 00:33:00,800
Speaker 1: have their own home diagnostic tools can plug in we're

637
00:33:00,800 --> 00:33:03,960
Speaker 1: talking about the the O B D two ports, the

638
00:33:04,000 --> 00:33:07,480
Speaker 1: diagnostic ports on the driver's side, and it's it's it

639
00:33:07,520 --> 00:33:10,720
Speaker 1: goes far deeper than that because it takes into account

640
00:33:11,520 --> 00:33:13,800
Speaker 1: the wheel speed, it takes an account the position of

641
00:33:13,840 --> 00:33:17,640
Speaker 1: the steering wheel. Everything is read all you know, your

642
00:33:17,680 --> 00:33:20,080
Speaker 1: your car is talking all the time to other models,

643
00:33:20,080 --> 00:33:22,120
Speaker 1: are talking to other modules and figure out what's going on.

644
00:33:22,480 --> 00:33:25,960
Speaker 1: And they determined that they knew exactly the the parameters

645
00:33:26,000 --> 00:33:28,840
Speaker 1: that were set because these are government standards that are

646
00:33:28,920 --> 00:33:32,320
Speaker 1: in place for a vehicle emissions test and they're the

647
00:33:32,360 --> 00:33:36,440
Speaker 1: same everywhere. So it's very very easy to say, when

648
00:33:36,480 --> 00:33:38,600
Speaker 1: this condition is met, then you do this, and when

649
00:33:38,640 --> 00:33:40,720
Speaker 1: this has meant you do that, and if these two

650
00:33:40,760 --> 00:33:43,560
Speaker 1: things are met, then you do this. And it's so

651
00:33:44,080 --> 00:33:46,640
Speaker 1: it's so simple for them to cheat this way. I

652
00:33:46,680 --> 00:33:49,000
Speaker 1: don't know why other people haven't tried this in the past.

653
00:33:49,040 --> 00:33:51,640
Speaker 1: If well, maybe they have. It's possible, but this was

654
00:33:51,680 --> 00:33:53,800
Speaker 1: one where where it was found out. Yeah, it was.

655
00:33:53,840 --> 00:33:55,760
Speaker 1: It's like you said, it's very simple. It's an if

656
00:33:55,840 --> 00:34:01,200
Speaker 1: then right, if conditions are equivalent to a testing situation,

657
00:34:01,600 --> 00:34:06,200
Speaker 1: then engage the emission controls like that. That's that's basic

658
00:34:06,280 --> 00:34:10,360
Speaker 1: computer programming is the if then statement, and they obviously

659
00:34:10,400 --> 00:34:13,200
Speaker 1: we're oversimplifying for the purposes of this discussion, but that's

660
00:34:13,280 --> 00:34:18,759
Speaker 1: that's the basic model they followed, which is incredibly subversive

661
00:34:18,760 --> 00:34:20,680
Speaker 1: and brilliant at the same time. Yeah, I mean there

662
00:34:20,719 --> 00:34:22,839
Speaker 1: could I don't know how many parameters they've got here,

663
00:34:22,840 --> 00:34:25,480
Speaker 1: but there could be ten different indicators that the vehicle

664
00:34:25,640 --> 00:34:29,480
Speaker 1: is an emissions testing bedpoint and and then you react

665
00:34:29,520 --> 00:34:31,400
Speaker 1: this way. But then once you unplug all that and

666
00:34:31,440 --> 00:34:33,799
Speaker 1: you're on your way, we don't want that. We don't

667
00:34:33,840 --> 00:34:35,919
Speaker 1: want it to react that way. Because the driver was saying,

668
00:34:36,239 --> 00:34:37,759
Speaker 1: you know, I went in for emissions testing in the

669
00:34:37,760 --> 00:34:40,719
Speaker 1: car fels like it's broken so wrong. It's not responding

670
00:34:40,719 --> 00:34:43,440
Speaker 1: the way it should. I'm not getting the fuel economy

671
00:34:43,480 --> 00:34:45,200
Speaker 1: that I was getting before. Why do you guys do

672
00:34:45,239 --> 00:34:48,640
Speaker 1: to my car? So? Uh. One of the two thousand

673
00:34:48,719 --> 00:34:51,560
Speaker 1: sixteen thing that I was mentioning before, Volkswagen has revealed

674
00:34:51,600 --> 00:34:55,000
Speaker 1: that it has an emission control system that might only

675
00:34:55,120 --> 00:34:57,560
Speaker 1: engage during tests. I got the feeling like this the

676
00:34:57,600 --> 00:35:00,040
Speaker 1: way it's been reported, it sounds like someone who's it

677
00:35:00,080 --> 00:35:01,960
Speaker 1: had been caught doing something wrong. And then when they

678
00:35:01,960 --> 00:35:04,319
Speaker 1: are directly asked, hey, did you also do this like

679
00:35:05,360 --> 00:35:08,760
Speaker 1: it might be well, not against the rules. It plays

680
00:35:08,880 --> 00:35:11,720
Speaker 1: right into why would they build the models any different

681
00:35:11,719 --> 00:35:14,520
Speaker 1: than they did because fourteens and all the way back

682
00:35:14,520 --> 00:35:17,279
Speaker 1: to oh eight, because they knew what worked and they

683
00:35:17,320 --> 00:35:19,240
Speaker 1: hadn't been caught at that point yet. They had already

684
00:35:19,280 --> 00:35:23,080
Speaker 1: manufactured those cars. Yeah, and the two thousand sixteen one

685
00:35:23,120 --> 00:35:25,560
Speaker 1: has the additional element and that it heats up a

686
00:35:25,600 --> 00:35:28,080
Speaker 1: pollution control catalyst. And that's the thing that I was

687
00:35:28,080 --> 00:35:30,280
Speaker 1: talking about, you know, separating out the nitrogen and oxygen,

688
00:35:30,560 --> 00:35:34,120
Speaker 1: the nitrogen oxide into nitrogen and oxygen. That's what the

689
00:35:34,880 --> 00:35:39,399
Speaker 1: models have. Yeah, they had installed Lean Knox traps and

690
00:35:39,400 --> 00:35:41,719
Speaker 1: in certain vehicles and in other vehicles, you know, like

691
00:35:41,760 --> 00:35:44,200
Speaker 1: after two thousand twelve they installed something that called the

692
00:35:44,320 --> 00:35:49,239
Speaker 1: selective catalytic reduction systems and uh in you know, I

693
00:35:49,280 --> 00:35:52,120
Speaker 1: guess that's the one with the liquid urea solution that

694
00:35:52,160 --> 00:35:53,520
Speaker 1: was sprayed into it. So it's a it's a much

695
00:35:53,520 --> 00:35:56,879
Speaker 1: more complex system than the Lean Knox traps. But um

696
00:35:57,800 --> 00:35:59,880
Speaker 1: that that him self is gonna be a problem for

697
00:36:00,160 --> 00:36:02,560
Speaker 1: Wagon because they have to deal with all these different

698
00:36:02,600 --> 00:36:05,799
Speaker 1: vehicles in different ways. They need different things for the fix.

699
00:36:05,880 --> 00:36:08,719
Speaker 1: And I can outline that later. Yeah, just a quick

700
00:36:08,760 --> 00:36:11,239
Speaker 1: example if you if you look up the news that

701
00:36:11,320 --> 00:36:13,680
Speaker 1: you hear that like some of the models of the

702
00:36:13,680 --> 00:36:19,600
Speaker 1: facade were had twenty times the the allotted you know,

703
00:36:19,640 --> 00:36:22,359
Speaker 1: the allowable amount of emissions when it was in its

704
00:36:22,719 --> 00:36:26,799
Speaker 1: normal driving operation and I'm outside of the emissions test, right,

705
00:36:26,840 --> 00:36:28,840
Speaker 1: And the Jetta was even worse. It could be between

706
00:36:28,880 --> 00:36:30,799
Speaker 1: fifteen and thirty five times. Some of them were up

707
00:36:30,800 --> 00:36:36,200
Speaker 1: to forty times the allowed amount of emissions of nitrogen oxized. Here,

708
00:36:36,200 --> 00:36:37,799
Speaker 1: I'm gonna guess that those are the ones that were

709
00:36:37,840 --> 00:36:41,200
Speaker 1: just the lean, the Lean Knox Traps equipped ones, because

710
00:36:41,239 --> 00:36:45,319
Speaker 1: that's kind of other manufacturers were saying, how can you

711
00:36:45,400 --> 00:36:47,759
Speaker 1: get these these standard? He can you meet these standards

712
00:36:48,200 --> 00:36:50,839
Speaker 1: with just a Lean Knox trap It's there's just no way.

713
00:36:51,000 --> 00:36:53,440
Speaker 1: We can't. We can't do it. How are you doing it? Yeah?

714
00:36:53,600 --> 00:36:55,719
Speaker 1: That was the magic. Where's the lepre con inside your

715
00:36:55,760 --> 00:36:59,800
Speaker 1: engine that's allowing this to happen. So here's a fun fact. Uh,

716
00:37:00,080 --> 00:37:02,200
Speaker 1: did you did you run across the name of the

717
00:37:02,239 --> 00:37:07,759
Speaker 1: engineer who who is credited as discovering this. He's got

718
00:37:07,760 --> 00:37:10,799
Speaker 1: a perfect name, all right. So it's Volkswagen that has

719
00:37:10,840 --> 00:37:13,480
Speaker 1: been called out on this. The name of the engineer

720
00:37:14,480 --> 00:37:18,600
Speaker 1: U S engineer whose discovery essentially led to the unveiling

721
00:37:18,600 --> 00:37:22,640
Speaker 1: of this scandal is John German. No way, yeah, really

722
00:37:23,360 --> 00:37:29,120
Speaker 1: he's he's German, the engineer, but not a German engineer. Yeah.

723
00:37:29,200 --> 00:37:33,200
Speaker 1: And this is a private agency, right, yeah, Actually he was. Um,

724
00:37:33,480 --> 00:37:38,040
Speaker 1: so he also works not just with engineering, but he

725
00:37:38,080 --> 00:37:41,959
Speaker 1: works with a uh kind of an environmental protection sort

726
00:37:42,000 --> 00:37:45,320
Speaker 1: of organization. But he's not with the US government. No, No,

727
00:37:45,440 --> 00:37:47,799
Speaker 1: he was not. Uh And so originally, in fact, he

728
00:37:47,880 --> 00:37:50,280
Speaker 1: handed that information over to the US government. So originally

729
00:37:50,920 --> 00:37:55,359
Speaker 1: what he was doing was purely he didn't suspect Volkswagen

730
00:37:55,360 --> 00:37:58,239
Speaker 1: of doing anything hinky. What he was doing was he

731
00:37:58,280 --> 00:38:01,600
Speaker 1: was looking at the nitrog an ox side emissions, the

732
00:38:01,680 --> 00:38:05,640
Speaker 1: NOx emissions in Europe and seeing how how out of

733
00:38:05,680 --> 00:38:08,960
Speaker 1: control they were in certain regions, and then looking at

734
00:38:09,080 --> 00:38:13,200
Speaker 1: the data for the United States and saying, well, I mean,

735
00:38:13,239 --> 00:38:15,920
Speaker 1: obviously there's a difference between the number of diesel vehicles

736
00:38:15,920 --> 00:38:17,839
Speaker 1: on the road in Europe and those in the US.

737
00:38:17,920 --> 00:38:21,400
Speaker 1: But he was saying, but he was saying, well, you know,

738
00:38:21,440 --> 00:38:23,880
Speaker 1: there's there's something clearly happening over here in the US,

739
00:38:24,000 --> 00:38:28,560
Speaker 1: like the Volkswagen cars are amazing. Uh, maybe we can

740
00:38:28,600 --> 00:38:31,399
Speaker 1: look into the engineering of the Volkswagen cars and give

741
00:38:31,440 --> 00:38:35,719
Speaker 1: advice to European automakers to help out Europe. So it

742
00:38:35,760 --> 00:38:39,040
Speaker 1: was it was purely in an approach to help someone

743
00:38:39,160 --> 00:38:42,080
Speaker 1: else out that he even started looking into this. But

744
00:38:42,160 --> 00:38:44,680
Speaker 1: he's then essentially what he did was he was measuring

745
00:38:44,719 --> 00:38:47,960
Speaker 1: these levels on the road as like a highway travel

746
00:38:48,040 --> 00:38:51,120
Speaker 1: or city travel versus in a lab environment. Yes, he

747
00:38:51,239 --> 00:38:54,840
Speaker 1: specifically started looking at how the cars were performing in

748
00:38:54,920 --> 00:38:59,560
Speaker 1: various environments and discovered there were vast inconsistencies, So real

749
00:38:59,600 --> 00:39:04,000
Speaker 1: world's situations versus lab situation exactly as dramatically well in

750
00:39:04,000 --> 00:39:06,960
Speaker 1: this case, well extremely different in the case of Volkswagen

751
00:39:06,960 --> 00:39:10,719
Speaker 1: in particular. Yes, and so at this point he's saying, huh,

752
00:39:10,920 --> 00:39:14,960
Speaker 1: something is really off about this, and was tempted to

753
00:39:15,040 --> 00:39:19,280
Speaker 1: even perhaps call it a defeat device at that stage,

754
00:39:19,280 --> 00:39:22,080
Speaker 1: but he did not. He instead handed the data over

755
00:39:22,160 --> 00:39:25,680
Speaker 1: to the e p A and as a courtesy, handed

756
00:39:25,680 --> 00:39:29,840
Speaker 1: the report over to Volkswagen as well in two thousand

757
00:39:29,920 --> 00:39:34,319
Speaker 1: fourteen May two thousand fourteen, so it's been more than

758
00:39:34,360 --> 00:39:38,560
Speaker 1: a year since this data got to Volkswagen, and German

759
00:39:38,680 --> 00:39:41,280
Speaker 1: says the reason he sent it to Volkswagen was because

760
00:39:41,360 --> 00:39:45,880
Speaker 1: perhaps it was legitimate oversight, something like maybe it was

761
00:39:46,040 --> 00:39:48,480
Speaker 1: a fault in part of the engineering that could be

762
00:39:48,520 --> 00:39:52,960
Speaker 1: addressed and fixed, that there might be an honest mistake here.

763
00:39:53,120 --> 00:39:55,480
Speaker 1: And you know, he was giving them a huge benefit

764
00:39:55,480 --> 00:39:57,239
Speaker 1: of the doubt. Sure, he might even be thinking that

765
00:39:57,320 --> 00:40:00,799
Speaker 1: it's in this one particular line of vehicles, maybe there's

766
00:40:00,840 --> 00:40:02,520
Speaker 1: a problem with that, or maybe it's a it's very

767
00:40:03,040 --> 00:40:05,200
Speaker 1: it could be very very simple for you to change this.

768
00:40:05,239 --> 00:40:07,480
Speaker 1: But he had no idea that this was the tip

769
00:40:07,520 --> 00:40:09,919
Speaker 1: of the iceberg. So the e p A starts looking

770
00:40:09,920 --> 00:40:12,279
Speaker 1: into it, and it wasn't until September of this year

771
00:40:13,800 --> 00:40:17,200
Speaker 1: that Volkswagen essentially came out and said you got us.

772
00:40:17,440 --> 00:40:20,279
Speaker 1: Oh boy, yeah, you know what. I Okay, they've known

773
00:40:20,320 --> 00:40:21,759
Speaker 1: about it for a while. You you do have to

774
00:40:21,760 --> 00:40:24,440
Speaker 1: give them some some credit, uh, to come right out

775
00:40:24,480 --> 00:40:26,520
Speaker 1: and say like, yeah, you you got us, you got

776
00:40:26,560 --> 00:40:30,120
Speaker 1: us fare and square out. They they said that due

777
00:40:30,120 --> 00:40:34,239
Speaker 1: to some rogue software developers, like no one has come

778
00:40:34,239 --> 00:40:37,400
Speaker 1: out to the point in Volkswagen to say this was

779
00:40:37,680 --> 00:40:40,920
Speaker 1: a decision like they're not willing to say this decision

780
00:40:40,960 --> 00:40:43,000
Speaker 1: goes all the way to the top. Yeah, it's more

781
00:40:43,120 --> 00:40:47,680
Speaker 1: like someone lowered down made this decision without our our knowledge,

782
00:40:47,840 --> 00:40:50,359
Speaker 1: and that's and we're suffering for although the top guy

783
00:40:50,400 --> 00:40:53,440
Speaker 1: did step down. Yes, yeah, so I mean it's uh,

784
00:40:53,480 --> 00:40:57,480
Speaker 1: it's it's definitely affected uh, their corporate structure as well. Yes,

785
00:40:57,680 --> 00:41:00,440
Speaker 1: in the last month, it'll and it will continue to

786
00:41:00,480 --> 00:41:03,400
Speaker 1: affect them heavily in the oncoming months. Yeah. Yeah, this

787
00:41:03,480 --> 00:41:06,440
Speaker 1: is so far reaching. I mean I I sometimes sit around,

788
00:41:06,440 --> 00:41:08,680
Speaker 1: like at my desk, I'm thinking about like just the

789
00:41:08,680 --> 00:41:11,880
Speaker 1: the sheer volume of vehicles not only here in the

790
00:41:11,920 --> 00:41:15,560
Speaker 1: United States but worldwide vehicles or so, Yeah, we have

791
00:41:15,880 --> 00:41:18,560
Speaker 1: wet half a million here and it's a big deal here.

792
00:41:18,719 --> 00:41:20,880
Speaker 1: I can't imagine what it's like over there, What's what

793
00:41:20,880 --> 00:41:23,400
Speaker 1: they're going through over there. But I just think about

794
00:41:23,440 --> 00:41:26,160
Speaker 1: like the pure logistics of this whole thing, with some

795
00:41:26,200 --> 00:41:28,520
Speaker 1: of the fixes that they're proposing and all that, and

796
00:41:28,560 --> 00:41:31,680
Speaker 1: the time involved and the money involved, and you know,

797
00:41:31,719 --> 00:41:34,279
Speaker 1: are they you know the bigger questions are they going

798
00:41:34,320 --> 00:41:36,600
Speaker 1: to come back from this? Are they gonna what's this

799
00:41:36,640 --> 00:41:40,040
Speaker 1: gonna do to Diesel's reputation not only not only here

800
00:41:40,120 --> 00:41:42,880
Speaker 1: but worldwide. I mean, everybody kind of bought into this.

801
00:41:42,960 --> 00:41:45,600
Speaker 1: It's you know, we get listen and we get listener

802
00:41:45,600 --> 00:41:48,040
Speaker 1: mail all the time from listeners in Europe that prior

803
00:41:48,120 --> 00:41:50,800
Speaker 1: to this, we're saying, why aren't you guys on diesel,

804
00:41:50,880 --> 00:41:52,480
Speaker 1: like we are over here in Europe, why aren't you

805
00:41:52,520 --> 00:41:54,799
Speaker 1: Why aren't you doing that? And I mean it's one

806
00:41:54,800 --> 00:41:56,279
Speaker 1: of those things where you look at it and you

807
00:41:56,320 --> 00:41:59,520
Speaker 1: think it's a lie that we want to believe. Right,

808
00:41:59,600 --> 00:42:03,000
Speaker 1: it's a venient lie because it gives us the feeling

809
00:42:03,040 --> 00:42:07,200
Speaker 1: that we're not contributing to pollution and we're getting the

810
00:42:07,200 --> 00:42:09,440
Speaker 1: the performance we want out of our vehicles and the

811
00:42:09,440 --> 00:42:12,719
Speaker 1: fuel economy we want out of our vehicles. If you

812
00:42:12,800 --> 00:42:16,040
Speaker 1: tell me that lie, I am probably inclined to believe

813
00:42:16,080 --> 00:42:19,360
Speaker 1: it because it's to everyone. It seems to be to

814
00:42:19,480 --> 00:42:22,080
Speaker 1: everyone's benefit until you strip away the lie and realize

815
00:42:22,080 --> 00:42:24,080
Speaker 1: how much pollution is actually being dumped out there. A

816
00:42:24,120 --> 00:42:26,360
Speaker 1: lot of people felt really good about driving you know,

817
00:42:26,480 --> 00:42:28,400
Speaker 1: clean diesel engines. I mean, it's right there in the

818
00:42:28,480 --> 00:42:31,319
Speaker 1: name clean diesel. So people felt really good about going

819
00:42:31,360 --> 00:42:33,200
Speaker 1: to VW and picking up a you know, t D

820
00:42:33,280 --> 00:42:37,319
Speaker 1: I equipped t D equipped vehicle and being happy about that,

821
00:42:37,360 --> 00:42:41,200
Speaker 1: like I'm doing my part, yeah, Like I'm being responsible adult.

822
00:42:41,239 --> 00:42:44,240
Speaker 1: I'm not getting one of those gas guzzlers that's eating

823
00:42:44,280 --> 00:42:47,080
Speaker 1: up gasoline and pouring out tons of carbon monoxide out

824
00:42:47,120 --> 00:42:50,320
Speaker 1: into the atmosphere. Uh yeah. And according to the Guardian,

825
00:42:50,360 --> 00:42:52,920
Speaker 1: this is something you guys covered on Scott You were

826
00:42:52,960 --> 00:42:55,080
Speaker 1: on an episode of Forward Thinking with Joe and Lauren

827
00:42:55,320 --> 00:42:57,200
Speaker 1: while I was out on vacation and talked about this.

828
00:42:57,239 --> 00:42:59,959
Speaker 1: But the Guardian estimated that it could have been around

829
00:43:00,360 --> 00:43:04,320
Speaker 1: nine almost nine fifty thousand metric tons of nitrous oxide

830
00:43:04,360 --> 00:43:08,560
Speaker 1: or nitrogen oxide emissions every year that this was this

831
00:43:08,600 --> 00:43:11,400
Speaker 1: technology was out there. See what the numbers are just immense.

832
00:43:11,480 --> 00:43:14,000
Speaker 1: I mean, it's it's all of this, this whole thing.

833
00:43:14,120 --> 00:43:15,719
Speaker 1: And when you go back all the way to the

834
00:43:15,760 --> 00:43:18,040
Speaker 1: two thousand eight model, you're you thinking that, well, this

835
00:43:18,080 --> 00:43:20,640
Speaker 1: has been happening for seven years, for eight years now

836
00:43:20,640 --> 00:43:24,319
Speaker 1: at this point, I guess model years. Um, it's just

837
00:43:24,400 --> 00:43:28,600
Speaker 1: such a big, big problem. It's so enormous in all aspects.

838
00:43:29,480 --> 00:43:32,080
Speaker 1: I really am having a hard time seeing how Volkswagon

839
00:43:32,160 --> 00:43:35,080
Speaker 1: recovers from this. Right. And and as we pointed out earlier,

840
00:43:35,120 --> 00:43:38,520
Speaker 1: if you already have one of these vehicles, then until

841
00:43:38,600 --> 00:43:40,960
Speaker 1: there is a fix, you're going to continue to contribute

842
00:43:40,960 --> 00:43:44,360
Speaker 1: to that that pollution. And it's not because you're a

843
00:43:44,360 --> 00:43:48,040
Speaker 1: bad person. It's because the car itself, the way it's designed.

844
00:43:48,719 --> 00:43:50,600
Speaker 1: That's that's just how it works. I mean to put

845
00:43:50,600 --> 00:43:53,839
Speaker 1: it bluntly, you were sold a lie and you bought

846
00:43:53,880 --> 00:43:56,759
Speaker 1: that lie. But you know why, it wasn't your fault.

847
00:43:57,200 --> 00:44:00,160
Speaker 1: The government bought that lie too, because because they the

848
00:44:00,200 --> 00:44:03,399
Speaker 1: wool was pulled over its eye. Yeah, I just kind

849
00:44:03,400 --> 00:44:05,920
Speaker 1: of come clean. I drive a Volkswagen, but it's not

850
00:44:05,960 --> 00:44:07,960
Speaker 1: a diesel. I think I mentioned that in the Forward

851
00:44:07,960 --> 00:44:10,040
Speaker 1: Thinking episode two, and I love it. I mean I

852
00:44:10,280 --> 00:44:12,560
Speaker 1: have it's a great engine. It's a lot of fun,

853
00:44:12,560 --> 00:44:15,160
Speaker 1: but it's a gasoline burning engine. So I'm not involved

854
00:44:15,160 --> 00:44:17,319
Speaker 1: in all this. And I gotta say that when I

855
00:44:17,400 --> 00:44:19,560
Speaker 1: when I see a Volkswagen on the road now, I

856
00:44:19,640 --> 00:44:21,960
Speaker 1: consciously look to the lower right corner of the back

857
00:44:22,040 --> 00:44:24,359
Speaker 1: end of the vehicle and I try to see if

858
00:44:24,400 --> 00:44:26,000
Speaker 1: it's a t d I equipped and a t D

859
00:44:26,080 --> 00:44:29,759
Speaker 1: equipped vehicle, And I just think, like, what is that

860
00:44:29,840 --> 00:44:32,279
Speaker 1: person going through right now? They're dealing with, you know,

861
00:44:32,280 --> 00:44:34,000
Speaker 1: they bought a car that they thought was you know,

862
00:44:34,040 --> 00:44:36,600
Speaker 1: all the things we said it and it's not. Uh,

863
00:44:36,640 --> 00:44:39,120
Speaker 1: they're gonna have to deal with the dealership very soon

864
00:44:39,160 --> 00:44:41,120
Speaker 1: about you know, what they're going to do to fix

865
00:44:41,160 --> 00:44:43,240
Speaker 1: this and how they're gonna do it. Um, it depends

866
00:44:43,280 --> 00:44:45,840
Speaker 1: on what make and model you have, what they're gonna do,

867
00:44:45,880 --> 00:44:48,239
Speaker 1: how they're gonna handle it. Um. It's not gonna cost

868
00:44:48,280 --> 00:44:50,120
Speaker 1: you anything except it is going to be very very

869
00:44:50,160 --> 00:44:52,440
Speaker 1: inconvenient for you in the near future. And do you

870
00:44:52,480 --> 00:44:55,919
Speaker 1: continue to trust that manufacturer with with those people? Buy

871
00:44:55,920 --> 00:44:58,759
Speaker 1: another Volkswagen when all this is said and done. Yeah,

872
00:44:58,800 --> 00:45:02,160
Speaker 1: when when the two thousand seventeen models, presumably assuming that

873
00:45:02,200 --> 00:45:05,399
Speaker 1: Volkswagen is able to produce them, when they come out,

874
00:45:05,440 --> 00:45:08,560
Speaker 1: would they buy a diesel engine two thousand seventeen Volkswagen

875
00:45:08,600 --> 00:45:10,400
Speaker 1: and well, other people that maybe we're kind of on

876
00:45:10,440 --> 00:45:12,719
Speaker 1: the fence about Volkswagen, you know, they were considering it

877
00:45:12,760 --> 00:45:15,600
Speaker 1: up until this point, or maybe someone just narrowly missed

878
00:45:15,640 --> 00:45:17,560
Speaker 1: buying one or just bought one the day the things

879
00:45:17,719 --> 00:45:20,319
Speaker 1: that this scandal broke. What do they do? I mean,

880
00:45:20,320 --> 00:45:23,719
Speaker 1: there's so many individual situations that I'm really curious about

881
00:45:23,800 --> 00:45:27,320
Speaker 1: right now, and it ripples out so far. So we've

882
00:45:27,320 --> 00:45:30,960
Speaker 1: heard the term that that they could be facing billions

883
00:45:30,960 --> 00:45:33,480
Speaker 1: of dollars in fines and In fact, early on in

884
00:45:33,520 --> 00:45:36,040
Speaker 1: this story, it was said that Volkswagen had already set

885
00:45:36,040 --> 00:45:40,440
Speaker 1: aside like seven point three billion dollars for fines. Right now,

886
00:45:40,480 --> 00:45:44,959
Speaker 1: the Guardian estimates that the amount of fines may accumulate

887
00:45:45,040 --> 00:45:50,160
Speaker 1: to around eighteen billion dollars. Now that matches what I

888
00:45:50,200 --> 00:45:52,640
Speaker 1: heard initially. The very first number I heard was like

889
00:45:52,719 --> 00:45:55,960
Speaker 1: eighteen points seven billion dollars in d p A finds

890
00:45:56,480 --> 00:45:59,080
Speaker 1: strictly here for the United States. Now going beyond that,

891
00:45:59,120 --> 00:46:01,880
Speaker 1: there's gonna be is to pay elsewhere well, because they

892
00:46:01,920 --> 00:46:06,680
Speaker 1: have agreements with European nations as well. So I don't

893
00:46:06,760 --> 00:46:09,279
Speaker 1: know how you come back from something like this, I

894
00:46:09,320 --> 00:46:11,279
Speaker 1: really don't. I mean, you can save, you can put

895
00:46:11,280 --> 00:46:14,360
Speaker 1: money away, and they and you know, they have profitable quarters.

896
00:46:14,360 --> 00:46:15,880
Speaker 1: I'm sure that you know. I haven't looked at the

897
00:46:15,960 --> 00:46:17,759
Speaker 1: numbers of how much they make per quarter up to

898
00:46:17,840 --> 00:46:21,200
Speaker 1: this point. But there's no way they're squirreling all that way.

899
00:46:21,200 --> 00:46:23,279
Speaker 1: They're using it for new products, they're putting it back

900
00:46:23,280 --> 00:46:26,080
Speaker 1: into the business. Of course, they desperately need another love

901
00:46:26,120 --> 00:46:30,279
Speaker 1: Bug movie. That's that's gonna do it. Huh yeah, Well,

902
00:46:30,440 --> 00:46:32,440
Speaker 1: if you wonder now if Disney will ever show the

903
00:46:32,480 --> 00:46:37,400
Speaker 1: love Bug ever again after this, Uh, that was not involved. No, no, no,

904
00:46:37,640 --> 00:46:40,440
Speaker 1: are you trying to implicate Lindsay Lohan in this. I'm

905
00:46:40,440 --> 00:46:42,120
Speaker 1: talking about the new one. I'm going back to the

906
00:46:42,160 --> 00:46:48,560
Speaker 1: original because I loved the original. Yeah, I love that.

907
00:46:48,760 --> 00:46:51,879
Speaker 1: It was fantastic film. I love it. Um No. One

908
00:46:51,880 --> 00:46:53,239
Speaker 1: of the other things I wanted to mention, though, if

909
00:46:53,239 --> 00:46:56,720
Speaker 1: you were talking about ripple effect, this gets super crazy.

910
00:46:56,760 --> 00:47:01,960
Speaker 1: This could contribute to a severe economic downturn in Europe

911
00:47:02,480 --> 00:47:05,719
Speaker 1: for multiple reasons. UM. One is that the confidence of

912
00:47:05,719 --> 00:47:10,719
Speaker 1: a major European manufacturer has gone into sharp decline for

913
00:47:10,800 --> 00:47:16,880
Speaker 1: obvious reasons UM. And it has prompted several strategists, equity

914
00:47:16,920 --> 00:47:20,600
Speaker 1: strategists over at Bloomberg to readjust what their predictions were

915
00:47:21,040 --> 00:47:24,360
Speaker 1: for the stocks Europe six hundred index, and they have

916
00:47:24,400 --> 00:47:28,520
Speaker 1: adjusted it lower than what they had predicted. And because

917
00:47:28,719 --> 00:47:34,040
Speaker 1: of Volkswagen's association with China as well and the Chinese

918
00:47:34,080 --> 00:47:37,520
Speaker 1: markets which are very uncertain, this whole mess could get

919
00:47:37,840 --> 00:47:41,480
Speaker 1: really ugly from an economic standpoint, which I'm not gonna

920
00:47:41,520 --> 00:47:44,839
Speaker 1: get into because this is not an economics podcast and

921
00:47:45,200 --> 00:47:48,640
Speaker 1: I am in no way qualified to talk about that

922
00:47:48,840 --> 00:47:51,799
Speaker 1: that aspect of it. But it's kind of like when

923
00:47:51,840 --> 00:47:54,560
Speaker 1: you start pulling back and pulling back and pulling back,

924
00:47:54,560 --> 00:47:56,520
Speaker 1: you keep asking, am I am I back far enough?

925
00:47:56,560 --> 00:47:58,800
Speaker 1: Am I seeing the full picture yet? You know, just

926
00:47:58,800 --> 00:48:01,319
Speaker 1: just to tell you that, this last weekend, I was

927
00:48:01,320 --> 00:48:03,840
Speaker 1: out with a couple of friends, my wife and I

928
00:48:04,320 --> 00:48:06,479
Speaker 1: and uh, this couple that we were out with said

929
00:48:06,520 --> 00:48:10,560
Speaker 1: that they were um buying Volkswagen stock right now because

930
00:48:10,640 --> 00:48:13,319
Speaker 1: it's at a low point. And I was thinking, I

931
00:48:13,320 --> 00:48:14,680
Speaker 1: don't know, is that a good move or is that

932
00:48:14,760 --> 00:48:18,479
Speaker 1: a bad move? And I was thinking at the moment,

933
00:48:18,520 --> 00:48:19,839
Speaker 1: I said, you know what, that's probably a good move

934
00:48:19,880 --> 00:48:22,560
Speaker 1: because it's probably gonna come back. It's probably gonna you know, rebound,

935
00:48:22,600 --> 00:48:25,359
Speaker 1: and everything's gonna be fine. But the more I hear

936
00:48:25,400 --> 00:48:27,560
Speaker 1: about this, the last couple of weeks that I've been,

937
00:48:27,920 --> 00:48:31,479
Speaker 1: you know, studying this, and especially this last week, when

938
00:48:32,120 --> 00:48:34,839
Speaker 1: the enormity of this situation is really just finally hit

939
00:48:34,880 --> 00:48:38,120
Speaker 1: me how big this is, I don't really know. I

940
00:48:38,160 --> 00:48:40,239
Speaker 1: don't know if that is a good investment or not. Yeah,

941
00:48:40,640 --> 00:48:42,800
Speaker 1: I mean, I can't say for sure. And the stock

942
00:48:42,840 --> 00:48:45,480
Speaker 1: price went from like a hundred and sixty seven dollars

943
00:48:46,080 --> 00:48:50,880
Speaker 1: before the announcement of the discovery of this cheating or

944
00:48:50,880 --> 00:48:53,160
Speaker 1: at least the public unveiling that you know, this was

945
00:48:53,200 --> 00:48:55,880
Speaker 1: a thing uh today when I checked it earlier, it

946
00:48:55,880 --> 00:48:57,600
Speaker 1: was a hundred and two dollars. So it does the

947
00:48:57,640 --> 00:49:00,440
Speaker 1: smart money buy right now? Or do you wait and see?

948
00:49:00,480 --> 00:49:03,680
Speaker 1: Because if you're talking about a company that maybe facing

949
00:49:03,760 --> 00:49:06,319
Speaker 1: up to eighteen billion dollars in fines and we don't

950
00:49:06,360 --> 00:49:09,120
Speaker 1: know that that's the full extent yet, I would be

951
00:49:09,160 --> 00:49:12,439
Speaker 1: nervous to put money in that because I would think

952
00:49:12,440 --> 00:49:15,399
Speaker 1: like this company might fall a little further before it

953
00:49:15,560 --> 00:49:17,840
Speaker 1: bottoms out. It's probably not not the bottom yet. I

954
00:49:17,840 --> 00:49:20,160
Speaker 1: think we can both agree with that. I mean, and plus,

955
00:49:21,040 --> 00:49:24,120
Speaker 1: you know these fixes that they've outlined just this last week, Uh,

956
00:49:24,480 --> 00:49:29,279
Speaker 1: these don't begin until and some of some of them

957
00:49:29,320 --> 00:49:31,600
Speaker 1: it's like a three phase thing. Some of them don't

958
00:49:31,760 --> 00:49:34,839
Speaker 1: begin until late seen. This is this is a long

959
00:49:34,960 --> 00:49:37,480
Speaker 1: term problem for Folkswagen. It's not something that's gonna go

960
00:49:37,520 --> 00:49:41,160
Speaker 1: away overnight. And it's uh, if you haven't read about

961
00:49:41,160 --> 00:49:43,440
Speaker 1: it or you don't know exactly what they're gonna do

962
00:49:43,480 --> 00:49:47,000
Speaker 1: for the fix, um, it's going to be very very

963
00:49:47,040 --> 00:49:49,080
Speaker 1: costly for them. In addition to the fines that we're

964
00:49:49,080 --> 00:49:53,880
Speaker 1: talking about, which are already enormous. What they're proposing is

965
00:49:54,400 --> 00:49:56,960
Speaker 1: ridiculously expensive for a company to do. And yeah, and

966
00:49:56,960 --> 00:49:59,719
Speaker 1: it costs not just money but also put potentially in

967
00:50:00,000 --> 00:50:03,680
Speaker 1: moments of your vehicle, which also means it's gonna cost

968
00:50:03,760 --> 00:50:07,640
Speaker 1: and customer satisfaction and loyalty. I mean, the costs here

969
00:50:07,719 --> 00:50:09,960
Speaker 1: go beyond a dollar amount, you know. Can I just

970
00:50:10,040 --> 00:50:12,359
Speaker 1: can I just run through this real quick, dieing dere

971
00:50:12,640 --> 00:50:15,520
Speaker 1: I've mentioned about four times now, but I will quickly

972
00:50:15,520 --> 00:50:16,839
Speaker 1: go through it, and I'll tell you what they're doing.

973
00:50:16,880 --> 00:50:19,160
Speaker 1: And this is this is UM. The plan has laid

974
00:50:19,160 --> 00:50:22,839
Speaker 1: out by my um, the current us CEO, Michael horne Um.

975
00:50:22,880 --> 00:50:25,440
Speaker 1: He spent several hours testifying in front of a congressional

976
00:50:25,520 --> 00:50:29,120
Speaker 1: panel just this last week, and it's all about the

977
00:50:29,239 --> 00:50:32,120
Speaker 1: you know, the emission scandal. And uh, you know the

978
00:50:32,160 --> 00:50:35,160
Speaker 1: senators that he was in front of, they were you know,

979
00:50:35,200 --> 00:50:38,240
Speaker 1: they're angry at him. They were incredulous, you know that

980
00:50:38,040 --> 00:50:40,560
Speaker 1: that this this car maker would try to cheat the

981
00:50:40,600 --> 00:50:42,680
Speaker 1: buy in public like this and the U. S. Government

982
00:50:42,719 --> 00:50:46,040
Speaker 1: and uh, you know, sidestep all these these standards that

983
00:50:46,080 --> 00:50:48,480
Speaker 1: they in place. And and the funny thing is, and

984
00:50:48,520 --> 00:50:51,000
Speaker 1: I don't know that really say funny, but he's agreeing

985
00:50:51,000 --> 00:50:54,960
Speaker 1: with them throughout this whole testimony. He's saying, you know what,

986
00:50:55,080 --> 00:50:57,319
Speaker 1: I'm angry at the manufacturer as well, are you know

987
00:50:57,360 --> 00:51:00,000
Speaker 1: my company? Angry at them for doing this. I didn't

988
00:51:00,000 --> 00:51:02,600
Speaker 1: know that this is all happening. Um, you know, I'm

989
00:51:02,920 --> 00:51:05,920
Speaker 1: also upset. And so he has a bit of sympathy.

990
00:51:05,960 --> 00:51:08,160
Speaker 1: I mean, he gets That's how he gains, I guess,

991
00:51:08,239 --> 00:51:12,360
Speaker 1: is his sympathy with the people that are listening right, UM,

992
00:51:12,560 --> 00:51:14,160
Speaker 1: believe it or not, you know, whether you want to

993
00:51:14,239 --> 00:51:16,799
Speaker 1: or not. So there's like three different groups here, and

994
00:51:16,800 --> 00:51:18,359
Speaker 1: I'll quickly go through it. I'm not going to list

995
00:51:18,360 --> 00:51:21,280
Speaker 1: all of vehicles or anything like that, but UM basically

996
00:51:21,360 --> 00:51:23,960
Speaker 1: covers two different engine types. And you can kind of

997
00:51:24,000 --> 00:51:26,640
Speaker 1: group these into three groups. And you'll understand when I

998
00:51:26,640 --> 00:51:28,600
Speaker 1: read it. But it's an old the older engine is

999
00:51:28,640 --> 00:51:31,319
Speaker 1: the E N engine, and the new one is the

1000
00:51:31,400 --> 00:51:35,480
Speaker 1: E A to A eight engine. And the first group

1001
00:51:35,640 --> 00:51:38,840
Speaker 1: is it affects his sixty seven thousand vehicles. This is

1002
00:51:38,840 --> 00:51:41,040
Speaker 1: the smallest of the three groups here in the United States.

1003
00:51:41,560 --> 00:51:44,520
Speaker 1: And the fix is just an updated software fix. And

1004
00:51:44,560 --> 00:51:49,120
Speaker 1: so these are for you know, like the newer two models,

1005
00:51:49,640 --> 00:51:51,360
Speaker 1: and these are the ones that have the new e

1006
00:51:51,520 --> 00:51:54,880
Speaker 1: A eight eight engine. UM. Again the easiest fix, and

1007
00:51:54,920 --> 00:51:57,960
Speaker 1: that's because they're fitted with a selective catalectic reduction system

1008
00:51:58,160 --> 00:52:01,800
Speaker 1: or exhaust after treatment system that I mentioned earlier. UM,

1009
00:52:01,840 --> 00:52:04,160
Speaker 1: but really they're only going to need a software fixed

1010
00:52:04,160 --> 00:52:07,600
Speaker 1: to become compliant. And then the next group, this is uh,

1011
00:52:07,719 --> 00:52:09,680
Speaker 1: the the I guess in between group, you know, not

1012
00:52:09,800 --> 00:52:12,040
Speaker 1: not the biggest group that we'll get to last. Uh.

1013
00:52:12,080 --> 00:52:18,080
Speaker 1: This is just a through passat t d I, and

1014
00:52:18,200 --> 00:52:20,759
Speaker 1: this one will require an updated software fix and a

1015
00:52:20,840 --> 00:52:24,719
Speaker 1: possible hardware modification. So these are cars that have both

1016
00:52:24,760 --> 00:52:27,400
Speaker 1: a Lean Knox trap that we mentioned and an scr

1017
00:52:27,520 --> 00:52:30,440
Speaker 1: UREA system as well. And of course, you know the

1018
00:52:30,480 --> 00:52:33,480
Speaker 1: software hardware modifications that they're talking about. They're not really

1019
00:52:33,520 --> 00:52:37,800
Speaker 1: specifying what the hardware modifications will be for this specific vehicle,

1020
00:52:37,880 --> 00:52:41,120
Speaker 1: but vehicles are affected with that. So that's kind of

1021
00:52:41,120 --> 00:52:43,600
Speaker 1: like phase two and that's going to begin in mid

1022
00:52:44,400 --> 00:52:49,000
Speaker 1: That first one was early And as a side note

1023
00:52:49,000 --> 00:52:51,440
Speaker 1: on that first one that I mentioned, UH, they do

1024
00:52:51,560 --> 00:52:54,759
Speaker 1: know that you know, fuel economy will likely stay the same,

1025
00:52:54,840 --> 00:52:59,319
Speaker 1: but they said performance might be slightly affected, and that's

1026
00:52:59,320 --> 00:53:03,160
Speaker 1: bad news for people that own those vehicles sixteen you know,

1027
00:53:03,320 --> 00:53:06,000
Speaker 1: golf OUTI Jetta, you know, those vehicles are the ones

1028
00:53:06,040 --> 00:53:08,040
Speaker 1: that affected. So they don't know what it's going to

1029
00:53:08,120 --> 00:53:10,279
Speaker 1: do to the pisat t D I well. And the

1030
00:53:10,280 --> 00:53:12,200
Speaker 1: worst part about that is saying that they could be

1031
00:53:12,280 --> 00:53:17,520
Speaker 1: slightly affected me it even if it wasn't perceptible. By

1032
00:53:17,560 --> 00:53:20,839
Speaker 1: saying that it's going to be slightly affected, then you

1033
00:53:20,920 --> 00:53:24,560
Speaker 1: know the drivers are going to at least feel like

1034
00:53:24,680 --> 00:53:27,160
Speaker 1: there's a change in performance, even if it's not detectable

1035
00:53:27,680 --> 00:53:31,600
Speaker 1: on a meaningful scale. If you know, if you've heard

1036
00:53:32,160 --> 00:53:36,359
Speaker 1: that your vehicles performance might be slightly affected, that's enough

1037
00:53:36,360 --> 00:53:39,960
Speaker 1: to psychologically push you to believe that it doesn't feel well,

1038
00:53:40,040 --> 00:53:42,080
Speaker 1: you're gonna be sensitive to You're gonna be overly sensitive

1039
00:53:42,120 --> 00:53:44,000
Speaker 1: to that. You're gonna you're gonna think that whatever you're

1040
00:53:44,040 --> 00:53:46,160
Speaker 1: feeling is not what you should be feeling in your car.

1041
00:53:46,239 --> 00:53:49,600
Speaker 1: Even but honestly, it's probably gonna affect low end torque.

1042
00:53:49,760 --> 00:53:52,759
Speaker 1: It's gonna affect acceleration. And that's and that's the two

1043
00:53:52,760 --> 00:53:54,640
Speaker 1: things that you would really notice. That's the two things

1044
00:53:54,640 --> 00:53:56,960
Speaker 1: that make a car fund to drive. I mean, in

1045
00:53:57,120 --> 00:54:00,959
Speaker 1: most situations, you know, to can out top end speed

1046
00:54:00,960 --> 00:54:03,160
Speaker 1: because most people don't hit the top ends. Well, yeah,

1047
00:54:03,160 --> 00:54:06,040
Speaker 1: there's very few opportunities to do if this if this

1048
00:54:06,120 --> 00:54:08,440
Speaker 1: fix somehow affected the top end, like maybe dropped it

1049
00:54:08,480 --> 00:54:10,920
Speaker 1: down five or something. You know, from the top end,

1050
00:54:11,320 --> 00:54:14,000
Speaker 1: not many people would ever experience them. But when you

1051
00:54:14,040 --> 00:54:16,880
Speaker 1: remove acceleration from say a stoplight or trying to get

1052
00:54:16,920 --> 00:54:20,000
Speaker 1: on the freeway, Uh, that's going to affect your your

1053
00:54:20,040 --> 00:54:21,759
Speaker 1: customer base. People are gonna say, we don't want it.

1054
00:54:21,800 --> 00:54:23,759
Speaker 1: So the last group, and this is the biggest one,

1055
00:54:24,239 --> 00:54:27,239
Speaker 1: this affects Now, this is a bad group to this

1056
00:54:27,320 --> 00:54:32,080
Speaker 1: effects two thousand nine through two thousan fourteen jetted T

1057
00:54:32,200 --> 00:54:35,359
Speaker 1: D Eyes, Golf T D Eyes, Beetle t D Eyes

1058
00:54:35,480 --> 00:54:37,799
Speaker 1: out e A three's. So you know how many of

1059
00:54:37,800 --> 00:54:40,000
Speaker 1: these vehicles you see on the road, They're everywhere, all

1060
00:54:40,040 --> 00:54:42,839
Speaker 1: these cars. These are the ones that have a Lean

1061
00:54:42,920 --> 00:54:47,160
Speaker 1: Knox trap only. So these are the ones that may

1062
00:54:47,239 --> 00:54:50,640
Speaker 1: require the most work. And it's the largest group. Yeah,

1063
00:54:50,680 --> 00:54:53,520
Speaker 1: so it's probably going to require a a well, of course,

1064
00:54:53,520 --> 00:54:56,480
Speaker 1: it will require software, you know switch, it's gonna require

1065
00:54:56,520 --> 00:55:03,040
Speaker 1: hardware modifications that probably include adding a complete um SCR system.

1066
00:55:03,080 --> 00:55:05,279
Speaker 1: You know that that the cleaning system that we talked

1067
00:55:05,280 --> 00:55:09,160
Speaker 1: about the UREA system, and they've even talked about for

1068
00:55:09,200 --> 00:55:11,200
Speaker 1: this group. This is how complex this would be. They said,

1069
00:55:11,200 --> 00:55:13,000
Speaker 1: it's gonna take you know, between five and ten hours

1070
00:55:13,080 --> 00:55:16,239
Speaker 1: to make this type of fix and per vehicle, which

1071
00:55:16,280 --> 00:55:19,480
Speaker 1: is an enormous cost to the to the manufacturer for

1072
00:55:19,600 --> 00:55:21,840
Speaker 1: the time of the technician to do that, plus the

1073
00:55:21,880 --> 00:55:24,400
Speaker 1: parts the park. Can you imagine what that costs. So

1074
00:55:24,440 --> 00:55:26,920
Speaker 1: they're talking about for this specific group of vehicles, this

1075
00:55:27,040 --> 00:55:29,439
Speaker 1: last group that they won't even start touching until late

1076
00:55:30,840 --> 00:55:34,719
Speaker 1: It affects oh, by the way, three thousand of the

1077
00:55:34,840 --> 00:55:38,200
Speaker 1: four hundred and some that I think it's fours here

1078
00:55:38,200 --> 00:55:42,240
Speaker 1: in the state of the Yeah, they're talking about um offering,

1079
00:55:42,480 --> 00:55:45,600
Speaker 1: you know, like cash cash back offers. They're talking about

1080
00:55:45,840 --> 00:55:49,080
Speaker 1: the entire vehicle buy backs, which is huge. I mean,

1081
00:55:49,120 --> 00:55:52,120
Speaker 1: there's been very few times in US history there it's happened,

1082
00:55:52,600 --> 00:55:55,759
Speaker 1: but very few times when the manufacturer says that car

1083
00:55:55,800 --> 00:55:57,520
Speaker 1: will no longer be on the road, we're buying back

1084
00:55:57,560 --> 00:56:00,200
Speaker 1: every one of them and they'll be shredded or whatever

1085
00:56:00,239 --> 00:56:01,400
Speaker 1: they happen to do with them. I don't know what

1086
00:56:01,440 --> 00:56:02,719
Speaker 1: the plan would be for this, but if they do

1087
00:56:02,840 --> 00:56:05,799
Speaker 1: a car buy back, the situation. They're likely just going

1088
00:56:05,840 --> 00:56:10,400
Speaker 1: to destroy those vehicles. It's yeah, it's it's hard to

1089
00:56:10,520 --> 00:56:12,960
Speaker 1: even comprehend. Really, Yeah, you wouldn't buy back the car

1090
00:56:13,040 --> 00:56:14,600
Speaker 1: and then fix it and then try to sell anything.

1091
00:56:14,680 --> 00:56:17,080
Speaker 1: So it only makes sense. It's logically making sense to

1092
00:56:17,080 --> 00:56:19,000
Speaker 1: me that they would buy them back and shred them

1093
00:56:19,000 --> 00:56:21,439
Speaker 1: in some way just for them. So this is a

1094
00:56:22,400 --> 00:56:23,880
Speaker 1: do you see what I mean? It gets worse and

1095
00:56:23,880 --> 00:56:25,960
Speaker 1: worse all the time. Yeah. The more you look at it,

1096
00:56:26,000 --> 00:56:30,000
Speaker 1: the more you realize, Wait, no, I I don't have

1097
00:56:30,480 --> 00:56:34,520
Speaker 1: the full comprehension of everything that can happen. And as

1098
00:56:34,560 --> 00:56:38,600
Speaker 1: the story unfolds, will probably learn even more, like maybe

1099
00:56:38,600 --> 00:56:41,560
Speaker 1: we'll learn exactly where this decision was really made and

1100
00:56:41,600 --> 00:56:46,160
Speaker 1: maybe it was a group of rogues software engineers who

1101
00:56:46,160 --> 00:56:50,399
Speaker 1: are just desperate to have Volkswagen engines appear to meet

1102
00:56:50,520 --> 00:56:54,759
Speaker 1: all of these specifications. Um, you don't just one more

1103
00:56:54,840 --> 00:56:58,040
Speaker 1: quick thing. I mean, it's super quick, but think about

1104
00:56:58,160 --> 00:56:59,920
Speaker 1: the thing. I think about the awards that this thing

1105
00:57:00,040 --> 00:57:02,560
Speaker 1: is one, because you know, it wins engine awards. Of

1106
00:57:02,600 --> 00:57:05,080
Speaker 1: course it wins in two thousand eight, which is the

1107
00:57:05,080 --> 00:57:07,759
Speaker 1: first year that we're talking about the VW Jetta t

1108
00:57:07,840 --> 00:57:10,360
Speaker 1: D I clean Diesel won the Green Car of the

1109
00:57:10,440 --> 00:57:13,000
Speaker 1: Year award at the l A Auto Show. UM now,

1110
00:57:13,040 --> 00:57:14,279
Speaker 1: what do you do with that? Do you go back

1111
00:57:14,320 --> 00:57:16,720
Speaker 1: and do you remove that award? I mean, yeah, I

1112
00:57:16,840 --> 00:57:19,120
Speaker 1: would imagine you have to strip the awards from the

1113
00:57:19,280 --> 00:57:22,040
Speaker 1: from the different models. Just this year, the Volkswagen Golf,

1114
00:57:22,080 --> 00:57:24,400
Speaker 1: now not not particularly the t d I, but the

1115
00:57:24,440 --> 00:57:27,800
Speaker 1: Volkswagen Golf was awarded the North American Car of the

1116
00:57:27,880 --> 00:57:31,040
Speaker 1: Year award at the um at the Detroit Auto Show,

1117
00:57:31,080 --> 00:57:34,320
Speaker 1: the North American International Auto Show. UM. So this thing

1118
00:57:34,400 --> 00:57:37,360
Speaker 1: along the way, that's just two. It's won many awards

1119
00:57:37,360 --> 00:57:40,360
Speaker 1: along the way, and it has long been luded as being, uh,

1120
00:57:40,560 --> 00:57:42,320
Speaker 1: you know, kind of like the solution. This is this

1121
00:57:42,360 --> 00:57:44,919
Speaker 1: is what diesel should be here in the United States

1122
00:57:45,040 --> 00:57:48,000
Speaker 1: or really worldwide. Yeah. Well, I mean that was why

1123
00:57:48,040 --> 00:57:49,720
Speaker 1: German was looking into it in the first place. So

1124
00:57:49,760 --> 00:57:52,560
Speaker 1: I apologize for interrupting there. But the awards thing, I

1125
00:57:52,560 --> 00:57:54,400
Speaker 1: just had to get get that out there because they're

1126
00:57:54,440 --> 00:57:57,200
Speaker 1: they've been so heavily awarded for all these Diesel engines

1127
00:57:57,280 --> 00:57:59,640
Speaker 1: that what do you do with all that? Now? It's

1128
00:57:59,720 --> 00:58:02,240
Speaker 1: again part of the big problem. I guess it goes

1129
00:58:02,280 --> 00:58:04,240
Speaker 1: back to that phrase. You know, if it seems too

1130
00:58:04,240 --> 00:58:08,280
Speaker 1: good to be true. It probably is right in there.

1131
00:58:08,400 --> 00:58:10,200
Speaker 1: Why didn't they look into it when it did seem

1132
00:58:10,240 --> 00:58:12,480
Speaker 1: too good to be true? Again, I think it's one

1133
00:58:12,480 --> 00:58:15,000
Speaker 1: of those things where, well, you would either think, well,

1134
00:58:15,000 --> 00:58:19,600
Speaker 1: no company would be so bold as to as to

1135
00:58:19,680 --> 00:58:23,240
Speaker 1: try and fake their way through because the consequences, as

1136
00:58:23,280 --> 00:58:26,440
Speaker 1: we see now, the consequences are so dire for any

1137
00:58:26,440 --> 00:58:29,680
Speaker 1: company that would attempt that, it seems unthinkable that they

1138
00:58:29,680 --> 00:58:31,640
Speaker 1: would try and do that. Now, had they caught this

1139
00:58:31,720 --> 00:58:35,200
Speaker 1: in say two thousand nine or two uh, this would

1140
00:58:35,200 --> 00:58:37,400
Speaker 1: be dramatically different, would be a much smaller number of

1141
00:58:37,440 --> 00:58:39,720
Speaker 1: vehicles are affected. It would be an easier thing for

1142
00:58:39,840 --> 00:58:42,400
Speaker 1: VW to fix and say like a Holly, you gott USU,

1143
00:58:42,680 --> 00:58:45,120
Speaker 1: or or even for them to say like it would

1144
00:58:45,120 --> 00:58:49,040
Speaker 1: be even more believable for them to say, uh, this

1145
00:58:49,040 --> 00:58:53,160
Speaker 1: this was something that was uh, you know, not intended,

1146
00:58:53,360 --> 00:58:55,880
Speaker 1: but we will fix it like you could if it's

1147
00:58:55,920 --> 00:58:58,440
Speaker 1: if it's for a year, then you might say, well,

1148
00:58:58,480 --> 00:59:01,240
Speaker 1: there was something going on in the man manufacturing process

1149
00:59:01,280 --> 00:59:05,320
Speaker 1: where uh, someone had this brilliant idea or they thought

1150
00:59:05,320 --> 00:59:10,280
Speaker 1: it was a brilliant idea and the implication wasn't completely realized.

1151
00:59:10,320 --> 00:59:13,720
Speaker 1: Within the company, you could at least plausibly make that point.

1152
00:59:13,760 --> 00:59:16,400
Speaker 1: But we're eight years into this, eight model years into this,

1153
00:59:16,480 --> 00:59:19,600
Speaker 1: it's a lot harder to make that plausible argument. It is. Yes,

1154
00:59:19,680 --> 00:59:22,680
Speaker 1: and and even this eighth model year that was scheduled

1155
00:59:22,720 --> 00:59:25,200
Speaker 1: to come in, as you said, has been embargoed because

1156
00:59:25,360 --> 00:59:27,760
Speaker 1: there's a hold on Those vehicles are quarantined and not

1157
00:59:28,120 --> 00:59:32,120
Speaker 1: able to be sold here. So um, again, it's just

1158
00:59:32,160 --> 00:59:34,960
Speaker 1: a real head scratch all around. Why would they do this?

1159
00:59:35,040 --> 00:59:37,760
Speaker 1: Why why would a company allow this to happen? It

1160
00:59:37,840 --> 00:59:41,280
Speaker 1: is a little crazy. Now on, on a related note,

1161
00:59:41,320 --> 00:59:43,880
Speaker 1: I have a thing to wrap this up with, because

1162
00:59:44,080 --> 00:59:46,960
Speaker 1: obviously this is a story that's still going so it

1163
00:59:47,000 --> 00:59:49,840
Speaker 1: maybe a couple of years before it maybe actually a

1164
00:59:49,880 --> 00:59:53,200
Speaker 1: decade or more before we really see the full extent

1165
00:59:53,280 --> 00:59:56,120
Speaker 1: of how the story plays out. But uh, I have

1166
00:59:56,200 --> 00:59:58,880
Speaker 1: a related thing to ask you because it was something

1167
00:59:58,880 --> 01:00:01,520
Speaker 1: I had not heard of before, but I imagine you

1168
01:00:01,600 --> 01:00:06,600
Speaker 1: probably have. Have you heard about the practice called chipping? Yes, okay,

1169
01:00:06,640 --> 01:00:09,640
Speaker 1: this was new to me. So chipping is essentially an

1170
01:00:09,720 --> 01:00:14,800
Speaker 1: aftermarket approach to do pretty much what Volkswagen did, except

1171
01:00:14,920 --> 01:00:17,800
Speaker 1: this time it's a customer doing it on purpose to

1172
01:00:17,920 --> 01:00:22,280
Speaker 1: their vehicle. Yeah, to gain performance gains, so um, okay,

1173
01:00:22,400 --> 01:00:25,360
Speaker 1: or sometimes just to be a jerk face game. Let's

1174
01:00:25,400 --> 01:00:28,040
Speaker 1: be honest and I'll have a story about that in

1175
01:00:28,080 --> 01:00:29,920
Speaker 1: a minute. Okay, Okay, Well, I don't know what. I

1176
01:00:29,920 --> 01:00:31,480
Speaker 1: don't know what you're gonna come at me with you,

1177
01:00:31,640 --> 01:00:35,120
Speaker 1: but um, a lot of people that I've known have

1178
01:00:35,360 --> 01:00:37,920
Speaker 1: chipped their vehicles or have replaced the e c U

1179
01:00:38,360 --> 01:00:40,640
Speaker 1: or you know whatever that the flash upgrade or whatever

1180
01:00:40,680 --> 01:00:43,320
Speaker 1: the terminology was what they did. But there's a lot

1181
01:00:43,360 --> 01:00:45,560
Speaker 1: of different ways to do this. You can completely replace

1182
01:00:45,640 --> 01:00:48,040
Speaker 1: the the engine control unit and make your vehicle think

1183
01:00:48,040 --> 01:00:51,120
Speaker 1: that it's a different model year that has different performance

1184
01:00:51,120 --> 01:00:55,840
Speaker 1: specs or it's a you can make your US US

1185
01:00:56,280 --> 01:00:59,440
Speaker 1: spec vehicle think that it's a European spec vehicle and

1186
01:00:59,520 --> 01:01:01,680
Speaker 1: that it uh, it boosts the performance, you know, it

1187
01:01:01,720 --> 01:01:06,240
Speaker 1: allows a greater output you know, horsepower, tork, etcetera. Um,

1188
01:01:06,280 --> 01:01:08,840
Speaker 1: because you're not you're not electronically limiting your vehicle to

1189
01:01:08,920 --> 01:01:11,840
Speaker 1: whatever the standards are in the place that you are currently,

1190
01:01:11,880 --> 01:01:18,040
Speaker 1: So you're you're upping the manufacturers restrictions on your vehicle electronically. Yeah. Yeah,

1191
01:01:18,080 --> 01:01:21,360
Speaker 1: And whether that's the top end restriction or it's a

1192
01:01:21,400 --> 01:01:24,040
Speaker 1: low end torque thing or shift points or whatever happens

1193
01:01:24,080 --> 01:01:28,320
Speaker 1: to be. Um, it's it's it's a common practice among

1194
01:01:28,320 --> 01:01:31,000
Speaker 1: tuners to do stuff like this of of you know,

1195
01:01:31,080 --> 01:01:33,960
Speaker 1: smaller vehicles, you know, like performance import type vehicles or

1196
01:01:34,360 --> 01:01:37,000
Speaker 1: even big trucks. A lot of diesel guys do that.

1197
01:01:37,760 --> 01:01:39,920
Speaker 1: In fact, they're programmable to the point where they can,

1198
01:01:40,080 --> 01:01:42,120
Speaker 1: you know, kind of change things around frequently as much

1199
01:01:42,120 --> 01:01:44,760
Speaker 1: as they want toy with the numbers and you know,

1200
01:01:44,800 --> 01:01:47,280
Speaker 1: make it really good for pulling and for towing, or

1201
01:01:47,360 --> 01:01:49,560
Speaker 1: they can make it, uh, you know, like performance gains

1202
01:01:49,600 --> 01:01:53,240
Speaker 1: for diesel engines. You get crazy great performance numbers out

1203
01:01:53,240 --> 01:01:55,720
Speaker 1: of a diesel engine if you just have it chipped correctly,

1204
01:01:56,400 --> 01:01:59,160
Speaker 1: which you know, again you you're getting great performance at

1205
01:01:59,160 --> 01:02:03,040
Speaker 1: the expense of the legality of the emissions from your vehicle.

1206
01:02:03,160 --> 01:02:05,280
Speaker 1: And you know, see there's the thing is that you

1207
01:02:05,280 --> 01:02:08,600
Speaker 1: can go back with a scan tool and change that

1208
01:02:08,640 --> 01:02:11,560
Speaker 1: back to whatever you needed to be for the emissions.

1209
01:02:12,080 --> 01:02:14,320
Speaker 1: It's exactly the same thing that Volkswagen is doing, except

1210
01:02:14,360 --> 01:02:17,600
Speaker 1: on a more manual basis. Yes, yes, and other people.

1211
01:02:17,640 --> 01:02:19,920
Speaker 1: You know, if you're outside of that tenure window or whatever,

1212
01:02:20,000 --> 01:02:22,320
Speaker 1: you don't have to have emissions testing. Then you know,

1213
01:02:22,320 --> 01:02:24,480
Speaker 1: it's fun to make your jeep Cherokee think that it's

1214
01:02:24,520 --> 01:02:26,840
Speaker 1: a cop car r and that can happen. You can

1215
01:02:26,920 --> 01:02:28,800
Speaker 1: do stuff like that. So one of the other things

1216
01:02:28,800 --> 01:02:30,880
Speaker 1: that you can end up doing with this. Okay, here's

1217
01:02:30,880 --> 01:02:33,400
Speaker 1: where we get to the jerk face part. Right. Yeah,

1218
01:02:33,560 --> 01:02:37,520
Speaker 1: So sometimes when you chip a car of diesel powered

1219
01:02:38,680 --> 01:02:42,480
Speaker 1: vehicle and you activate it, one of the things that

1220
01:02:42,600 --> 01:02:45,240
Speaker 1: your vehicle might do when you pressed down on the

1221
01:02:45,280 --> 01:02:49,160
Speaker 1: accelerators belch out an enormous cloud of black exhaust. So

1222
01:02:49,280 --> 01:02:53,960
Speaker 1: you're talking about rolling coal, rolling coal, coal rolling or

1223
01:02:54,120 --> 01:02:59,800
Speaker 1: rolling coal. So Scott, I walk home. Oh no, it

1224
01:03:00,080 --> 01:03:03,280
Speaker 1: is a three mile walk from from here to my house.

1225
01:03:04,400 --> 01:03:06,800
Speaker 1: And there's a point that I like to rest at.

1226
01:03:07,640 --> 01:03:10,400
Speaker 1: It's it's a little more than halfway to my house.

1227
01:03:10,600 --> 01:03:13,040
Speaker 1: And usually at that point, especially on a hot day,

1228
01:03:13,120 --> 01:03:16,200
Speaker 1: I like to sit down on a bench that's outside

1229
01:03:16,200 --> 01:03:20,560
Speaker 1: of a lovely little flower shop in in uh the

1230
01:03:20,640 --> 01:03:24,000
Speaker 1: Kendler Park area of Atlanta, and I sit down and

1231
01:03:24,040 --> 01:03:25,960
Speaker 1: I rest for a few minutes before I continue on.

1232
01:03:26,000 --> 01:03:30,760
Speaker 1: It's it's lovely, you know. I I collect my thoughts,

1233
01:03:31,160 --> 01:03:33,920
Speaker 1: I relax, and then I get up to walk the

1234
01:03:33,960 --> 01:03:36,840
Speaker 1: rest of the way. There was a day not long ago,

1235
01:03:36,960 --> 01:03:40,400
Speaker 1: Scott although back when it was much hotter. When I

1236
01:03:40,440 --> 01:03:42,640
Speaker 1: sat down on that bench, got up, I'm ready to

1237
01:03:42,680 --> 01:03:46,120
Speaker 1: start walking. Well, it's at an intersection that's a four

1238
01:03:46,120 --> 01:03:49,080
Speaker 1: way stop, and it's a busy intersection with a four

1239
01:03:49,080 --> 01:03:51,680
Speaker 1: way stop, which is a little tricky for pedestrians because

1240
01:03:51,720 --> 01:03:53,040
Speaker 1: you have to make sure you have the attention of

1241
01:03:53,080 --> 01:03:56,120
Speaker 1: the drivers before you walk across. There's no light to

1242
01:03:56,280 --> 01:04:00,800
Speaker 1: time it with hazardous situation. Yeah. So there's a large

1243
01:04:00,840 --> 01:04:04,479
Speaker 1: red Diesel pick up to my left as I'm about

1244
01:04:04,520 --> 01:04:06,040
Speaker 1: to cross the street here and you can hear that

1245
01:04:06,080 --> 01:04:09,080
Speaker 1: loud knocking noise. You know, it's Diesel. So I am

1246
01:04:09,080 --> 01:04:11,080
Speaker 1: about to cross the street, but they decide they want

1247
01:04:11,120 --> 01:04:14,240
Speaker 1: to go. So not only do they go, but they

1248
01:04:14,240 --> 01:04:19,560
Speaker 1: flipped the switch and I am covered from head to

1249
01:04:19,600 --> 01:04:24,720
Speaker 1: toe in black exhaust as they turn right. So they

1250
01:04:24,760 --> 01:04:27,760
Speaker 1: turn in front of me. Uh so, because they were

1251
01:04:27,760 --> 01:04:29,360
Speaker 1: on my left, they turn right, so they go down

1252
01:04:29,400 --> 01:04:32,040
Speaker 1: the street. I was about to cross and belch out

1253
01:04:32,080 --> 01:04:35,320
Speaker 1: that black smoke while cackling and driving down that jerk

1254
01:04:35,400 --> 01:04:37,600
Speaker 1: faces Yeah that you know what that is a jerk

1255
01:04:37,640 --> 01:04:42,480
Speaker 1: face move. I agree, I agree that that whole that

1256
01:04:42,560 --> 01:04:45,000
Speaker 1: whole thing bothers a lot of people. I mean, other

1257
01:04:45,000 --> 01:04:46,680
Speaker 1: people say it's my right to do this, and I'm

1258
01:04:46,680 --> 01:04:50,440
Speaker 1: gonna do this no matter what you know, and and uh,

1259
01:04:50,920 --> 01:04:52,680
Speaker 1: I guess you could say that. You know, people have

1260
01:04:52,760 --> 01:04:56,440
Speaker 1: been doing this for exhibition for a long time. Like

1261
01:04:56,440 --> 01:04:59,440
Speaker 1: you know, we go to a like a tractor pull

1262
01:04:59,480 --> 01:05:01,680
Speaker 1: event or something like that. You see all those vehicles

1263
01:05:01,680 --> 01:05:03,960
Speaker 1: are belching smoke like that, and they're doing it because

1264
01:05:04,120 --> 01:05:05,960
Speaker 1: it's a there is a performance gain when you do

1265
01:05:06,000 --> 01:05:09,200
Speaker 1: it as well. But the situation that you're talking about,

1266
01:05:09,200 --> 01:05:12,240
Speaker 1: they were doing it just simply to be it's an

1267
01:05:12,240 --> 01:05:15,640
Speaker 1: effective to uh envelope you in this cloud of soot,

1268
01:05:15,720 --> 01:05:19,040
Speaker 1: and that's terribly dangerous for you. It's not nice on

1269
01:05:19,080 --> 01:05:21,320
Speaker 1: their part. It was dangerous for them to let's be honest,

1270
01:05:21,320 --> 01:05:24,400
Speaker 1: because at that point I was not happy. What it does,

1271
01:05:24,600 --> 01:05:26,760
Speaker 1: and just everybody knows is when you flip that switch,

1272
01:05:26,760 --> 01:05:28,800
Speaker 1: it just dumps a bunch of extra fuel into the

1273
01:05:28,800 --> 01:05:32,720
Speaker 1: engine and then that unburned fuel can't quite get burned

1274
01:05:32,720 --> 01:05:34,200
Speaker 1: off the way it normally would. And you know, with

1275
01:05:34,240 --> 01:05:36,320
Speaker 1: all those exhaust scrubbers that we talked about, you know,

1276
01:05:36,360 --> 01:05:39,840
Speaker 1: the particular filters and all that, it bypasses all that,

1277
01:05:39,920 --> 01:05:41,520
Speaker 1: and then you end up with this cloud of smoke

1278
01:05:41,600 --> 01:05:43,560
Speaker 1: that looks like um, like it's coming out if you

1279
01:05:43,560 --> 01:05:46,680
Speaker 1: don't the little trains that burn coal, it looks like that,

1280
01:05:46,920 --> 01:05:48,439
Speaker 1: and that's what they call it. They call it rolling coal.

1281
01:05:48,920 --> 01:05:52,040
Speaker 1: And uh, just so you guys know, out there, out

1282
01:05:52,040 --> 01:05:55,760
Speaker 1: there and listener land. According to John Swanson of California's

1283
01:05:55,760 --> 01:05:59,080
Speaker 1: Air Resource Board, any modification to a pollution control system

1284
01:05:59,280 --> 01:06:04,080
Speaker 1: is illegal unless the manufacturer of that product had proven

1285
01:06:04,160 --> 01:06:07,040
Speaker 1: that the modification doesn't result in any adverse impact on

1286
01:06:07,040 --> 01:06:10,560
Speaker 1: the environment. Yeah. Now again, any place that I've seen

1287
01:06:10,600 --> 01:06:12,360
Speaker 1: this happen in real life was has been like an

1288
01:06:12,360 --> 01:06:14,600
Speaker 1: attractor pullet or something like that. But I've never seen

1289
01:06:14,640 --> 01:06:19,240
Speaker 1: anybody actually had this done to them outside of video clips. Yeah,

1290
01:06:19,280 --> 01:06:22,640
Speaker 1: I wish that. No, I don't know that. The second

1291
01:06:22,680 --> 01:06:25,640
Speaker 1: guest I've seen in traffic, I've seen some some uh

1292
01:06:25,800 --> 01:06:28,040
Speaker 1: you know, diesel trucks that are emitting quite a bit

1293
01:06:28,040 --> 01:06:30,280
Speaker 1: of smoke, but they're traveling at such a speed that

1294
01:06:30,320 --> 01:06:31,920
Speaker 1: I can't tell if they've done that. At a slow

1295
01:06:31,960 --> 01:06:35,000
Speaker 1: speed is very apparent what happens because it's a dramatic

1296
01:06:35,040 --> 01:06:38,800
Speaker 1: difference in the output of exhaust gases rather the cloud

1297
01:06:38,800 --> 01:06:41,680
Speaker 1: of smoke or whatever. Sot uh. I can't say for

1298
01:06:41,720 --> 01:06:43,800
Speaker 1: sure that I've never seen it happen in real life,

1299
01:06:43,920 --> 01:06:46,440
Speaker 1: but but I don't think so not intentionally. Like you know,

1300
01:06:46,440 --> 01:06:48,880
Speaker 1: when they there's a big truck and a priest is

1301
01:06:48,920 --> 01:06:51,439
Speaker 1: following it, you know, they they flip the switch because

1302
01:06:51,440 --> 01:06:53,960
Speaker 1: I think that's funny. Or a walker. A lot of

1303
01:06:54,000 --> 01:06:55,720
Speaker 1: times you'll see you can see videos of this where

1304
01:06:55,920 --> 01:06:58,720
Speaker 1: they go buy bikers or walkers or whatever and shoot

1305
01:06:58,760 --> 01:07:01,320
Speaker 1: these mean spirited videos where they the same to me

1306
01:07:01,400 --> 01:07:03,680
Speaker 1: did to you. It wouldn't surprise me if there's some

1307
01:07:03,800 --> 01:07:07,440
Speaker 1: video on YouTube where you see a an exhausted, sweaty

1308
01:07:07,520 --> 01:07:11,440
Speaker 1: bald podcaster coated in soot, Well, I'm sorry to hear

1309
01:07:11,480 --> 01:07:13,920
Speaker 1: that happened to you, man. That's yeah. As a as

1310
01:07:13,960 --> 01:07:18,680
Speaker 1: a pedestrian who already considers himself somewhat environmentally friendly, it

1311
01:07:18,760 --> 01:07:21,360
Speaker 1: was it was like it was like a cherry on

1312
01:07:21,480 --> 01:07:24,600
Speaker 1: top for my day at any rate. Yeah. By the way,

1313
01:07:24,600 --> 01:07:28,080
Speaker 1: car Stuff has a podcast on Rolling Cole. Oh wow, okay, yeah,

1314
01:07:28,160 --> 01:07:32,280
Speaker 1: go check that out. Guys. That's not it's a completely

1315
01:07:32,320 --> 01:07:35,680
Speaker 1: shameless plug because there's no shame to be had. Uh yeah,

1316
01:07:35,760 --> 01:07:38,400
Speaker 1: definitely check out car stuff guys. Scott, thank you so

1317
01:07:38,480 --> 01:07:40,360
Speaker 1: much for coming on the show and kind of talking

1318
01:07:40,360 --> 01:07:44,280
Speaker 1: about the scandal and the technology behind it. Uh, this

1319
01:07:44,320 --> 01:07:46,120
Speaker 1: is a little bit of a departure from our normal

1320
01:07:46,160 --> 01:07:48,480
Speaker 1: tech stuff episodes, but I thought it was really important

1321
01:07:48,520 --> 01:07:50,680
Speaker 1: to talk about because it's something that's been in the news.

1322
01:07:51,080 --> 01:07:53,480
Speaker 1: It does have to do with the tech and in

1323
01:07:53,560 --> 01:07:56,280
Speaker 1: the software of the car, and there's a lot of

1324
01:07:56,280 --> 01:07:58,240
Speaker 1: stuff we could have touched on, but this this show

1325
01:07:58,280 --> 01:08:00,520
Speaker 1: has gone pretty long, so I don't want to continue

1326
01:08:00,560 --> 01:08:04,280
Speaker 1: it on anymore. But I mean this also ties into

1327
01:08:04,320 --> 01:08:09,440
Speaker 1: other elements of why it's it's harder and harder to

1328
01:08:09,440 --> 01:08:11,640
Speaker 1: tell what's going on with your vehicle, at least to

1329
01:08:11,720 --> 01:08:14,920
Speaker 1: tell and be sure that that's really what's happening. Sure you.

1330
01:08:15,040 --> 01:08:17,840
Speaker 1: I mean look at the false bill of sale that

1331
01:08:18,200 --> 01:08:21,760
Speaker 1: that all these VW owners were handed and it really

1332
01:08:22,160 --> 01:08:24,680
Speaker 1: kind of opened everybody's eyes to the fact or to

1333
01:08:24,720 --> 01:08:27,280
Speaker 1: the idea of what manufacturers could do to kind of

1334
01:08:27,280 --> 01:08:30,200
Speaker 1: toy with these things. Uh, that how much control they

1335
01:08:30,200 --> 01:08:33,200
Speaker 1: have over every little situation that your car can be in.

1336
01:08:33,240 --> 01:08:35,920
Speaker 1: I mean, it's very very specific and it's very very

1337
01:08:35,920 --> 01:08:38,400
Speaker 1: devious what they did, but um, well they got away

1338
01:08:38,439 --> 01:08:41,360
Speaker 1: with it for about eight years. But too bad for them,

1339
01:08:41,360 --> 01:08:43,479
Speaker 1: they had caught. Yeah, it was the wrong time to

1340
01:08:43,520 --> 01:08:45,800
Speaker 1: get caught. If they were gonna get caught and and

1341
01:08:45,880 --> 01:08:49,000
Speaker 1: somehow escape this, it should have been earlier. They thought

1342
01:08:49,000 --> 01:08:50,680
Speaker 1: they were gonna get away with it forever. And that's

1343
01:08:50,720 --> 01:08:52,400
Speaker 1: one of those points where you realize, like you are

1344
01:08:52,439 --> 01:08:55,519
Speaker 1: all in. By the way, thanks for having me on

1345
01:08:55,560 --> 01:08:57,599
Speaker 1: the show again. I appreciate it. It's it's always fun

1346
01:08:57,600 --> 01:08:59,519
Speaker 1: to talk with you here about the stuff. And and

1347
01:09:00,040 --> 01:09:02,040
Speaker 1: really there's so much more that we could talk about

1348
01:09:02,240 --> 01:09:04,080
Speaker 1: this whole thing. I mean, there's so many angles to

1349
01:09:04,120 --> 01:09:06,679
Speaker 1: this VW story and it's going to continue for years.

1350
01:09:06,720 --> 01:09:10,560
Speaker 1: As you said, Yeah, well, and if there are any

1351
01:09:10,560 --> 01:09:13,040
Speaker 1: major developments further on down the line, like several months

1352
01:09:13,080 --> 01:09:14,760
Speaker 1: from now, maybe we'll have you back on. We'll talk

1353
01:09:14,800 --> 01:09:16,679
Speaker 1: a little bit more about it and to kind of

1354
01:09:17,000 --> 01:09:21,160
Speaker 1: explore uh more of the that that element about how

1355
01:09:21,960 --> 01:09:25,240
Speaker 1: uh the technology of cars is making it possible for

1356
01:09:25,360 --> 01:09:27,400
Speaker 1: us to first of all, it's making it harder for

1357
01:09:27,479 --> 01:09:29,840
Speaker 1: us to work on our own vehicles, and secondly, it's

1358
01:09:29,840 --> 01:09:32,000
Speaker 1: making it harder for us to even understand what's happening

1359
01:09:32,000 --> 01:09:35,440
Speaker 1: with our vehicles here. I think that's an interesting conversation

1360
01:09:35,560 --> 01:09:37,920
Speaker 1: and it's it's one we've kind of touched on in

1361
01:09:37,960 --> 01:09:41,000
Speaker 1: the past when we talk about autonomous cars too, so

1362
01:09:41,080 --> 01:09:44,160
Speaker 1: maybe we'll revisit that. Guys, if you have any suggestions

1363
01:09:44,200 --> 01:09:46,479
Speaker 1: for future episodes of tech Stuff, whether it's a topic

1364
01:09:46,600 --> 01:09:49,400
Speaker 1: or a guest host or an interview subject or anything

1365
01:09:49,439 --> 01:09:52,320
Speaker 1: like that, let me know. The email address you can

1366
01:09:52,360 --> 01:09:56,120
Speaker 1: send that information to is tech Stuff at how stuffworks

1367
01:09:56,120 --> 01:09:58,920
Speaker 1: dot com, or drop me a line on Facebook, Tumbler

1368
01:09:59,080 --> 01:10:01,880
Speaker 1: or Twitter. Handle it all three of those is text

1369
01:10:01,920 --> 01:10:04,839
Speaker 1: Stuff H s W. And I'll talk to you again

1370
01:10:05,400 --> 01:10:13,679
Speaker 1: really soon for more on this and thousands of other

1371
01:10:13,720 --> 01:10:25,000
Speaker 1: topics because it has stuff works dot com