If We Want Electric Autonomous Cars Theyll Need A Hell Of A Lot More Juice. Good morning Welcome to The Morning Shift, your roundup of the auto news you crave, all in one place every weekday morning. Here are the important stories you need to know. Gear Surprise, Self Driving Cars Need A Lot Of Brain Power. Oh, you want an electric car that can also shuttle you around without you having to move a muscle What do you think this is, magic fairy land Turns out, battery and computer powered cars may not mix too well because autonomous driving technology needs so much power just to run. From Automotive News Some of todays prototypesfor fullyautonomoussystems consume. Borg. Warner Inc. The supplier of vehicle propulsion systems expects the first autonomous cars likely robotaxis that are constantly on the road will be too energy hungry to run on battery power alone. In an industry where the number of LEDs in a brake light are scrutinized for their impact on gas mileage, processing data from laser, radar and camera sensors will be an enormous challenge not just for coders working on machine learning, but for engineers trying to power vehicles efficiently. The vice president of Borg. Warner, a parts supplier in the auto industry, told Automotive News that companies are constantly battling because governments push for percent improvements in fuel economy each year. Mix that in with power sucking driverless technology, and youve got a recipe for funGear How Trumps Newest Outlook On NAFTA Could Affect Car Prices. The U. S., Mexico and Canada are still talking about the North American Free Trade Agreement, and car dealers are saying what we already knew Car prices could very well go up if President Donald Trump gets what he wants. Ad Aware Pro 2009 V8 Cracker' title='Ad Aware Pro 2009 V8 Cracker' />Trump has called NAFTA, a 1. U. S., Canada and Mexico, a disaster and threatened to pull the U. S. out, according to the Wall Street Journal. While hes not pulling the U. S. out of NAFTA yet, dealers told Bloomberg Trumps new proposal to require a percentage of U. Good morning Welcome to The Morning Shift, your roundup of the auto news you crave, all in one place every weekday morning. Here are the important stories you need. Owner Car Notes scott8570 cerbera bobk Cerbera 4. Absolutely bloody fantastic SirSagalot Chimaera tony19locke Chimera Even with the faults jomarsaidel. Top VIdeos. Warning Invalid argument supplied for foreach in srvusersserverpilotappsjujaitalypublicindex. As everyone is undoubtedly aware by this point, on August 21st, folks across the country will be able to see a total solar eclipsethe first one visible coastto. Torrentz domain names are for sale. Send an offer to contactinventoris. S. content in vehicles could suppress demand and hike prices Anything that raises the price of a car will affect ultimately consumers and automobile sales, Mark Scarpelli, the chairman of the National Automobile Dealers Association, said Tuesday in Detroit. We are concerned, but at the end of the day, we dont know what the rule making is going to be. The Trump administration is expected to call for stricter automotive rules of origin as part of talks to overhaul the North American Free Trade Agreement that resume this week. Nafta requires that 6. Key business groups such as the Chamber of Commerce have said a Trump proposal requiring substantial U. S. content is a non starter. If you need more information on what NAFTA is and what could happen if Trump does decide to dismantle it, head over here. Gear Guess Whos Actually Making Money On Electric Cars Well, to be fair, we should say Guess who says theyre actually making money on electric cars Renault says that. Weird. Business Insider reports that Renault board member Gilles Normand told the Sddeutsche Zeitung newspaper recently Renault can make money selling electric vehicles. Thats different from one of the U. S. s most well known EV producers, Tesla, as Business Insider reports Tesla is not yet able to cover costs. From Business Insider Together with its sister company Nissan, Renault has already sold half a million electric cars including the Leaf and Zoe models. Currently, Nissan is the market leader in electric cars. Renault has lofty goals. In five years time, they are aiming for 2. In addition, half of all their models will be equipped with an electric motor so that, in addition to petrol, they can also be powered electrically. Renault and Nissan dont yet have any hybrid cars but the third company in their alliance, Mitsubishi, does. Business Insider didnt give any numbers for Renault or Tesla, so take all of that with a grain of salt or two. Gear Dealers Arent Thrilled At Automakers Approaches To Bonuses Usually, when you get a bonus, you take that money and runno questions asked. But car dealerships arent that way, because many think a traditional automaker bonus system is hurting brands and customer confidence. Stair step bonuses are programs used by automakers, which give incentive to up sales numbers per model. Put simply, it would be like somebody telling you youd get a bonus for selling five chocolate bars at 1 a piece than one bar at 5just because they want more of those chocolate bars out among the public. That method leads to bad tactics like offering too steep discounts and generous trade ins at dealers, which isnt good for the bottom line. Online Product Registration Thank you for taking the time to register. Your feedback helps us develop products geared to your needs. It also, in the eyes of the National Automobile Dealers Association, impacts customer confidence and brand trust. From Reuters In a speech in Detroit, NADA Chairman Mark Scarpelli said the practice results in wild discrepancies and fluctuations in vehicles prices between different dealers, as well as a lack of consistency, lack of transparency, and lack of explanation that lead directly to a lack of trust in auto dealers and in vehicle brands, he said. Stair step bonuses are paid out to dealers on an escalating scale as they hit progressively higher sales targets. Dealers that fall short of targets receive nothing. Automotive News reports that Scarpelli said customer confidence goes down the drain when two customers go into a dealership on different days of the month and get two different prices, which, uh, yeahthats understandable. Gear Finally, A Way For People To Actually Learn How Their Cars Work. Vehicles have a lot of technology in them. They have so much technology and so many features, in fact, that a J. D. Power study found that people just wont use certain features if theyre too complicated. That means buyers pay for stuff and dont get to enjoy it, which doesnt sound like a worthwhile investment, but some folks dont feel like they have the time to sit at a dealership and go through which buttons to press or knobs to rotate. What Is Serial Data Buffering. So, a few Ford dealers in the U. S. are sending teams to help people learn how to use the more complicated features of their cars. Heres what Ford told Jalopnik, while adding that there was no official Ford initiative involved To bridge the gap between providing effective tech training and being considerate of a customers time, Don Sanderson Ford of Phoenix, Arizona, is putting a new spin on an old convenience offering on demand house calls aimed at providing comfortable, convenient technology training for new customers. Ineffective tech training sessions ones that are rushed or in which a customer is distracted are one reason why 2. J. D. Power. If youre a millennial, that percentage is even higher. But not knowing how to use the tech in your car could also mean youre missing out on helpful features that can help reduce anxiety in stressful driving situations. No matter how much time you do or dont haveand no matter whether the dealer you buy from has this kind of dealdo your wallet a favor and learn how to use the cool stuff. After all, you paid for it. Reverse An American Woman Takes A Walk In Space On Oct. Dr. Kathryn D. Sullivan became the first U. S. woman to walk in space when she went outside the shuttle Challenger to do a refueling test. The first woman to walk in space had been Russian astronaut Svetlana Savitskaya the year before, according to The New York Times.