Program used by Volkswagen and Audi in diesel cars literally take the car to get “clean” when he realizes he is being tested.
The research of the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) against Volkswagen by using software installed on their diesel vehicles sold in the US between 2008 and 2015 to “cheat” greenhouse gas emission tests and issue 10 to 40 times pollutants above the permitted level, continues to reveal new details.
Since 18 Setembrp when the research information was disclosed, the company admitted the practice. Its CEO, Martin Winterkorn, has resigned from office, the initial 482,000 cars affected in the US turned into nearly 11 million Volkswagen vehicles worldwide and that the company could face fines of at least 18 billion dollars.
This Monday, also Audi (brand owned mostly by Volkswagen) confirmed that 2.1 million of its cars had the same software as part of 11 million revealed earlier.
A specialist at West Virginia University believes that an audit of the software can reveal who knew what and when.
Details on how the software installed by the manufacturer deceived the pollutant emission test – in this case, so-called nitrogen oxides (NOx), highly toxic gases generated by burning fossil fuels – are included in the letter from the EPA for Volkswagen dated September 18
According to the EPA, “the position of the steering wheel, the vehicle speed, the time the engine was turned on and barometric pressure -. all very specific indicators of an emissions test – functioned as an activation trigger for the ‘cheating device.’ ” Essentially, the electronic control module of the vehicle (ECM) was changed to work in “clean” throughout the test run period.
“Miracle” technology
Kirk Wennerstrom, marketing director of the Greenwich Concours d’Elegance, a company specializing in cars “vintage” of Greenwich, Connecticut (USA), explains that the EPA tests involving the simulation of a number of different speeds, hard braking and simple and starts. “What Volkswagen has done is more or less as an average student hire a ‘nerd’ to pass him in school exams”.
To meet the specifications of emissions, manufacturers of diesel cars injecting a special fluid called AdBlue in the exhaust stream that catalyzes the NOx fumes. This feature reduces in fact the emission of pollutants to the required level but adds weight and cost to cars, forcing their owners to shoulder more maintenance costs because the fluid must be replaced regularly.
“The Volkswagen was the market say he had found a way to comply with the rules without the AdBlue” says Wennerstrom. “Everyone was amazed to innovation and I am sure that many manufacturers have tried a reverse engineering in Volkswagen engines to figure out how she did it.”
In the light of Scandal the BMW fellows actions also had problems last week, after the German magazine Auto Bild published an article which claimed that one of the diesel vehicles emitted manufacturer 11 times more NOx than EU standards allow.
In official response to Auto Bild, BMW said it “does not manipulate or adulterous gas emission tests.”
(IDGNS / Computerworld Brazil)
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