MBTA Winter 2015: Failure and Recovery

[tangent]

Well, that's not really what's going on in Metra's case, though. They directly operate most of their lines (HC, MD-N, MD-W, ME, NCS, RI, SWS) and contract with BNSF and UP to operate the lines on BNSF and UP tracks.

Yes that is more analogous to the MBTA which operates its subway and trolley lines and contracts with keolis to operate the commuter rail lines.

But I think that is the wrong level to contract out at or they should split up the contract at least. Contract out the maintenance perhaps, but not just with one provider. Big contracts are synonymous with big failures. Best to break up contracts to as many vendors as is practical if you go that route. At least 3 to keep it competitive.

 

[F-Line to Dudley]

Yes that is more analogous to the MBTA which operates its subway and trolley lines and contracts with keolis to operate the commuter rail lines.

But I think that is the wrong level to contract out at or they should split up the contract at least. Contract out the maintenance perhaps, but not just with one provider. Big contracts are synonymous with big failures. Best to break up contracts to as many vendors as is practical if you go that route. At least 3 to keep it competitive.

No, it's not really analogous. Metra is in the uniquely weird position of having 6 of North America's 7 largest Class I freight railroads owning track in its district. They have the most entangled landlord situation of any passenger rail operator on the continent.

-- Metra Electric (all Metra-owned)
-- BNSF Line (BNSF-owned/operated)
-- UP North Line (Union Pacific-owned/operated)
-- UP Northwest Line (Union Pacific-owned/operated)
-- UP West Line (Union Pacific-owned/operated)
-- Milwaukee District North (some Metra-owned, some Canadian Pacific-owned, CP dispatched)
-- Milwaukee District South (some Metra-owned, some Canadian Pacific-owned)
-- Heritage Corridor (some Metra-owned, some Canadian National-owned)
-- North Central (some Metra-owned, some Canadian National-owned)
-- Rock Island District (some Metra-owned, some CSX-owned)
-- SouthWest (Norfolk Southern-owned)

Except for the 100% in-house Electric District their ownership is cobbled together out of basically the first 10 miles of track from the terminal on the lines they have some ownership stake in, and then the rest they are all tenants on. Some they paid to lease the dispatching control of, and others the freights do all the dispatching. And then Union Pacific (the #1 largest freight carrier on the continent) and BNSF (#2 largest) demand to operate any passenger trains in their ownership territories, preventing Metra from keeping a 100% in-house operation.

There isn't any comparison in the world for how complex Metra's track ownership situation is. The only 'foreign' territory the T ever had to operate in since the start of the modern public-owned commuter rail system in 1976 was:

-- Amtrak ownership, NEC @ RI border and points south + Amtrak NEC dispatching South Station and points south, 1976-present.
-- Conrail/CSX ownership, T-controlled dispatching on Franklin Line, Franklin Jct. to Forge Park, 1988-present.
-- Conrail/CSX ownership + dispatching on the outer Worcester Line, 1994-2012.
-- Conrail/CSX dispatching on the T-owned inner Worcester Line, 1976-2012.
-- Boston & Maine/Guilford Rail System ownership + dispatching on the Fitchburg-Gardner portion of the Fitchburg Line, 1980-88. Service cut back to Fitchburg after Guilford revoked dispatching access in retaliation for losing the 1987 operating contract renewal to Amtrak.
-- Boston & Maine, Lowell Line from Lowell-Concord, ownership from state line to Concord, dispatching from Lowell to Concord, 1980-81.

All of these have been taken care of. T owns and dispatches all the way to Worcester now. They have control of the little sliver of CSX ownership they run in to reach Forge Park, as well as a baked-in purchase option on that 1988 contract to buy the whole Milford Branch whenever they please. The NEC and South Station sharing agreement with Amtrak has been baked into place since '76, and has more protection against turf wars than what MARC, SEPTA, and NJT deal with on the NEC. They secured 'perpetual' passenger and dispatch rights from Lowell to Concord from Pan Am when they were trading land deeds at Northpoint, so Nashua and/or Concord service is already locked down under their complete ops control for when that happens. They have 'perpetual' passenger rights secured for Wachusett to avoid the ugliness with Gardner control the last time around, and may outright buy that 10 miles of track and associated dispatching before the new extension stop opens.

There's zero landlord conflicts muddying up the waters. Every commuter rail line is under internal lock-and-key. Every potential future commuter rail line, including the border-crosser to Nashua or Concord, is under internal lock-and-key. So they have no private entities they have to cooperate with if they pull ops in-house. Just the usual Amtrak/NEC agreements that have been unchanging for 39 years and 4 different operators.

 

[EricS]

I don't mean to be nit-picky, but I was under the impression that Metra fully owned the Milwaukee and Rock Island district lines (other than the first few miles heading out from Chicago Union Station which is owned by Amtrak).

 

[F-Line to Dudley]

I don't mean to be nit-picky, but I was under the impression that Metra fully owned the Milwaukee and Rock Island district lines (other than the first few miles heading out from Chicago Union Station which is owned by Amtrak).

Nope. CSX owns two small slivers of it: Joliet after the line crosses US 30 past New Lenox, and 123rd St.-Blue Island on the Suburban Branch. Both for access to freight yards. It's by far the smallest ownership overlap Metra has to endure with any of its 6 freight landlords, but the Rock isn't totally 100% in their control.

 

[EricS]

Thanks for the detail on the Rock Island District. Do you know which section(s) of the Milwaukee District lines are not owned by Metra (or Amtrak)?

 

[bolehboleh]

I'm not sure if this is the correct forum for this article, but I thought this might give us some hope for the MBTA

http://www.boston.com/news/local/ma...m6Q01t4yD5d9dxhwAo3XOL/story.html?p1=story_hp

p.s. I really fucking hate this new "snarky" boston.com style of writing.

 

[F-Line to Dudley]

Thanks for the detail on the Rock Island District. Do you know which section(s) of the Milwaukee District lines are not owned by Metra (or Amtrak)?

According to CP's system map, they own all of Milwaukee-West and Milwaukee-North where they split north of Western Ave. Not sure if that's accurate, though, since Wikipedia seems to contradict that. Milwaukee-West division post might be where it splits from North Central Service at Franklin Park (freight yard at the junction) with Milwaukee-North changing to CP north of Glenview after it merges with the freight connecting branch linking Milwaukee-West. Metra ownership does pick back up on Milwaukee-North past Fox Lake to Walworth on the portion that hasn't had commuter rail service since 1982. That's on a stubby CP branchline; the CP mainline continues due north of Rondout Jct. where the Amtrak Hiawatha route diverges from Milwaukee-North.

 

[EricS]

I'll need to dig up something to double-check, but I was pretty sure that Metra owned all of the Milwaukee-North and Milwaukee-West tracks (purchased from the Milwaukee Road in 1987, per the Metra website), other than a portion owned by Amtrak. For MD-N, I believe the mainline switches from Metra to CP ownership at Rondout (where the Fox Lake branch splits off), but Metra owns the portion it operates on, namely the mainline south of there and the branch line northwest of there.

Anyway, I've probably rambled about Metra enough.

 

[Jahvon09]

Re: Anyone know whats going on here?

Info has surfaced yesterday that the MBTA has ordered about 40 new locomotives for its commuter rail trains five years ago, and that they are just sitting there in the rail yard broken & out of service!

Seems that the T knew about the problem, yet it had the new locos delivered broken anyway. The problem is with the traction motors that help drive the engines' wheels.

It is now saying that there will be more commuter rail delays during the summer because of it. Commuters are frustrated and angry to here this, as it does not sit too well with them! Remembering the brutal winter that we've had and the mountain of delays and waiting in frigid temp to board trains, trolleys & buses, they want answers has to just why this snafu is coming back to haunt them again.

Gov. Charlie Baker is none too please as well. He feels that commuters are being screwed over again, and wants to get the ball rolling on getting the new locos off dead tracks and into revenue service where they belong!

 

[Jahvon09]

Info has surfaced yesterday that the MBTA has ordered about 40 new locomotives for its commuter rail trains five years ago, and that they are just sitting there in the rail yard broken & out of service! About 24 of them were fixed & put into service, so that is a little over half of them in service.

Seems that the T knew about the problem, yet it had the new locos delivered broken anyway. The problem is with the traction motors that help drive the engines' wheels.

It is now saying that there will be more commuter rail delays during the summer because of it. Commuters are frustrated and angry to here this, as it does not sit too well with them! Remembering the brutal winter that we've had and the mountain of delays and waiting in frigid temp to board trains, trolleys & buses, they want answers has to just why this snafu is coming back to haunt them again.

Gov. Charlie Baker is none too please as well. He feels that commuters are being screwed over again, and wants to get the ball rolling on getting the new locos off dead tracks and into revenue service where they belong! Sad!

 

[Arlington]

Info has surfaced yesterday that the MBTA has ordered about 40 new locomotives for its commuter rail trains five years ago, and that they are just sitting there in the rail yard broken & out of service! About 24 of them were fixed & put into service, so that is a little over half of them in service.

None of this is news.

They had to be delivered (or shipped from the factory) before Jan 1 2015 so that they'd be exempt from newer tougher EPA restrictions, but everyone knew that with any new design there's going to be warranty fixes after delivery.

Like any new design (though mostly cobbled battle-tested parts) there were systems-integration problems and some were revealed by cold weather. A decent fraction of the "equipment availablity" problems on CR this winter, were, in fact, the HSPs doing wonky things in freezing temps.

Enough of the HSPs are now working that they're retiring the Screamers (the boxy 10xx series locomotives)

And we can expect them all to be much better winter-ready by the autumn.

 

[TheRifleman]

I feel bad for Charlie Baker he basically walked into the Governor position and the MBTA is basically BROKEN. They need to clean house and restructure the entire operation. And this is going to cost a lot of money (Billions that we don't have)

 

[winstonoboogie]

None of this is news.

A decent fraction of the "equipment availablity" problems on CR this winter, were, in fact, the HSPs doing wonky things in freezing temps.

Enough of the HSPs are now working that they're retiring the Screamers (the boxy 10xx series locomotives)

And we can expect them all to be much better winter-ready by the autumn.

Actually, by mid-February 2015, there were still only 10 HSPs that had been accepted for service, all of the others were still waiting for replacement traction motors at Norfolk Southern's Altoona shops or the P&Ws Worcester shops, and had not entered acceptance testing. The small number of HSPs that were running didn't do too bad. The majority of the equipment problems were older units having traction motor failures, and then Keolis falling behind on mandatory inspections because they were busy dealing with all of the winter related failures. The older units, especially the screamers, had multiple major failures during the winter. The large numbers of screamers now stored is as much a factor of the units self destructing at a fast rate vs. confidence in the HSPs. As pointed out in the Globe article this past week, HSP availability has still been low despite many more being accepted because Keolis is still trying to catch up on inspections and training

 

[Arlington]

Actually, by mid-February 2015, there were still only 10 HSPs that had been accepted for service, all of the others were still waiting for replacement traction motors at Norfolk Southern's Altoona shops or the P&Ws Worcester shops, and had not entered acceptance testing. The small number of HSPs that were running didn't do too bad. The majority of the equipment problems were older units having traction motor failures, and then Keolis falling behind on mandatory inspections because they were busy dealing with all of the winter related failures. The older units, especially the screamers, had multiple major failures during the winter. The large numbers of screamers now stored is as much a factor of the units self destructing at a fast rate vs. confidence in the HSPs. As pointed out in the Globe article this past week, HSP availability has still been low despite many more being accepted because Keolis is still trying to catch up on inspections and training

Thanks for a better answer than I gave. I was also going to clarify that the need to manufacture all the HSPs before the end of 2014 did cause them to be rushed out the door of the assembly plant before they were really ready, but the point is that while bad news (that I underplayed as originally written), this part (that the HSPs were rushed and need a lot of post-production warranty work) is not new news.

More HSPs should have been available last winter and weren't but we pretty much knew then that they were new, late, deadline-rushed, and were going to need work before fully available

 

[winstonoboogie]

More HSPs should have been available last winter and weren't but we pretty much knew then that they were new, late, deadline-rushed, and were going to need work before fully available

Yes, if all of the HSPs were here when originally expected, and if the screamers were retired before they were on their last legs, the winter problems might not have lingered as long as they did (but with 90 inches of snow in 3 weeks, there would still have been problems)

 

[F-Line to Dudley]

Info has surfaced yesterday that the MBTA has ordered about 40 new locomotives for its commuter rail trains five years ago, and that they are just sitting there in the rail yard broken & out of service! About 24 of them were fixed & put into service, so that is a little over half of them in service.

Seems that the T knew about the problem, yet it had the new locos delivered broken anyway. The problem is with the traction motors that help drive the engines' wheels.

It is now saying that there will be more commuter rail delays during the summer because of it. Commuters are frustrated and angry to here this, as it does not sit too well with them! Remembering the brutal winter that we've had and the mountain of delays and waiting in frigid temp to board trains, trolleys & buses, they want answers has to just why this snafu is coming back to haunt them again.

Gov. Charlie Baker is none too please as well. He feels that commuters are being screwed over again, and wants to get the ball rolling on getting the new locos off dead tracks and into revenue service where they belong! Sad!

Citation on this news source that's got your frothed up into your latest "" panic over nothing? Preferably one that's not 3 months old?

There are 17 HSP-46's in-service on the southside, 8 on the northside as of Wednesday's roster snapshot. There are now more of them in-service than GP40MC's.

The delivery delays ended months ago, as did the major rotation out-of-service for replacement parts. They got a bad batch of traction motors at the plant. Which wasn't even a new-design related problem. The same exact traction motors that have been in active production for 20 years and in reliable service on the GE Genesis P32AC-DM dual-mode locomotives used by Metro North and Amtrak.

They had software testing bugs. Modern locomotives being heavily computer-controlled these days, with new builds requiring extensive debugging and optimization that almost inevitably slows down deployment. They always have computer bugs. Like it is on Amtrak's Sprinters; deliveries were painfully slow at the start, now have picked up to the point where Amtrak's totally retired 2 out of 3 classes of old stuff and--this week--has started lending out some of its excess Toasters to MARC for pinch-hit duty on Penn Line commuter rail. The later HSP-46 deliveries with the updated firmware run so noticeably smoother that passengers can tell the difference vs. the earlier delivery units. The earlier delivery units are getting the firmware mods. There's one Screamer left on the active roster. The first GP40MC has been retired.

Where is the "" with commuter rail power? It's June 12. This is old news.


Now, you want to see an equipment availability debacle...that's the Rotems. 20% of the fleet is officially out-of-service (not including the ones on regular shop rotation or out day-to-day with aches and pains or sitting in the yard while Keolis huffs-and-puffs to keep up on regular inspections). The Hyundai-Rotem warranty modifications encampment in Davisville, RI is now in its second year of operation. They were for most of last year keeping pace of 7-10 on the property at any given time and regular 5-for-5 swaps. Now the logjam down there is the largest it's ever been, with 14 in or awaiting mods. Including 4 cab cars that haven't budged in over 3 months. The 74 oldest-generation Kawasaki bi-levels have already gone through their long testing incubation period on the first modded units of the rebuild program and now have 4 rebuilds back on the active roster and 6 back on the property in acceptance testing. On an overhaul contract voted on by MassDOT nearly 4-1/2 years after the Rotem contract, with first cars shipped off 4 months after the the first Rotems arrived. They were supposed to have all the Rotems in-service so they didn't have shortages or too many K cars simultaneously out for rebuild. Now the rebuild factory is starting to churn through the K's at a pace where overall fleet availability of just the units subject to rebuild (i.e. not the 3 later batches) may surge ahead of the Rotems--temporarily at least--if that logjam in Davisville doesn't get any smaller.

^^THAT^^ is what Gov. Baker should be none-too-pleased about. Getting bitten in the ass once more by low-bidder syndrome and shoddy product from manufacturers too inexperienced and in-over-their-heads at what they were attempting to build.


The HSP's are fine. It's GE guts and MPI packaging. GE's the #1 supplier in the world of locomotive components and virtually owns the market now for new freight engines based on the same stuff beneath the hood of an HSP-46. The same stuff beneath the hood of the HSP-46 is going to be used to re-power old passenger locomotives--like the GE Genesis when Amtrak gets rid of theirs and they go on the aftermarket for commuter rail operators--such that those re-powers have the HSPs' heartbeat under their respective hoods. MPI has the most successful passenger locomotive in active production--the MP36/MP40--and has good quality control. They pounced and triaged immediately when the bad batch of motors came in...enlisted the help of Norfolk Southern and Providence & Worcester to speed the change-outs. They didn't do stupid shit like Rotem, making excuses or going deer-in-headlights to the point where the GM had to make a business trip to Korea to get some answers. Yes, the custom packaging for this new locomotive taxed their resources to the limit...but they did not overreach on components. There will be parts available for these things for eons. There will be like-minded makes (even if MPI doesn't end up having interest in building more carbon copies). They will last for a rebuild program (unlike the Rotems), and they did not succumb to low-bidder syndrome.


Lay off the "" a bit. There are issues and there are non-issues. This is a non-issue.

 

[Jahvon09]

None of this is news.

They had to be delivered (or shipped from the factory) before Jan 1 2015 so that they'd be exempt from newer tougher EPA restrictions, but everyone knew that with any new design there's going to be warranty fixes after delivery.

Like any new design (though mostly cobbled battle-tested parts) there were systems-integration problems and some were revealed by cold weather. A decent fraction of the "equipment availablity" problems on CR this winter, were, in fact, the HSPs doing wonky things in freezing temps.

Enough of the HSPs are now working that they're retiring the Screamers (the boxy 10xx series locomotives)

And we can expect them all to be much better winter-ready by the autumn.

I just found out about this yesterday.

I knew that there were some of them in service, but I never knew that there were so many of them on the back burner.

 

[Jahvon09]

Citation on this news source that's got your frothed up into your latest "" panic over nothing? Preferably one that's not 3 months old?

There are 17 HSP-46's in-service on the southside, 8 on the northside as of Wednesday's roster snapshot. There are now more of them in-service than GP40MC's.

The delivery delays ended months ago, as did the major rotation out-of-service for replacement parts. They got a bad batch of traction motors at the plant. Which wasn't even a new-design related problem. The same exact traction motors that have been in active production for 20 years and in reliable service on the GE Genesis P32AC-DM dual-mode locomotives used by Metro North and Amtrak.

They had software testing bugs. Modern locomotives being heavily computer-controlled these days, with new builds requiring extensive debugging and optimization that almost inevitably slows down deployment. They always have computer bugs. Like it is on Amtrak's Sprinters; deliveries were painfully slow at the start, now have picked up to the point where Amtrak's totally retired 2 out of 3 classes of old stuff and--this week--has started lending out some of its excess Toasters to MARC for pinch-hit duty on Penn Line commuter rail. The later HSP-46 deliveries with the updated firmware run so noticeably smoother that passengers can tell the difference vs. the earlier delivery units. The earlier delivery units are getting the firmware mods. There's one Screamer left on the active roster. The first GP40MC has been retired.

Where is the "" with commuter rail power? It's June 12. This is old news.


Now, you want to see an equipment availability debacle...that's the Rotems. 20% of the fleet is officially out-of-service (not including the ones on regular shop rotation or out day-to-day with aches and pains or sitting in the yard while Keolis huffs-and-puffs to keep up on regular inspections). The Hyundai-Rotem warranty modifications encampment in Davisville, RI is now in its second year of operation. They were for most of last year keeping pace of 7-10 on the property at any given time and regular 5-for-5 swaps. Now the logjam down there is the largest it's ever been, with 14 in or awaiting mods. Including 4 cab cars that haven't budged in over 3 months. The 74 oldest-generation Kawasaki bi-levels have already gone through their long testing incubation period on the first modded units of the rebuild program and now have 4 rebuilds back on the active roster and 6 back on the property in acceptance testing. On an overhaul contract voted on by MassDOT nearly 4-1/2 years after the Rotem contract, with first cars shipped off 4 months after the the first Rotems arrived. They were supposed to have all the Rotems in-service so they didn't have shortages or too many K cars simultaneously out for rebuild. Now the rebuild factory is starting to churn through the K's at a pace where overall fleet availability of just the units subject to rebuild (i.e. not the 3 later batches) may surge ahead of the Rotems--temporarily at least--if that logjam in Davisville doesn't get any smaller.

^^THAT^^ is what Gov. Baker should be none-too-pleased about. Getting bitten in the ass once more by low-bidder syndrome and shoddy product from manufacturers too inexperienced and in-over-their-heads at what they were attempting to build.


The HSP's are fine. It's GE guts and MPI packaging. GE's the #1 supplier in the world of locomotive components and virtually owns the market now for new freight engines based on the same stuff beneath the hood of an HSP-46. The same stuff beneath the hood of the HSP-46 is going to be used to re-power old passenger locomotives--like the GE Genesis when Amtrak gets rid of theirs and they go on the aftermarket for commuter rail operators--such that those re-powers have the HSPs' heartbeat under their respective hoods. MPI has the most successful passenger locomotive in active production--the MP36/MP40--and has good quality control. They pounced and triaged immediately when the bad batch of motors came in...enlisted the help of Norfolk Southern and Providence & Worcester to speed the change-outs. They didn't do stupid shit like Rotem, making excuses or going deer-in-headlights to the point where the GM had to make a business trip to Korea to get some answers. Yes, the custom packaging for this new locomotive taxed their resources to the limit...but they did not overreach on components. There will be parts available for these things for eons. There will be like-minded makes (even if MPI doesn't end up having interest in building more carbon copies). They will last for a rebuild program (unlike the Rotems), and they did not succumb to low-bidder syndrome.


Lay off the "" a bit. There are issues and there are non-issues. This is a non-issue.

The MBTA is ALWAYS going to go with the lowest bidder with things. It has been doing it this way for years, & it will CONTINUE to do it this way for many years to come.

 

[F-Line to Dudley]

I just found out about this yesterday.

I knew that there were some of them in service, but I never knew that there were so many of them on the back burner.

How old was this article? There are 13 unaccepteds left either waiting at the factory, in-transit, or sitting in the testing line. Out of 40 units total. They've plowed through 40% of the acceptances in 3-1/2 months, and are 1 accepted unit away from the 70% mark on this order. They might be done before Labor Day at this pace, which is more than you can say for the Rotem refugee camp in Rhode Island. They have already achieved full replacement numbers for retirement of the F40PH Screamers and all other wreck victims and early retirements from the last 22 years combined, have knocked out the first GP40MC retirement, and are now sizing up the strongest and weakest of the remaining Geeps to see which 12-15 units stay and which 8-12 go.



Old news. Months old news. And no longer the least bit accurate news.

 

[F-Line to Dudley]

The MBTA is ALWAYS going to go with the lowest bidder with things. It has been doing it this way for years, & it will CONTINUE to do it this way for many years to come.

Let's review, shall we, what started this:

Info has surfaced yesterday that the MBTA has ordered about 40 new locomotives for its commuter rail trains five years ago, and that they are just sitting there in the rail yard broken & out of service!

This is false. You are ""-ing a falsehood.

Seems that the T knew about the problem, yet it had the new locos delivered broken anyway. The problem is with the traction motors that help drive the engines' wheels.

This is false. The problem was discovered after delivery, and it was fixed with motor change-outs. As mentioned, this motor has been in active use and active production as replacement parts for over 20 years without a hiccup on Amtrak and Metro North trains that take a harder daily pounding than the T's. Please explain how a "shit happens" event like a third-party supplier screwing up...then everyone up the chain getting notice and implementing their action plan...is a planning indictment. Or indictment of the bid process. Clearly they didn't pick a cheap component based on the success Amtrak and Metro North have had with the same...exact...verbatim motor.

It is now saying that there will be more commuter rail delays during the summer because of it. Commuters are frustrated and angry to here this, as it does not sit too well with them! Remembering the brutal winter that we've had and the mountain of delays and waiting in frigid temp to board trains, trolleys & buses, they want answers has to just why this snafu is coming back to haunt them again.

This is incorrect. Locomotive fleet availability is at its high point for the year, and high point for several years. Because the HSP-46's have now officially displaced the Screamers which could not make it through a single service day half the time without breaking down and sucking up so much of the shop's resources that they almost couldn't function tending to other equipment.

And if that weren't enough, they've got the 7 lease units as backup for the backup now.

Gov. Charlie Baker is none too please as well. He feels that commuters are being screwed over again, and wants to get the ball rolling on getting the new locos off dead tracks and into revenue service where they belong!

Where did he say that? Can you please link to this source you read "yesterday" that has these quotes. Not the quotes from his commission about the past-tense meltdown of 3 months ago. Not the quotes giving the postmortem about what happened 3 months ago. The not-old-news quotes. The new-news quotes. The ones that say we're "" for the summer.


What does this have to do with low-bidder? I have no fucking idea. Sometimes...yes, sometimes...the manufacturers that know what the hell they're doing can deliver a more efficient bid than the Rotems and Bredas of the world who end up lighting money on fire throwing darts at a board. And the locomotive market has so much hegemony on what systems are actually underneath the hood on half the makes out there (e.g GE GE GE GE GE GE) it generally takes rank incompetence on software coding to snatch defeat from jaws of off-shelf victory (and, yes, they were previously burned bad by that with the FrankenGP40's and their computer-control hacks that never worked right).



You kind of need to start substantiating this stuff after umpteenth appearance of the "" chicken little act in these threads. Scaremongering about old news as if it's new news ain't a real responsible thing to do. You can most definitely feel welcome to pose a scenario about a known vulnerability for discussion's sake. That is, after all, what we do here. But these "WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE!" overreactions about stuff you can't even remember where you heard it from serves no productive purpose.