Its been reported here in the UK that BMW will adopt the Bosch stop/ start system to save fuel while stationary from next year including the 7,5 & 3 series. It is claimed this will give approx. 5% fuel savings overall.
Only Citroen uses a fuel saving system like this currently.

 

Maybe so in city traffic but the starter will burn off and the car will need a much bigger charger and battery.
That means more weight (battery) and energy comsuming (charger).

I'm personally not that hot on these <5% savings in gas economy.
In fact they do not save that much fuel!

We can all do better by buying smaller engines to our cars and driving smoother.

The real improvement is gain by diesel and coming hybribs.

Nevertheless, everthing consuming less oil is good.

 

Thats going to hurt the starter... I always thought starting and stopping an engine a lot will hurt the car. I dont care about the battery. That can be replaced for a lot cheaper than engine components.

AND will the car start and stop quick enough? BMW software + Start and stop = no good.

 

Not a fan of this at all. I am for helping to conserve fuel and one of the points that I chose the 5 over other cars. But I really don't want my car to start taking over the engine completely. :thumbsdown:

How long will it be until they start limiting acceleration or highway speeds? They are already talking about pulling back the limits to 55 MPH here in NJ.

 

BMW published an article in last month's North America BMW Magazine that suggested using the button to stop the car if it is going to sit idle for more than a certain amount of time. This and other methods were described to conserve fuel. So the Start Stop is useful for more than just "show".

If I find some time, I'll try to transcribe it.


I don't have the button, so I can't say for sure, but it is fast enough with the key. There is one very long red light that I used it on once, but other than that I don't really need to do this - not how my driving is.

 

Actually the "key" has the function already.

When you start your car just twist the key to the "start" position and let go.

The car will do the rest.

Tryed it?

 

Fock, now we have to wait for iDrive to boot up every time the traffic light turns green...

 

BMW suggested that if stopping at traffic light or idle for more than 20 seconds, you should turn off the engine to conserve fuel. The key number here is 20 seconds. We need to find out how much fuel the car burn during 20 sec idle, and how much fuel is needed to restart the car. If more fuel is needed to restart the car, it'd make no sense to turn off the engine.

 

poor starter

 

No, more is not needed. I think the 20 second figure is the threshold after which you're using more fuel than restarting.

I just saw some TV show saying that the US uses 10% of its gasoline idling at red lights.