Ford has patented a new tech, which will allow for artificially produced noise to make an engine sound like there are more cylinders at work. It’s not for “go-faster” purposes but to provide enhanced fuel efficiency.
As an example, a three-cylinder unit could produce sounds similar to an inline-six. The reason behind this, according to Ford, is that the tech would improve fuel efficiency by encouraging drivers to shift gears at lower revs – a solution which addresses real-world efficiency for downsized engines.
Theoretically, Ford claims that drivers usually shift by ear. In the case of a 1.0 litre EcoBoost engine, for example, higher revs are held to gain more power from the tiny displacement. Unfortunately, this style lowers fuel economy, hence the need for a noise-based solution.
By recording the sound produced by the engine and playing it at the optimum mark in the combustion cycle, it will sound as if there are more cylinders working. As a result, Ford believes that drivers will then move on to a higher gear sooner, which in turn enhances efficiency.
On another note, the application of this tech will also help the environment as well. With that being said, there’s no promise that the patented technology will ever feature in Ford models at all.
Elsewhere, models such as the Ford Mustang with the 2.3 litre EcoBoost engine and the new Focus RS already have artificial sound producing capabilities. Being performance models however, such sounds are of course meant to make the drive more exhilarating instead.
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Meanwhile in bolehland, they praise pondan engine sound sushi car.
I think Proton has the best sounding engine ever. Perhaps should add it to the new Perdana?
U must be joking?
I always thought Malaysians are the real pioneers in this category. So many Ah Beng cars on the road have it already.
we did, on Kancil..
Totally agreed with you.. Only that, they weren’t patented.. :D
ah beng cars use cheap exhaust that sounds like fart cans so it’s not engine’s sounds
Or you can make it sound harsh like a washing machine/ lawn mower so people go slower to save fuel.
While you’re at it also put loose screws that rattle when driven to make people drive slower
Can i oso make my 3-cylinder axia sound like fire spewing V12? Will save my fuel up to 30km/L.
Absolutely unnecessary for Malaysia. Already majority prefers automatics rather than manuals. And personally some jakun drivers singing praises for the BMW turbocharged inline-four engine. They didn’t know what they’re missing from the silky smooth inline-six engines…..
Sob…sob…sob… I can’t even afford inline-four, let alone inline-six
Malaysian roads are flooded with “too loud too slow” cars.
bunyi macam ribut …..
lari macam siput …..
you my man, deserve a thumbs up. hahaha
you my man,deserve thumbs up because comment like a boss
Coming from a Ford customer, I think Ford has taken this “eco-maniac” joke too far. Though I concur that the 1.0 three cylinder pot is a thrill to drive, but it’s fuel economical is not great at all. The 5.6 litre/100km is only achievable if you drive it below the 1500 rpm boost threshold ALL THE TIME. Now, tell me which stupid idiot will do that in real world driving? In fact, a Mazda 2 Skyactiv or even a Civic with old tech SOHC 1.5 trump the Ecoboost 1.0 in fuel efficiency. Speaking of fuel efficiency, no amount of stupid tech or downsizing will win over a good old NA. Heck, if you don’t believe me, you can pull the new Ford Focus 1.5Turbo and put it head to head against the Mazda 3 2.0 NA, the Mazda 3 still wins over the Ford in sipping fuel even though it has bigger engine!
All these downsizing frenzy is just a gimmick initiated by VW to get pass China’s emission tax structure, which happens to be VW largest overseas market and most important cash cow outside Europe. Since then, all the marques has follow suit in this stupid “downsizing” route with all these turbocharging claim of “environmental friendliness”, which in my opinion, the biggest lie and gimmick in today’s global automotive world.
This downsizing myth and lie is now bulldozing all continents around the world like the biblical truth, anyone who dare to question its validity will be immediately curse for blasphemy (how dare you kill polar bear! they asked). Now, even classy and dignified BMW (and Honda VTEC) also follow this rout. For a purist, I am very sad. But in business sense, it is justifiable. Let us morn the passing of an era and relegate our VTEC thrill as grandfather stories someday, as one writer of Paultan recently pointed out.
well at least downsizing reduce the road tax. give and take.
True. I have both the Mazda 2 1.5 and Ford Fiesta Ecoboost 1.0. The Mazda 2 averages 7 l/100km mixed urban/highway but the ford only can achieve 8.5 l/100km mixes urban/highway.
Sad that Ford tries to advertise such low fuel consumption figures which are not achievable in real life.
my Fiesta 1.6 achieves a combined 8.5l/100km as well but i drive on the aggressive side.
i’ve tried resetting the averages and driving like a civil being for a month and the best i could get was about 7.3l/100km
on my personal experience: the advertised 5.9l/100km could only be achieved on a pure highway run.
Most modern engines employ a reasonable amount of fuel saving tech (yes some better than others) but in a practical sense, if you’re light-footed and don’t drive like a maniac…your real-world fuel costs will be thereabouts the same save for a couple of bucks difference.
Yes, though personal driver behaviour does effect the fuel consumption, but many people tend to forget another factor relating all these new “downsizing” turbo charged engines.
It all got to do with the BASIC DISPLACEMENT of an engine. Turbocharging engines are machines with two very distinctive characters, treat it with a light foot, it will behave like a good old NA that sips fuel like an English lady. But once that turbo spooled up, with the extreme dense air being compressed into the combustion chamber, more fuel will be needed to burn the compressed air, hence the fuel consumption will be badly affected. The problem with all these new turbocharged downsizing engines nowadays is that they come with a very small BASIC DISPLACEMENT, ie 1.0, 1.2, 1.5, 1.6 and so on… Before the turbo started to spool, they are basically an underpowered engine, and because of that, carmarkers tend to put low inertia turbochargers with a very low RPM spooling threshold. With that being said, you will be needing the boost 90% of the time, no matter how careful you are with the throttle. I can attested to this because my family has booth the FIesta Ecoboost and the Mazda 2 Skyactiv. My brother and I have driven booth car extensively and no matter how careful we are with the throttle, the Mazda still wins in fuel efficiency. This experience kicked started my doubt on all these “downsizing” frenzy across the globe, I soon make some research on this topic and started gathering info about all these downsizing turbocharging mill. You’ll be surprise in real world driving condition, the 1.4 TSI mill is no match to Honda’s dinosaur tech SOHC 1.8 NA, I repeat, in real world driving condition, same driver over same traffic condition. You can pull any Japanese NA engines of the same segment, be it the Sylphy, Mazda 3, Altis or the Civic (not the current turbocharged Civic) against their European downsizing counterpart, such as the Jetta, Golf, Focus or 308, the NA lineup in real world driving condition always win in fuel efficiency. The Japanese carmakers are pragmatic and low key in their business demeanor, they tend to work hard in silence to let their product speaks for themselves rather than buy you over using UNTRUTHFUL claim and gimmicks, which explains why the Japanese are silent about it even though they knew the truth.
As in the case of my Ford 1.0 Ecoboost, the turbo kicks in at 1400-1500rpm, which inadvertently, no drivers can maintain that kind of rpm in real world traffic. So, you’ll be needing that boost more than 90% of the time, without the boost, it’s just a seriously underpowered 1.0 engine hauling a FIesta chassis. The reason I am making a statement here is that these downsizing frenzy has nothing gotta do with fuel saving, it is a LIE manipulated by very clever PR manipulation initiated by VW and follow suited by other carmakers. This colossal PR manipulation that currently spread through the entire automotive globe scene is just a mean to sell more cars under the current emission tax structure and on a fake moral high ground, appeased to the environmentalist and “green” government across the globe. In a nutshell, it has nothing gotta do with environmental friendliness nor energy conservation. This downsizing frenzy was originally started in the last decade spearheaded by VW in China market, soon, this downsizing fever, or shall I call it virus spread through the European continent and across the globe to what we are having today.
On the contrary, the route to turbocharging fuel saving is to jack up the BASIC DISPLACEMENT of an engine. This because with a big BASIC DISPLACEMENT, you don’t need to spool the turbo early because you have sufficient power to haul the car down low in the RPM range without kick starting the turbocharger too early. This explains why turbocharged cars with big displacement such as the current BMW M4, with its 3.0 six cylinder pot doesn’t fare much worse in terms of fuel efficiency against its v8, 4.0 predecessor, because the BASIC DISPLACEMENT is there and it don’t have the “rely on boost 90% of the time” scenario that beleaguered many of these small displacement engines in the market. By making a large basic displacement, it defeats the purpose of downsizing at the first place, which is to avert the tax structure and sell more cars.
I am OK if these carmakers are are honest about their downsizing motive, WHICH IS TO SELL MORE CARS UNDER THE CURRENT TAX STRUCTURE. What really makes me puke is their moral high ground claim of environmental friendliness and energy conservation, which in reality, a blatant lie. On a final note, I am not a JDM fans nor I take money from the Japanese, anyone who has ownership experience with both continental downsizing engines and conventional NA cars can agree to what I’ve said, of course, driver’s heavy footed or not aside, assumed the same driver, same habit, in real world condition. You’ll be surprise to find out the truth.
Dude.. based on my personal experience, i find that a turbo car really saves fuel! I’m a quantity surveyor and i work with a construction company. They gave me a courtesy car to use. So i first got the car back in 2007 and it was a blue Toyota Fortuner 2.7V… it had leather seats, auto a/c and all. But the car was fuel hungry. I spent almost rm200 per week refueling the car (shell v-power, about rm150 each tank). And a full tank lasts max 4 days. Granted my commute is about 60km per day. Then 2 months ago they (my company ) upgraded my car to a january 2016 Toyota Fortuner 2.5G.. it lost the leather seats and auto a.c., among other luxury items but goodness me!!! The power of this beast is unbelievable. And a full tank now lasts at max 9 days.. same commute, same a.c. settings, same load (me alone, no equipments n etc). So i think your theory is a bit flawed on these turbochargers… should look more into it. Cheers mate!
You obviously didn’t read what I wrote in details. Your Fortune has 2.5 litre as it’s BASIC DISPLACEMENT, hence the basic displacement of your Fortuner is already sufficient to haul your car down low in the RPM range without needing to spool the turbocharger 90% of the time.
My point is all these downsizing turbocharger engines (like the Ford Ecoboost or VW TSI) fitted in many European cars are not fuel efficient as they claim to be because they have a very low BASIC DISPLACEMENT, which resulted the turbo needed to be spooled 90% of the time and very fuel guzzling compared to a bigger NA engine with a similar output.
Your Forturner is an entirely different case because you already has 2.5 litre at your disposal even without the turbocharger. You can read the BMW M4 example that I had given, I reiterate that turbocharging can only save fuel of you have a big BASIC DISPLACEMENT, at least 2.0 litre or above, which your Forturner fits exactly to what I have said. But by making a big BASIC DISPLACEMENT engine with turbocharging, that alone defeats the original downsizing route all these while propagated by all these car makers with fake moral high ground, claiming downsizing as a means of environmental friendliness and energy conservation, which in reality, a lie.
You obviously didn’t read my point in details and casually jump into your own conclusion to refute what I say. Sigh.
Dude did you know that the Fortuner 2.7V is a petrol engine and 2.5G is a diesel engine?
to Malaysian Driver:
calm your tits m8! it was just an opinion. yeah maybe there was a comprehension error on my part (well, since I iinitially viewed yr comment through a smartphone, there was no paragraph, just one continuous text). I get what your trying to say now. thanks for the explanation. I personally never driven a low cc turbocharged car (except for my mum’s ford kuga) but your theory is on point with personal experience since my mum’s car fuel hungry. cheers m8!
to Fortuner:
ofcouse la I’m aware my current ride is a diesel! u crazy ar I wana pump petrol onto diesel car? my point of the comparison was to demonstrate my ex NA 2.7 petrol fortuner with my current 2.5 turbodiesel VNT fortuner.. nothing to do with petrol vs diesel argument. cheers!
slay u are a huge retard. in the first place why the heck are u comparing a 2.7 petrol NA against a 2.5 turbo diesel ? the moment u do this comparison already shows u are ignorant of the differences between petrol and diesel .
you gain some, you lose some. For example, a 1.5T vs a 2.0 NA. the 1.5T will give you a much better response and driving thrill at probably a marginally higher fuel consumption than the 2.0 NA. Unlike back in the day when your only option for turbocharged cars were those with massive power but a range of like 100km before it runs out of gas.
marketeers (i am one myself) will highlight what people want to hear..hence manufacturers test these cars under controlled conditions where they can achieve those fuel economy numbers so we can shout about it on the adverts
like i said..you gain some, you lose some..there’s always a trade off.
potong a hilux vnt exhaust and sound like a v8 10ton lorry
Save fuel by creating noise pollution. Great, this is what humanity needs, …louder noise.
most of this sound symposer technology (whether on performance cars like Porches, BMW M-series, AMG Mercs, or even the Focus ST/Fiesta ST) channels the noise into the cabin through the firewall so it’s not really heard on the outside of the car.
i reckon the same concept is applied for this case. just for a different purpose.
I want the sound of an old school V12 F1 engine then. Hahaha. Or muscle car V8
psychology effect.
dose it required?
Just make it so it makes lots of wind sound like you’re driving really fast, or just remove noise insulation.
It actually works. Like Proton Campro cars have really loud engine noise & wind noise even at 110km/h that deters you to go any faster.
Unless you have hearing problem or used to riding bikes.