• 0 Posts
  • 252 Comments
Joined 2 years ago
cake
Cake day: October 23rd, 2023

help-circle





  • I see. That sounds very over-zealous to me, yes. The delay in moving off is so small that it doesn’t really have a safety impact (and the idea that a delay in moving off is a safety issue is way overblown in general, because the occasions when it comes up are so rare compared to the occasions when adequate braking comes up.).

    The beefier motors do cost more, and I haven’t seen a cost comparison. I would imagine they don’t cost much more though, and soon pay for themselves if you’re driving in the city. And they won’t overall increase fuel consumption - that much is clear from measurements. A random reddit post claimed that the break-even point in stop-start is a mere 7 seconds, which is basically every red light. Idk if that’s reliable but it gives you something to consider.


  • Stop signs are not a big part of driving in some countries. I obviously don’t know about everywhere, but in other countries I’m familiar with (Europe), most USA “stop” junctions are give way/priority/yield junctions where you don’t have to come to a complete stop, so stop-start would have no impact.

    In the UK, you only get Stop signs on junctions where your view is so extremely limited that anything less than a stop or absolute dead crawl would just always be dangerous. They’re very rare. In comparison, Yield signs in the USA are comparitively rare (in my experience) and most junctions where you most yield priority are governed by Stop signs.


  • Engines with start-stop have beefier starter motors. Electric motors can be sized for basically any task - the motors in my EV are not going to wear out and their duty cycle is crazy compared to a starter motor! So it’s just a matter of cost and size.

    Sounds insane to require drivers to disable start-stop to pass a test - where’s that? You mention stop signs so that sounds like the US. I’m afraid I don’t really trust US driving tests to accomplish anything sensible…


  • Typically it experiences most wear at start because the oil isn’t up to temperature. When stopped at a red light, oil is still coating all the components, so while the pressure may be low, it will only be a momentary increase in wear. 7 seconds is very little compared to the time it takes the engine to get up to temperature on a cold morning, which is wear the majority of wear will still come from.

    These systems have been in common use for like 15 years or something, and first became commercially available over 25 years ago. We’d have actual hard evidence if it were causing excess wear.