GoFar Car Kickstarter

[EEVblog]

As seen on my Cebit video last year, they finally have a Kickstarter:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/gofar/gofar-make-your-car-the-smartest-car-on-the-street

[Mechanical Menace]

All that just so you don't have to select the mpg readout built into your car?

[dr.diesel]

All that just so you don't have to select the mpg readout built into your car?

But some people need an idiot light to guide them!  I was once in an argument with a guy that believed the faster/harder you accelerated the better your mileage, cause you would spend less time accelerating?   

[firewalker]

An OBDII<->bluetooth/serial dongle plus a computer system. I think there are some android applications that utilize the phones gps+accelerometer+OBD-data to calculate things like that.

If I remember correctly Toyota used to have this system for years. At first an economy gauge, and later an economy LED (red, green). After some years they removed it because the ECU was ensuring the "economy".

Nevertheless, I think they are being too optimistic for ~20% economy. Modern ECUs are good enough in self regulating for optimum fuel consumption to extract 20% more economy.

Alexander.

[Corporate666]

What a useless device.

Sorry, but it is.

It's not going to do anything for automatic transmission cars other than tell you the obvious - the more gently you accelerate, the less fuel you use.  And even for those with manuals, most have built-in MPG meters and who is the idiot who will say "Wow, you mean that driving in 4th gear at 40mph/1500rpm is more efficient than keeping it in 2nd gear at 5,000rpm?  Who knew?!?".

Not to mention the *last* thing we need in the world is a herd of hypermiling douchebags taking 5 minutes to accelerate up to speed. 

And also not to mention "there are apps for that" - free apps.  Selling it as a separate device you need to plug in and that has fixed hardware vs. a phone which you have anyway and most people already use in their car?  Waste.  I'd rather have it on my phone.  The claimed accuracy difference isn't compelling.

Devices that require you to educate the consumer on why they need your device and which have to be sold on being better than others at a significant cost premium are virtually impossible to sell, unless you're on the leading edge of a whole new market.  But considering where we're going with cars and transportation, this thing has an extremely limited lifespan ahead of it.

[Mechatrommer]

I was once in an argument with a guy that believed the faster/harder you accelerated the better your mileage, cause you would spend less time accelerating?   

I recently in an argument with a friend that believed bigger wheel consume as much fuel as smaller wheel. because even though bigger wheel is heavy, the engine will rev half to get the same distance as the smaller wheel does.

[Neverther]

Wouldn't it be best to accelerate where engine is most fuel efficient (g/kWh from engine speed and load) like most diesel-electric powerunits do? Search for fuel consumption map.

[kaz911]

My Mercedes have a "green driving indicator" that shows 3 different "green bars"
1. Acceleration
2. Constant (constant speed)
3. Coasting (using engine for breaking)

All of the above are great for long highway trips - but once you get to a city - if you try to drive as nice as the car wants you to - you will end up as road-kill. Yes - if there are no one behind - I will coast - but if there are a lot of people behind - I will drive to minimize the queue length behind so people don't (feel) trapped behind a set of lights.

I would rather see green driving apps - show the REAL impact of things like SPEED HUMPS/BUMPS - and other road "annoyance features" - that might make you slow down to a crawl while driving over them - but the thing that uses the absolute most fuel - is accelerations - so every single one of the road annoyance features - is killing our environment and cars average fuel consumption.

[mikerj]

Not to mention the *last* thing we need in the world is a herd of hypermiling douchebags taking 5 minutes to accelerate up to speed. 

Amen to that.

[electr_peter]

Audi showed off as system (in last year, IIRC) where drivers gets information when the next traffic light ahead will turn green and what speed to drive to hit that traffic light at green. I am not sure this even works in special zones, but it would certainly be a very nice and useful feature (more constant speed, less accelerations/decelerations). Set autopilot to recommended speed and enjoy your cruise.

Fuel saving just from monitoring is overstated and particular device in question is almost useless. For it to work properly, driver must be completely ignorant. Also, I have noticed one problem with various bogus and half-bogus devices - fuel consumption measuring and comparison without proper conditions and controls is utterly useless. Try comparing normal fuel consumption with consumption when device is installed (and car is repaired in some cases) and driver "tries" to save. There could be a slight bias

"Smart" (in your face) measurement of fuel consumption is very similar to "smart" metering of electricity. Consumption is supposed to drop automatically by installing these expensive devices (or so the proponents claim) which is only backed by sketchy evidence. But that is OT.

[zerorisers]

All that just so you don't have to select the mpg readout built into your car?

I don't have a MPG option in my car... actually there are basically no electronics in it besides a few indicators, a radio, AC, and the starter...

[rob77]

i'm driving efficiently for ages but yet got a bluetooth OBD2 dongle and bought an android app - the two is giving me the same features as the gofar while there is NO CABLE hanging from the OBD2 dongle ! seriously guys behing gofar...get rid of that DANGEROUS cable coming from the obd2 module - the cable might go loose and might distract the driver - causing him to crash... 

[Mechanical Menace]

All that just so you don't have to select the mpg readout built into your car?

I don't have a MPG option in my car... actually there are basically no electronics in it besides a few indicators, a radio, AC, and the starter...

So this wouldn't work for you.

[rob77]

My car is electric, and often the second or third question people have is "how many MPG do you get?"

"Gallons of what?"

"Electricity"

At that point I usually do a little facepalm.

stupid question deserves a stupid answer

just calculate the volume of the battery pack in gallons + measure the distance youcan make on that battery pack in miles ..and there it is ! MPG of an electric car !   

[zapta]

My car is electric, and often the second or third question people have is "how many MPG do you get?"

"Gallons of what?"

"Electricity"

At that point I usually do a little facepalm.

stupid question deserves a stupid answer

just calculate the volume of the battery pack in gallons + measure the distance youcan make on that battery pack in miles ..and there it is ! MPG of an electric car !   

... or KG of coal at the electric power planet.  ;-)

As for that kickstarter project, they are optimizing the wrong metric. What counts if the FPG (fun per gallon).

My car has MPG and shift indicators and they are useless.

[mswhin63]

I Have been using a similar device "CarChip^TM" for approx 8 years logging everything for my Citroen Berlingo. It is too old now for real-time monitoring, but I believe the newer model has real-time monitoring capability.

http://www.davisnet.com/drive/products/carchip_products.asp

Even for its age has worked well for me and even show hard acceleration and braking too.

[zapta]

Acceleration is a good thing, I would pay for a device that will improve the acceleration, not for device that tells me not to accelerate.

My previous car had after-market firmware that increased response time and the power (by allowing higher turbo boost). Loved it. It was simple refreshing, not like those old 'chipping' of older cars where replaced ROM is replaced.  It also came with a control device that I could connect to the ODBII connector and select programs.

With my current car model the security is still holding but some good souls are working on it.

[FrankenPC]

Check out Torque Pro for Android.  I don't know if they have it for iOS.  You buy a cheap OBDII bluetooth dongle and you are set for about $15 USD total.  You get all kinds of real time engine data including MPG.

[Orpheus]

I've been using Torque + bluetooth OBDII for years. True, you do "just learn" how to drive efficiently in a few weeks/months, just as you learn to gauge your speed without constantly checking your speedometer, but the sweet spot for every car is different. My v6 minivan actually turns out to do better if accelerate more briskly after a full stop than my V8 luxury sedan, due to the different weight/power/tranny ratios. Also, US fuel stations pump a different mix in the winter (~5 mos, here in New England) with a different sweet spot. In both cars, I get up to 30% higher mileage than the other drivers in my family, ranging from teens to geriatrics, because I bothered to learn.

Also, several cars I've owned with an "instantaneous MPG readout" aren't well designed for this use. They may use a small built-in (limited) OBD2 display at the bottom of the instrument cluster (it can be distracting to constantly move my eyes that far) or switch out of Instant MPG mode when they feel they have "more important" things to tell me (like radio channel changes), then don't return to MPG mode.

As a hobby, I use an old android phone, tucked in the distant corner of the dash, where it meets the windshield, as a HUD projecting up onto a but or aluminum foil on the inside of the windshield (where it would only block my view of my hood/bonnet, not traffic, in accordance with local laws) Torque has a "HUD mode" (reversed image) to support exactly such a use. It's fun and useful.

I dreamt of such a device in my youth when I took long car trips in cars that were not always in the best of shape. Many a time I had to nurse a car home, wishing I had realtime info on something (battery voltage, oil level, radiator temp, fuel level -- sometimes it was a dash gauge that failed)

So, while it's not something I'd buy, I applaud the notion. More efficient driving doesn't have to be obnoxious (but they do seem to push the idea of "beating others" or "personal best")

[mswhin63]

Check out Torque Pro for Android.  I don't know if they have it for iOS.  You buy a cheap OBDII bluetooth dongle and you are set for about $15 USD total.  You get all kinds of real time engine data including MPG.

The Torque Pro looks great, nice tip!