British military developing GPS navigation that works without satellites

Did you know that GPS doesn't work underwater? Neither did we. But apparently it's a big enough problem that the United Kingdom's Ministry of Defense is working on a futuristic solution that will allow more precise navigation by the Royal Navy's submarines and surface ships, while eventually trickling down to consumer-grade mobile devices. That all sounds great, but its abilities aren't anywhere near as cool as its name - the quantum compass.

Using subatomic particles that interact with the Earth's magnetic field (which is a phrase I never though I'd write while working at Autoblog), the accuracy of submersible navigation could be drastically improved. When a boat surfaces, pinpointing its exact location can be off by as much as half a mile. With a quantum compass, its location would be accurate to just three feet.

Not only is the quantum compass highly accurate, but it's also virtually impossible to tamper with, unlike the overworked system of GPS satellites. Because quantum mechanics. Not surprisingly, the applications for the civilian world could be immense. Cars and phones would be able to deliver pinpoint-accurate navigation information in a form that is totally constant. Hop over to GPSDaily for the details.
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Mahindra plant and engineering ops comes to MI, electric bikes planned

Depending on who you speak to, India's Mahindra & Mahindra might be best known in the States for the six-year saga of huge hopes and dashed dreams embodied in a small, diesel pickup truck, as a tractor maker pushing its way into a US market ruled by John Deere and Kubota, as the owner of Ssangyong, as one of the companies that tried to buy Aston Martin or as an automotive engineering firm providing product development services to almost every carmaker out there. It's that last division that gets headlines now, Mahindra announcing an expansion of its facilities in Troy, Michigan on top of the news that it's setting up a factory in Ann Arbor, Michigan to build its GenZe scooter.

The Mahindra North American Technical Center (MNATC) is an outgrowth of the first tech center set up by Mahindra Engineering Services (MES) in 2012, now called Tech Mahindra. Mahindra Engineering is - obviously - the contract engineering services arm that serves a variety of industries, including transportation companies from Navistar to McLaren to Seat. Rick Haas, the president and COO of the MNATC, told Autoblog that he had five subject matter experts working out of the Tech Mahindra building doing product development for Mahindra in Chennai, India. Those experts weren't involved with Tech Mahindra, simply "squatting" in the building while they worked on products in the home market. About a year later it was deemed that the product development team "was exceeding our expectations, [so] we decided to turn this small group into a proper PD team and start full vehicle Product Development out of the Detroit area."

Those five engineers have moved into their new building and are now, Haas said, "up to 42 heads, on our way to about 100 this year, and more after that as we build a proper automotive PD center here to support the global aspirations of Mahindra in our auto business worldwide." They'll be "100% focused on supporting Mahindra's OEM auto business," supporting the engineering team in Chennai, India. "No work will ever be done for other companies" out of the MNATC, Haas said.

The Ann Arbor facility will build the GenZe, an electric scooter with a 30-mile-per-hour top speed and a price tag of $3,000. The plant is scheduled to manufacture 9,000 scooters per year, with the ability to increase that to 20,000 per year if sales take off. They will be sold direct in California, Florida, Oregon and Virginia, and through dealers in other states.
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NYT asks what happens when self-driving cars break the law

Here's the line to remember: "As robots become mainstream, lawmakers will have to grapple with how to govern machines and hold software accountable." That comes from a New York Times piece on what kind of legislation will be needed to deal with the inevitable accidents that autonomous vehicles will get into. The lawyers, naturally, will go after everyone with money, but who do the authorities charge when a self-driving car parks itself in a no-parking zone, and who will the jury hold responsible when it rolls the wrong way down a one-way street and, heaven forbid, injures or kills someone?

The academic world has already begun devoting white papers and test tracks to the subject, but it will be up to our elected leaders to - hopefully - start filling in some legally binding answers before the hard questions get asked in court. The earliest projections figure we have six years until autonomous cars drive themselves onto dealership lots, but once they show up, healthy public trust could make them quite popular. Head over to the NYT to read the piece and start thinking about who'll have to clean up the mess when you hear the phrase, "You have 20 seconds to comply..."
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BMW working on 2 Series Active Hybrid Tourer

The cover may have officially been pulled off the BMW 2 Series Active Tourer at the Geneva Motor Show, but BMW has apparently continued working on other variants behind closed doors. While at first glance this prototype looks like any other Active Tourer, the "Hybrid Test Vehicle" stickers on the passenger door and rear bumper give it away as something a little different.

Details about the hybrid Active Tourer are somewhat sketchy at the moment, but BMW indicated its likely direction for the electrified hatchback in the earlier Concept Active Tourer. It used a hybridized 1.5-liter turbocharged three-cylinder engine coupled with an electric motor with a total system output of 190 horsepower and 147 pound-feet of torque. The company claimed that it had a roughly 19-mile electric range and could hit 62 miles per hour in under 8 seconds. However, the Bavarian automaker hasn't said yet whether this powertrain would be used in the production version.

The internal combustion 2 Series Active Tourer is rumored to come to the US in 2015. Given the nearly complete look of the test car, the hybrid might not be too far behind.
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Paralyzed racer will steer Corvette with head movements at Indy 500

Fourteen years ago, Sam Schmidt was lapping the Walt Disney World Speedway while preparing for the upcoming Indy Racing League season when he crashed. He spent five weeks on a respirator, and when he did come off, he discovered that he'd lost the use of his arms and legs.

Despite this, he hasn't left the sport that he loves. He's the co-owner of Schmidt Petersen Motorsports, which has counted among its drivers Simon Pagenaud, Katherine Legge, Alex Tagliani and the late Dan Wheldon.

At this year's Indianapolis 500, Schmidt will be back behind the wheel, handicap be damned. He's teamed with Arrow Electronics, who has put together a semi-autonomous Chevrolet Corvette Stingray for Schmidt to lap at the Brickyard.

Arrow, along with Ball Aerospace, Schmidt Peterson, the US Air Force Research Lab and non-profit Falci Adaptive Motorsports has developed a user interface that will allow a driver to control a car simply by moving their head. According to our tech savvy friends at Gizmodo, the system works with infrared markers and overhead cameras to measure how and where a driver's head moves. Basically, Schmidt will turn his head right or left to turn, which makes sense. He can also bite down to brake or tilt his head back to accelerate.

For extra safety, the car, called SAM (short for semi-autonomous motorcar), is fitted with a GPS system that will keep Schmidt at least three feet from Indy's notorious walls. There will also be a human backup in the passenger seat that will be able to step in if any of the systems fail.

Paraplegics have been able to drive through hand controls for some time. It's heartening to see quadriplegics begin to regain the same abilities. Here's hoping Schmidt's Indy outing is a success.
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Turbocharger tweak responsible for Mercedes AMG Petronas F1 dominance? [w/videos]

The image above is a screenshot from a Mercedes-Benz video illustrating the workings of the power unit in its current Formula One challenger, the F1 W05. We're looking at the back of the engine, the exhaust-driven turbocharger in the foreground connected to the compressor via a fluted tube that is the heat-based energy recovery system, the ERS-H, that can be used to power the turbo. Except this isn't what the engine looks like.

As first discussed in a video by F1 technical blogger Craig Scarborough, then further explained in a video by Sky Sports, perhaps the single biggest development in the Mercedes power unit is that the turbocharger and the compressor sit on opposite sides of the engine; the turbo still sits at the back, but the compressor is at the front of the 1.6-liter V6 and the two are connected by a long shaft that runs through the engine's vee. Locating the compressor away from the turbo allows cooler, denser air to enter the engine, providing more power, and shortens the length of ducting necessary to get the air from the compressor through the intercooler and into the cylinders, meaning less turbo lag. The Sky report also suggests the arrangement lowers the temperature at the rear of the car, meaning the gearbox can be moved closer to the engine to improve balance, and has other benefits such as allowing smaller sidepods and more efficient use of the ERS-H.

Scarborough tweeted a line drawing of the concept, and someone else managed to snap a photo of the slightly obscured compressor on an actual engine. If the images from Ferrari and Renault Sport are to be believed then neither uses the same layout, even though the Magneti Marelli turbo that Ferrari uses did, at one time, place the ERS-H unit between the turbo and the compressor. There is certainly more to Mercedes AMG Petronas dominance than this one trick, but if it's a major contributor then the competition will have to find another way to challenge it: the engines are homologated for the year.


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Ford Fiesta 1.0L EcoBoost sales robust in early going

Okay, okay, okay, so I was just a smidge wrong. Those that read my review of the Ford Fiesta with the new 1.0-liter, EcoBoost engine will know that while I really enjoyed the torquey little three-cylinder, I was concerned that Ford's decision to force 1.0-liter owners into a manual transmission, steel wheels and one trim level might hurt sales of the new engine. I was also concerned that the promised 45-mile-per-gallon highway rating wouldn't be enough to tempt buyers into trying an engine that's so far outside of what the general public is use to. My concerns, though, seem to have been for naught.

While not doing a booming business on the triple-equipped Fiesta, Ford is seeing a take rate of four to eight percent per month in the engine's first few months on sale. Now, four to eight percent might not sound like a lot - if, like last year, the Fiesta sells around 71,000 units, there'd be barely 5,600 1.0-liter models on the road. It is also small potatoes relative to the take rate on EcoBoost-equipped vehicles across the Ford range, which US sales analyst Erich Merkle estimates to be roughly 35 to 40 percent of retail sales. Still, according to The Detroit News, the 1.0-liter is getting adopted at roughly the same rate as the sparkling Fiesta ST, which should be a solid indication of just how well this little engine is doing.

The 1.0-liter's success "really speaks volumes, not just to what we're doing with the Fiesta, but with EcoBoost in general," Merkle told Autoblog.

The biggest issue that Ford seems to be facing in regards to the 1.0-liter is a supply issue - engines just can't be built quickly enough. Production at the Cologne, Germany factory where the triple is built was doubled to 1,000 engines per day last year, in the face of growing European demand. Despite this, widespread availability in the US is still rather far off. And it's only going to get more difficult to snap up a 1.0-liter Fiesta, as Ford will begin offering the tiny engine in the Focus later this year. Customers that have purchased the triple - around 1,000 people, a third of whom are from California, according to The Detroit News - have had to custom order their vehicles.

Provided Ford can really ramp up production and come to grips with its supply issues, the future looks bright for its newest EcoBoost engine.
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