GAS-SAVING GADGETS - FEGEDABOUTEM!

Run your car on water. Run your car on air. Put this pill in your gas tank and improve mileage more than 50%. Secret 100-mpg carburetor Detroit doesn’t want you to know about! Save over $100 a month guaranteed in fuel costs with this special fuel additive. Our $49.95 fuel-saver creates a mileage-increasing swirling vortex in your engine; turns the air-fuel mixture into a hurricane or a tornado! This proven product uses the same concept behind the jet engine to save you at the pump. Attend our free hotel meeting and learn how to market this gas-saver to your friends and neighbors.

Bullshit.

It used to be that advertisements for these kinds of products were found only in the classified section of Popular Mechanics or sold on the midway at county fairs (though I must admit that infomercial guy who sells the ShamWow chamois is pretty entertaining; heck, we almost bought one ... or two).

Cars and trucks come from their factories designed to get the best possible mileage from a gallon of gas. Some people might find that hard to believe, but vehicles are designed, inside and out, for the lowest-common denominator of driver and the care they might show their car. That's because, when drivers start "adding lightness" and perform other tricks on the family sedan to make it lighter, faster and go, stop and handle better, then you're talking about building ... a race car.

Let me make another point: None of the gas-saving scams listed above work. Not one of them. I will tell a story to support my case ...

Most everyone is familiar with STP, and we don't mean Stone Temple Pilots (though they are cool, too).

In October 1954, three St. Joseph, MO businessmen ponied-up $3,000 in start-up capital and introduced Scientifically Treated Petroleum. Better known as STP, their first product was STP Oil Treatment, that they claimed helped automobile motor oil resist thinning at high temperatures and pressures. Not really a "treatment," it was more like a 100-or-more weight oil that was so thick it could plug leaks in head gaskets and fool about any driver into thinking their engine was running better than before ... and it might, for awhile, at least. It's kind of the liquid equivalent of the infamous "sawdust in the transmission." In 1961, STP was purchased by the Studebaker Packard Corporation. The now-infamous Andy Granatelli was appointed CEO in 1963 and began marketing the products through auto and boat racing. Those who aren't familiar with this great promoter, Granatelli (whose brother Vince was also involved and successful in IndyCar racing for decades), is the man seen kissing Mario Andretti in Victory Circle at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, after Andretti won the 1969 Indy 500; THAT is Andy Granatelli. And he was damn happy STP had spent a lot of money getting Andretti into the race in the first place. It was Andretti's first and to be his only win at The Speedway.

I also have it on good authority that Granatelli is able to consume up to $400 worth of sushi during lunch. And I'm still on my way to the point of this story.

Big racing news this week said that Petty Enterprises, the family-owned NASCAR team which was first-called Petty Engineering when Lee Petty founded it in 1949, sold a majority interest in their team and company to Boston Ventures, which describes itself as "a leading middle market private equity firm which invests in the entertainment, media, and communications sectors," whatever all that means. All of it did remind me of an STP story which applies to this posting's look at "fool additives, uh, I meant FUEL additives, gas secrets and 100-mpg carburetors".

A couple of decades ago I was at Southern California's wonderful old Riverside Raceway, attending what had to be one of the last NASCAR Winston Cup events at that track. That raceway is now a shopping mall, and not even a nice one at that. Race tracks look better in the desert than shopping malls.

Anyway, I was walking along the pit wall as the various teams brought their cars out, getting ready for the start of the race, which was about an hour off. I spotted the Petty car, the #43 STP Dodge, and even though I was new both to the sport and journalism, I knew that the red, white and blue car usually was worth some sort of story, and as just a few people surrounded it, I saw that this might be a chance to get some sort of story or at least some worthwhile background. Maybe even to meet the driver ... Richard Petty.

So I walked up to the car and a crew member had just opened the hood and was leaning over the engine. Getting closer, I saw he was pouring a liquid into that huge engine's oil fill pipe, and it was coming out of a can labeled "STP".

"How much do you put in there?" I asked.

"Not enough to hurt it," he barked back. I got the idea.

Whatever he was pouring into the engine was probably not any kind of STP product, but perhaps an ultra- lightweight oil, sometimes called a "home brew," which is often used by NASCAR race teams only for the few laps run during qualifying sessions. Only NASCAR and IndyCar run these kind of multi-lap qualifying sessions, with just one car on the track at a time, among the world's major racing series. This thin, super-slick oil allows the engine's parts to operate more freely, with less friction, producing more rpm, horsepower and, ultimately, speed. But the oil provides engine protection for only a few laps. So we don't recommend using this kind of oil in any car or truck to achieve better mileage, especially if you plan to run that car, truck or motorcycle for more than 10 miles before its next oil and filter change. The lightweight goo probably does provide improved mileage, but no one has admitted, as far as we know, to running enough laps with the stuff to comment for sure ... Though I am certain it's happened, with an engine that got great mileage ... for 1/2-mile-or-so ... and then "jus' blowed-up," as they say in NASCAR. (Photo - Honda's robot, Asimo, is seen in lights above the Honda FCX Clarity fuel cell sedan at the Los Angeles Auto Show).

Think about this: If Detroit (or Tokyo or Stuttgart or Seoul) had ways to improve mileage, wouldn't the manufacturers would promote them like crazy as the world beat a path to their showrooms? Of course! How do we know? Because it’s already happened. For proof, just take a look at Honda, GM and Toyota.

Click below for more on what to expect soon from GM, Honda and Toyota in fuel-saving cars and trucks ...

The first-generation Toyota Prius went on-sale in the US in August, 2000, as a 2001 model. Toyota’s goal, the company has often said in recent years, is to offer a gas/electric hybrid version of almost every model they make, including their Toyota, Lexus and Scion brands. (Photo - A 2004 Toyota Prius).

Their Scion division should be leading the way for mileage improvements for all of Toyota; can’t figure out why that’s not happened. Buyers should not be able to buy any Scion model that are not "green."

Having owned a Prius since the car first arrived on these shores (and we waited three months for ours and paid retail, just like everyone else) and having also road-tested the $124,000 Lexus LS600 hL gas/electric hybrid, I’m convinced Toyota can build a great luxury car and a great inexpensive hybrid. If they can combine the two into a reasonably-priced, comfortable family-sized performance sedan which gets over 50 mpg, and there's really little reason to think they can't accomplish this, they’ll remain the world’s biggest car company for a long time. (Photo - Toyota will soon be building their Camry gas/electric hybrid in three countries; Japan, Australia and Thailand).

And in just the past week, Toyota announced plans for building three new factories in Japan, and all three will produce batteries ... nothing else ... for their current and coming gas/electric hybrids. Also, Toyota said this week that they will be building hybrid Camrys in Australia and Thailand, as well as Japan.

In addition, Toyota has developed a new fuel cell hybrid, a green car powered by hydrogen and electricity, that can travel more than twice the distance of its predecessor model without filling up, the automaker said Friday, June 13th.

The improved model's maximum cruising range is 516 miles compared with 205 miles for Toyota's previous fuel cell model. The FCHV-adv (Fuel Cell Hybrid Vehicle - ADVanced) will be available for leasing in Japan later this year. Pricing and other details weren't available, and overseas plans are still undecided. (Photo - Honda's FCX Clarity fuel cell sedan at the Los Angeles Auto Show).

Why is it called a "fuel cell hybrid"? The FCHV-adv also comes with an electric motor and works as a  hybrid by switching between that motor and the hydrogen-powered fuel cell. Fuel efficiency in the FCHV-adv was improved 25 percent with better braking and other changes. The new fuel cell vehicle can also start and run in temperatures as low as minus 22 degrees Fahrenheit. Getting a fuel cell to work well in cold weather has been a big technological challenge.

As for Honda, they announced before Memorial Day they’ll sell four different gas/electric hybrids in the US soon, including a hybrid version of the Fit, a new version of the Civic hybrid, an all-new  hybrid modeled on the wild CR-Z concept car from last year’s Tokyo Motor Show and an all-new, family-sized “Prius fighter”.

Honda has sold about 262,000 gas/electric hybrids worldwide since 1999; Toyota has sold more than 1 million Prius since 1997. Honda’s Accord hybrid was one of the company’s few miscues in the US; you can’t market a car as both a “fuel-saving hybrid” and “the most powerful Accord ever” . Kind of schizo, no?

Beginning later this year, 200 hand-picked US families will lease (for about $600 a month) Honda’s FCX Clarity, a hydrogen-powered fuel cell EV family sedan which produces just one emission: pure water vapor. (Photos - Artwork depicts how the General Motors Equinox CUV fuel cell EV works; Below that, the Equinox at the Los Angeles Auto Show).

General Motors has been several years in development of their own hydrogen fuel cell CUV (Crossover Utility Vehicle), called Equinox. GM's Hy-wire and Autonomy concepts have led to Equinox, and the next big step is getting Equinox into the driveways and garages of numerous Americans who sign lease contracts, too (GM also leased their sorely-missed EV1, which was marketed through Saturn dealers).

GM promises that in 2010 they will be selling, through Chevrolet, a car called Volt. Volt, which has been exhibited at auto shows and gotten a lot of media attention, is a plug-in gas/electric hybrid, combining three quite different technologies. Volt's emphasis is on the "electric" part of gas/electric. Volt will have a small gasoline-powered "generator" on-board whose main function is to keep Volt's batteries charged. Each wheel will have its own electric motor, fed from those batteries. The generator will hold 12-gallons of gasoline and GM says Volt will be able to drive its first 40 miles, after overnight charging through a standard 110-volt outlet, on e-power alone; total mileage after an overnight charge and a full 12-gallon fuel tank will be somewhere around 640 miles. Not bad.

So in fact, what major car-makers are doing now is the last thing Big Oil would want them to do: Working  to make cars and trucks which need no oil-based fuels at all, other than the amount of those dead dinosaurs needed to actually build vehicles, as petroleum products are needed in fiberglass, plastics and all sorts of other internal and external parts.

Not that there aren’t real ways to improve performance, mileage and emissions; just look at a Formula 1 race car to see cars without a camshaft which manage to run pretty damn well. For example, a F1 car’s engine valves are opened and closed with air pressure (run your car with air!) negating the need for a camshaft. Talk about weight loss and increased performance!

Short of investing the $100 million-or-so it takes to create a F1 engine from scratch, car- and truck-owners have a lot of real options when it comes to improving mileage and emissions, and this website will highlight many of them.

Whoever said that “there’s a simple solution for every problem, and it’s usually wrong” was absolutely right when it comes to creating more miles from a gallon of gas.

-30-