Hi all!

Every time I post a question, the responses are great. Lots of info in our collective ranks! Anyhow, my question is about diesel cars. Here in the States, VW is really the only contender, but personally I hate working on them and their reliability is reportedly less than stellar. But, Jeep is rumored to be creating a diesel Liberty, and Mercedes is (I believe) looking at marketing several diesel models here as well. Would this be a worthwhile cause in light of the leaps and bounds gas hybrids have been making? Some say that diesel will be cleaner when it is made available with lower sulphides (or something similar-I forget what the magic ingredient is ). What do you all think? Would you ever consider a diesel over a hybrid car? Any long term VW TDI owners who can comment on experiences with their chariots? Your thoughts...

 

The Jeep Liberty CRD has been out a while now, unfortunately they have priced it at a huge premium over the standard Liberty and it's not rated much higher than the standard one. The Mercedes diesels look great, although they're out of reach of most buyers. I would personally love to have a Honda Civic 2.2 i-CTDi. It's already available for 2006 in Europe, but alas, we don't get them here. I'm a little bit of a hot-rodder at heart, and love the idea of tuning up a turbodiesel Civic to 170hp and 300 ft-lbs of torque while still getting 45-50mpg. It's all going to come down to a question of if the manufacturers can reach the incredibly stringent emissions regulations in effect once we finally get low sulpher fuel here in the USA.

 

Might be some more delays in getting ULSD to the market.

http://www.greencarcongress.com/2005...house_dir.html

 

And in other news, WorldNetDaily just broke a story supposedly with actual memos from oil industry insiders that suggest our capacity problems were not only artificial limitations, but intentional in order to drive up prices and increase profits. Honestly, why does oil get a free pass when water and electricity services are subject to government regulation? EVERYONE spends more on gasoline than their water bill, and I'm sure many folks spend more on gasoline than they do electricity. Maybe it's time to tighten the oil industry a bit?

 

AZCivic:
I don't believe you are correct. It all depends on how you drive for that 50MPG.
Most people I've seen in research gets low 40's.

Back to Atomic Frog's question:
No, at least not until they have proven themselves as long distance clean runners.

Today I did 71.4MPG over my 45mile commute to work in my Civic.
I wouldn't want to take the MPG hit.

 

Hey HG:

Sorry to get off topic but does your '04 HCH really display 71.4? My '03 will display 71.1 (18.8 mi/liter) and 71.5 (18.9) but never 71.4.

Dave

 

Most people, yes, but a hypermiler will easily get 45-50mpg. Right now I only see one Civic diesel in the RHMDB, aptly named Civic Diesel which shows 60-67mpg with Honda's older, less advanced although smaller displacement CTDi. The newer motor should still be able to achieve 45-50mpg even with the larger displacement and bigger turbo than the 1.7 CTDi.

TDIClub also holds monthly hypermiler contests. Here's a link to the August results. Over a third of them seem to have gotten better than 50mpg. Only one lone guy got over 60mpg, so sure, it's not quite up there with the hybrid hypermilers, but it's still an impressive result. I honestly think a Civic i-CTDi could beat out pretty much all the VW TDi figures anyway.

 

Hi AZCivic:

___I would love an iCDTi in an 06 Civic w/ all the Euro (Leather interior) and US (Honda’s NAVI) fixin’s but alas, no way will we ever see it here because of the emissions

___The link you provided is great but the best of the bunch barely hits 62 mpg in smallish and slower Diesels? Those guys really need our help

___Good Luck

___Wayne R. Gerdes
___Waynegerdes@earthlink.net

 

Solecondad, yep 71.4.
Tried my darndest to keep it at 72.0 but couldn't quite do it.

 

Shame on you. This has been a good month for me. My first tank calculated out to 66.65 even though I put in a bit more gas after the click; my current tank is 68.4 at 225 miles. I **so** much want to take a picuture of a 70 mpg tank !!