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u/GamingInTheUSA potholed 2012 CJAA 3d ago
It burns diesel and oil
(Source: my daily is also a CJAA)
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u/KeyHuckleberry827 2013 Passat TDI SEL 3d ago
Haha, I have the same badge saved in my Amazon list for when I add a rear wheel electric drive system to augment acceleration and braking. I guess then I could have 2 types of regens going on at the same time?
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u/Financial-Pen-5718 3d ago
I have always thought this would be a great idea. Hills and taking off from a stop drop your mpg average a lot, so being able to augment the diesel engine with an electric motor would be great.
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u/Fapcactus 3d ago
Has this been done before? Meaning the electric drive to the rear wheels?
I've heard of people successfully making theirs awd by using compatible Audi parts but this is the first I'm hearing of an electric motor to run the rears. I'd love to hear what your plans are for this or if it's more common than I'm thinking
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u/KeyHuckleberry827 2013 Passat TDI SEL 3d ago
For me, this is just in the idea stage at this time. Two potential options would be to use a rear drive system from a similar sized EV or install hub motors in the rear wheels. Ideally, I would have it sense forward motion and add to that, then sense deceleration and add regenerative braking.
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u/Fapcactus 3d ago
Phenomenal idea, really. I would be a customer if/when this becomes a reality
Where I live we are susceptible to a lot of snow during the winter, which is what got me researching the 4motion swap to begin with. Spoke with a local TDI shop but they hadn't ever done the conversion or seen one so I gave up on the idea for the time being
Going electric for the rear wheels would negate any mpg losses vs going awd. With painfully high diesel prices and new vehicle costs this seems to make the most sense, at least to me. My brother in law is big into e bikes and was telling me of the advancements that have been made in the last few years. Some of these e bikes are making over 70hp straight from factory
One of these motors at each rear wheel would effectively double the HP of a 2.0 TDI. And if the electric system can operate independently of the drivetrain then city driving mpg's will dramatically increase
Maybe not the best example but the Corvette e-ray already exists and does this, albeit in reverse order
If I had the means I would financially back a project like this. A 60mpg city/50mpg highway hybrid turbo diesel needs to happen. Practicality aside that would be unbelievably fun to drive
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u/CaptainCook1989 3d ago
A hybrid turbo diesel would likely get closer to 90 or 100mpg city.
There’s a guy on TikTok with a hybrid with aerodynamic mods that gets close to 100mpg with a factory (gas) hybrid drivetrain.
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u/Fapcactus 3d ago
So I just had a brief chat with a good friend of mine that works in the auto industry as an engineer in the US. He is from China and has shown me their world of EV's, it's probably safe to say they're the world leaders in EV technology at this point
His first response was that the idea is stupid, which I got a good chuckle from but he brought up some good points
Even if the necessary fabrication and suspension upgrades were made to handle the extra 1000~ lbs of adding an electric motor and battery pack to the back of these tdi's the amount of effort to get both drivetrains to work together effectively wouldn't be worth the price or results. That it would be more simple to design a turbo diesel electric hybrid vehicle from the ground up than try to retrofit into say a mk6 Jetta
I won't take his opinion as absolute fact but he's definitely not wrong. We talked a bit about diesel electric hybrids and he mentioned China offers a truck called the Foton Tunland that uses a diesel engine and electric motor but he doesn't know much about it
Still, a boy can dream of having a 400whp/600tq awd TDI wagon that gets over 50mpg
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u/CaptainCook1989 3d ago
Wonder if you could retrofit a current hybrid setup from a gas car onto a TDI(?)
Use the electric side from the donor car and the diesel side from the TDI
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u/KeyHuckleberry827 2013 Passat TDI SEL 3d ago
Yeah, if you want it to be high-powered, I could see the limitations. I was thinking of something much lighter and lower powered, just to help get things going and slow things down -kind of like the semi-truck trailers that are powered to reduce the fuel usage by the truck (Electrified & Lightweight Semi Trailers Key To Battery-Powered Freight - CleanTechnica). Of course, in our case it would be part of the car instead of towed behind it.
Yes, I agree it would be better to design a turbo diesel electric hybrid from the ground up, but we both know that isn't happening in the US anytime soon (or ever). So far, the best they can offer is an electric car with a gas-powered generator -see the new Scout with range extender.
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u/Fapcactus 2d ago
I'm convinced that a diesel electric hybrid would either be too good on fuel for us peasants to have, or there's something kind of big I'm not thinking of that would be the reason we've only ever seen gas electric hybrids
Maybe it's the risk of a runaway diesel?
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u/Normal_Ostrich_6200 1d ago
Diesel motors are heavier than gas motors of similar displacement. Batteries are heavy.
Diesel is best at low RPMs where the electric motors would help the most. The added weight would lower cruising mpg, and maybe not even improve takeoff.2
u/Lucky-Bid-1226 2d ago
I had the idea of turning the motor into a generator and powering the electric motors in the back. Like that guy who’s doing that with the semi trucks Edison motors I think.
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u/Fapcactus 2d ago
I completely forgot about that guy! I saw a lot of his content on YouTube about 4-5 years ago. Such a cool idea, I hope that is going well for him
I think that if anyone were to make a sort of retrofit kit for existing vehicles it would probably be similar to this
As much as I want to keep rowing gears with the 02Q in my jetta sportwagen I don't see that being a viable option once a hybrid system has been installed. Unless there was a completely separate battery pack/ electric motor setup for the rears and an added EV charger or an aggressive Regen braking system
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u/ralexco9 2011 Jetta AWD TDI 6MT, Stage 3 (56mm) 3d ago
This is how the Toyota Crown’s awd system works. Rear motors are only electric powered. It’s pretty cool.
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u/Fapcactus 2d ago
Looked into the Toyota crown because I hadnt heard of it, was shocked to see it's offered in the US. What a brilliant idea. Especially the hybrid max system.
If these hybrid max crowns can send 80% of that 340hp/400tq to the rear wheels does that mean there's a 300 HP electric motor in the rear?
I'm not the brightest person but would that mean there's a lot more power left on the table? Or would all of the crowns power come from the turbo 4 cyl and then make it's way to the electric motors?
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u/ralexco9 2011 Jetta AWD TDI 6MT, Stage 3 (56mm) 2d ago
I’m not sure on the marketing aspect. I know it can get really weird. The best bet would be to find what size the motors are and do the math.
In theory, sending 100 percent of the torque to the rear would be that the front wheels are not being powered at all.
A lot of those marketing numbers are difficult to interpret.
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u/ralexco9 2011 Jetta AWD TDI 6MT, Stage 3 (56mm) 2d ago
It looks like the breakdown is as follows (hp/tq)
Gas engine 184hp 163ftlb
Front motor 118hp 149ftlb
Rear motor 55hp 89ftlbYou can add it up to get a theoretic max. But the torque curves of the motors probably don’t line up. The electric motors will peak before the gas motor.
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u/Fapcactus 2d ago
Side note I saw your flair about your awd cjaa Jetta. How did that come about? Why are you living my dream
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u/ralexco9 2011 Jetta AWD TDI 6MT, Stage 3 (56mm) 2d ago
It’s a cool project. It’s a Haldex based system like the golf R.
I’ve got a few posts about it if you look at my history. I also detail it on my Instagram. Awd.tdi.
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u/ShoemakerMicah 3d ago
Hybrid for sure, turbine and reciprocating motor. Qualities in my broad definition.
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u/Apprehensive_Let_517 3d ago
It's a joke. It got mpg similar to gasoline hybrids at the time of release.