Horse 1002 - The Littler Big Car?

http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/national/holdens-big-aussie-six-gets-smaller-20090605-byil.html
A new 3.0-litre V6, expected to arrive in an updated Commodore to go on sale in September, follows a trend to use technically advanced, smaller-capacity engines to cut fuel consumption.

Will it?

I'm wondering where exactly Holden are going to get these new 3.0L V6s from. Remember that they're not exactly in cahoots with Opel after the GM explosion, so the 3.2L V6 in the Opel Insignia is probably not available to them anymore. Does this mean a core job on their existing 3.6L V6 to take it down to 3.0L? Remember that it's already undergone a drop itself from 3.8L when they switched from the VY to VZ models.



Assuming that the do re-core the 3.6L motor down to 3.0L it doesn't really change the basic problem, that the Commodore still will weighs kg. The problem of carting about a big heavy car doesn't go away.
That's the real underlying cause of fuel consumption - the competing forces of weight and horsepower.

Think about basic Newtownian physics (even though they're all obsolete).
W = Fd - Work equals force times displacement (distance)
F = ma - Force equals mass times acceleration
By direct substitution we get:
W = mad - Work equals mass times acceleration times distance
Also:
KE = ½mv² - Kinetic Energy (which is the ability to do work) equals one half of mass times velocity squared.

The basic constant in all of these is... mass. If you have a big engine or a small engine, they both still have to move the same amount of mass. Since the Commodore is not getting any smaller and will remain at about 1690kg for a VF Poverty Pack... or whatever they choose to call the base model VF.
If you ask something smaller to move a big thing, then you either rev it harder which undoes the fuel consumption you've just saved or you need to drop the power output, which is an anathema to the buying public who be paying more money for a worse spec'd car.

Personally I hope that Holden abandon the Zeta Platform altogether and adopt the smaller one they'd developed for the Torana TT36 concept:


Given that when the price of petrol begins to head upwards again after the global financial crisis, then this is probably the best bet if Holden wants to keep its "big car". GM America were given a shakeup, and this I hope is a warning shot to GM Australia... or will that be RuddCar?