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Automotive News & Views What Would It Take for YOU to buy a diesel car?
1503 messages, Last post on Nov 14, 2009 at 1:11 PM
You are in the Automotive News & Views Forum. Your Hosts are steve_ & claires
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Replying to: ruking1 (Jan 04, 2009 11:44 am)
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Replying to: yankabilly (Jan 04, 2009 12:06 pm) The 2003 VW Jetta TDI can easily do that and still deliver 48 mpg. On a recent 3 state and 45 min CN border stop and go trip (965 miles one way) I ran a steady 75 mph with bursts to 80 mph and it returned 59 mpg. So in comparison to a Jetta gasser which would struggle to get 29 mpg, the diesel for logical purposes is an absolute no brainer. It is such a no brainer than when even close friends ask me what I get in a diesel, I don't even say anymore. If they press, I just say well it could be better.  
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Replying to: yankabilly (Jan 04, 2009 12:06 pm) Americans don't like diesel cars and won't buy them. That's why the Big Three will not built them for domestic market, at least not the domestic market *as it is now configured*. If one does not agree that the government *punish* people until they do buy diesels, then you have to let the market dictate what is built by what is bought. You could not currently give away at 1/2 price a $35000 Chevrolet diesel sedan. You could not get an American driver into a Peugeot turbo diesel hatchback or a VW Rabbit diesel. You CAN (and have) gotten them into diesel pickups for hauling gravel, etc.
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Replying to: Mr_Shiftright (Jan 04, 2009 4:20 pm) So for example while we get a pretty good 38-42 mph on a(gasser) Honda Civic for a commute, I would buy a turbo diesel Civc that got 56 mpg !!! The unacknowledged problem is it is simply not available on the US market.
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Replying to: ruking1 (Jan 04, 2009 4:31 pm) Diesel passenger cars have never had more than 6% of the market. Why would an automaker pour hundreds of millions into such a niche market? To develop it? Into what? A market for cars that burn very expensive fuel? A market for an unspecified future time when fuel costs might (or might not) double or triple in price? It's not like with other emerging markets, like computers or iPods, when there was nothing like it one could buy in the early days----right now you can buy gasoline cars that get outstanding gas mileage.
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Replying to: Mr_Shiftright (Jan 04, 2009 4:39 pm) Diesel passenger CARS are currently less than 1% of the passenger vehicle fleet. I read that 92.5% of the diesel passenger vehicle fleet (ie light trucks) are diesels. So the over all % diesel is  2%, down from less than 3%.
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Replying to: ruking1 (Jan 04, 2009 4:46 pm) Besides, back then diesel engines made sense in a luxury car like an old 300---you could get small car mileage out of a large car. Remember this was an era when a) most large 4-door cars got 15 mpg and b) when diesel fuel cost less than regular gasoline. Neither of those market forces is now operative. Running a 70s Mercedes diesel today only makes sense in that you can buy them cheap and so you don't have car payments, and that they can still deliver reliable day to day transportation---and they look nice even now. But if the engine blows up you can throw the car away or spend more than the entire value of the automobile to fix it....not so smart. I think if you jumped on those old Benz owners and hit them up with truth serum and examined their service and repair records, you'd see that these are no cheaper to run than any other used car.
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Replying to: Mr_Shiftright (Jan 04, 2009 4:39 pm)  Some of the proplem is epa I dont think people know that when mpg regulation is stablished it is based on colective of vehicles not on A vehicle. Get this Ford built a Paint department in Loran Ohio and never used it so when they do there pollution standered they add it to the average whitch is zero so there partical numbers are lower HMMMM!! Ford has a diesel motor in Europe that get I think 50 plus mpg Yes old motors nocked like hell.But this new motor is quiet  . There are more then 2 dozen tankers off the gulf coast because there is a glutten of oil at the refinerese. If you noticed when the price of gas was way up the price of motor oil at you're local auto zone and other places only went up a few pennies HMMM?? Also a diesel motor will last 2-3 hundred miles gas motor will last only 150. People with vehicles that better then that never drove over 45mph
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Replying to: yankabilly (Jan 04, 2009 5:05 pm) The Ford Ranger diesels are ancient history, and anyway, they weren't American engines. Perkins and Mitsubishi, from the 1980s. A compact diesel pickup isn't a bad idea actually.
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Replying to: Mr_Shiftright (Jan 04, 2009 4:39 pm) I beg to differ. Apart from the anti-car, AKA Prius, there isn't a gas-powered car on the market that will average better than 40 mpg. We shouldn't judge all diesels by the unimpressive VW model - if automakers tried just a little to excel in diesel offerings, they could blow away all gas-powered cars except hybrids on the fuel economy front, and for about the same price premium as a hybrid car. But they haven't, and with the Japanese fading back out of the diesel picture in recent months they probably won't, given that the consumer's first thought is going to be for the current price of diesel when they go to buy the car. As it has been for much of the year, diesel is still WELL above regular unleaded in price in my area. |
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