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I have decided to sell it, buy a petrol that she likes (I think that will only kill whales not dolphins) and put the money towards something irresponsible (that will kill everything just not by cancer)
The reality is that I can't be arsed to do anything in the short term
There is no short term, the government is plowing research cash into electric and autonomous self driving cars, so they obviously think that's the future. Trouble is the state of play is electric super cars that only the mega rich can afford, or townie cars that can barely get to the corner shop and back. As for self drive, who the hell wants that? If you are too lazy to move a steering wheel take a bus, they don't just take the joy out of driving, they take the driving out of driving, and I don't believe they will become practical for another ten years.
There is no short term, the government is plowing research cash into electric and autonomous self driving cars, so they obviously think that's the future. Trouble is the state of play is electric super cars that only the mega rich can afford, or townie cars that can barely get to the corner shop and back. As for self drive, who the hell wants that? If you are too lazy to move a steering wheel take a bus, they don't just take the joy out of driving, they take the driving out of driving, and I don't believe they will become practical for another ten years.
it does look sh*t down the road
but the next 25 years will be ok which is the maximum amount of time I am concerned about
I won't be driving then and may have stopped well before
during the next 25 years no government will stop (wealthy) enthusiasts enjoying their classics and that's all that matters to me
it's also unthinkable that they will be able to get millions out of £1K snotters into £25K/ £200 a month leccy cars in the short term (ten years) let alone everyone out of diesels and into petrol or leccy
Tends to confirm my view that the sheeple deserve to be buttfucked by the Gov't. Yes, we all knew Diseasels were bad and cost more to run than a petrol car. Until they stuck the same unreliable turbos and DI systems on petrol cars too...
Diseasels belong in heavy trucks - until LPG/CNG becomes more competitive.
Calculations seem to demonstrate that BEVs are about as energy-efficient as a good hybrid car (the grid ain't all it's cracked up to be) so the sheeple will get done yet again.
I posted this way back in 2006, quoting the late, great LJK Setright:
Forty years ago, British scientists tried to alert us to the carcinogenic dangers of exhaust fumes from diesel engines. It was the time of the great smog panic in California, and legislators in the US were only concerned with such emissions as could be identified with the photochemical air pollution peculiar to their west coast. In Britain, the transport lobby, heavily reliant on cheap diesel fuel, warned off the government, medical science and all, and saw to it that the subject should not again be raised.
Diesel fuel is foul stuff. Not being volatile, it does not evaporate when spilled. At the filling pump, even if you wear the plastic gloves provided, it will still soil your shoes. Spilled on the road, it lingers as the worst skid-provoker known to motorcyclists.
Yet British motorists are buying diesel cars as never before, believing that the ability to drive more miles per tank-full means greater economy. In fact, diesel engines cost more to make, cost more to install, weigh more, and create more pollution. Dealing with all this has to be paid for ultimately by the customer, so the supposed economy is a rather false one. No less false is the idea that current diesels perform better than comparable petrol engines. They do not, and cannot; the extreme mechanical stresses imposed on engine components by the diesel cycle see to that. They have to run more slowly, so they cannot develop a lot of power; all they do is to provide generous low-speed torque which is impressive in relation to the power output -- but only because new diesels are turbocharged.
In any case, torque is merely a force. The job of an engine is to develop power; converting that to propulsive force is the job of the transmission. The folk who wax lyrical about low-speed torque from diesels are either too lazy or too incompetent to change gear, and too mean to invest in automatic transmission.
Yet it would be a mistake to suppose that the diesel is doomed always to play second fiddle to the petrol engine. I believe that its best features will one day be combined with those of the petrol engine. Some engine makers are working in that direction, and it could happen in a dozen years. Then we should have an engine setting new standards in performance, longevity, economy, salubrity, and sheer suitability for propulsion.
We might no longer call it a diesel, but we could certainly call it modern.
its a fact of life, or physics or engineering if you like, that the more components you have, the more likely one of them will fail, everything else being equal
modern cars are all like it.
hence it becomes more appealing to rent than buy as even a shyte little fiat 500 could break the bank in terms of fix outside warranty
fix this ****er?
VW created those TSI engines which have SC and Turbo ffs. i bet they are a nightmare as they age
compare that with a simple old NA lump from 20 years ago. maybe stick to something with electronic ignition though
having said all that modern diesels are nothing like what Setright would have seen, they now recycle their own fumes to burn the particulates. still dirty but not as dirty..
Now with SCRs and DPFs they are indeed less filthy. And ironically, less filthy than these horrid DI petrol turbos which currently have neither!
They can of course be modified to run on CNG or LPG, but due to space requirements, that is only practicable for vehicles with a lot of space in the chassis and high GVWs, such as trucks and buses. Far cleaner.
04-14-2017, 11:37 PM
