The wife's A2 1.4 TDi has just covered 31,000 for its first service!!

My A4 V6 TDI Quattro does 40 mpg (chipped), not bad for a 210bhp car!!! and its as quick as my Scoob ever was.

quote: "Which dreamland are you in?" re DieselVImpreza insurance

I got a few quotes from Liverpool Victoria- Impreza Turbo UK with decat and scoobyECU was £700 ish, Golf 150 Tdi- Jabba'd was £550ish, BMW Diesel 330D was £750 ish.

Why bother with a crappy comment like that? I expect better than that from a moderator. Get some quotes yourself and look at the difference-it's peanuts. Fact is driving round in an old Impreza is actually cheaper overall for me than any viable diesel alternative- plus I get a car that is WAY faster than any diesel on the market. Diesels are OK for co. car drivers and people who like to kid themselves they are saving money. They only really make sense in Europe where I saw gazoil as cheap as 40p a ltr.

I Looked at diesel Focus instead of the zetec petrol and when you take the purchase price into consideration and the fact diesel is more expensive than UL I would have top be doing 15K a year over 3 3 years to negate the costs. As I dont do anywhere near 15K a year and only tend to keep cars for 2 years, I didnt bother.

I was looking at buying a comfortable cruiser recently and settled on a used Rover 75.

Looking at examples about a year old I could save around £2000 opting for the 2.5V6 petrol over the 2.0litre diesel.

I know the diesel will be worth more come resale and does about 18mpg more but the economics didn't add up. Once I test drove both examples there was only one choice........ the V6 petrol.

Just need to sort out a track day car now, think that will be petrol as well. :)

In diesels defence I also run a Skoda Felicia 1.9D Gli. It feels strong to drive, have had no problems in 5 years and always returns 45mpg on it's weekly duty of plodding around town and shops. Does sound like a tractor on these cold mornings though. ;)

Lee

MY99 with all mod's declared (decat, Morettes etc etc) Scooby - approx £1100 (can't be assed to find the paperwork now). TDi - £650 (with mods declared). Both include CAT1 business use.

Want a brush to make some more sweeping statements with? ;)

PS. I know I'm saving money - the four brick walls around me now are a good reminder...

Get a better insurance company or postcode-the difference for me was £200. With the "Which dreamland are you in?" comment you're the one who started painting things with a wide brush to paraphrase your tired cliche. Pot, kettle, black.
Theres no need to be so defensive just because you've entered the world of poverty motoring :D.

Is this the right time to start talking about the real-world performance of diesels? :p

Probably not :D

according to my calculations, £ for £, the most economic car is actually a TVR 350. Second was the TVR SEAC. Really wish I hadn't bought a bl**dy diesel now. :)

Agreed brickboy.

Anyone else got Scooby / TDi insurance comparision figures?

RA £1100
1.6 Focus Zetec (group 6) £300

Cant see the tdci being a whole lot more, certainly not £800 more ;).

Focus TDCi 370
BMW 330D Sport 550
Impreza UK Turbo 800

And the BMW and Focus are a damn sight quicker on the dual carriage ways/motorways I drive than either of the petrol models. The BMW may not be quite as fast as the Impreza but it isn't as far off as you'd think.

Steve

BMW 330D well over 20 secs to get to 100

UK Impreza about 15 secs


No difference at all is there?

Of course in the real world 0-100 sprints don't happen very often, oh apart from every single fecking day in my commute. Real world performance is a cop out IMHO.

The 330D does 62 in 7.2, with 2 gear changes which isn't to shoody, but then it also accelerates rather nicely in 6.

But the point is I wanted something that was pretty quick, not Impreza quick but which wouldnt cost me an arm and a leg to run...and 43mpg every day when i do 500+ miles a week is what I wanted. I would have been servicing my Scooby roughly every 3 months the BMW is going to be 1 every 9-10 months.

If I want more performance I can plug a Tuningbox, AC Schnitzer Box in or get an AMD etc remap ..205 BHP, 310lbft upto 250 BHP 380lbft which drops the 0-62 time to just over 6s.

So as you say the 0-100 time is not what matters the 60-80 or so is what I'm interested in and a very large bucket of torque helps that somewhat.

Steve

I imagine 60-100 the torque from a chipped 330D is going to be pretty awesome- however I'm more interested in all round performance/cost ratio. My Impreza is the best compromise for me so far as I'm sure your diesel is for you.
What amazes me is how many diesel "evangelists" kid themselves their cars are somehow quick- 'cos compared to my cheap old Impreza they aren't- in any conditions one could mention (apart from an economy test)

Nacro -- I don't want to argue about the merits of diesel vs petrol. Scoobs and many other sporty petrol cars are a lot quicker over most of the performance measures in magazines etc, and away from the lights, no contest.

But there is a condition where a lot of diesels are just as quick as a Scoob. In-gear acceleration and "punch" from steady speeds, which is what counts for A / B road overtaking.

Like you say, horses for courses, not trying to pretend a diesel is the be-all and end-all of performance but they can be quick :)







[Edited by brickboy - 12/8/2003 10:26:09 AM]

And on that note, let's have some more figures on Scoob vs TDi insurance costs.

At the moment, it seems a number of us need to change our postcodes...

Can't believe this debate is still raging!

I'm with Nacro all the way - diesels are OK for what they are, but the equivalent petrol power car will have them every time. I can't really understand why people would buy a diesel in the UK as you don't seem to save that much (unless it's a company car of course).

All that filling up at the smelly pump, noisy engines and trying to kid yourself it's a performance car is not really for me. Still each to their own I guess.

tiggers.

Have you driven any of the modern deisels?? The Focus 2.0 feels gutless compared to the TDCI and is nearly the same price. The 330i again feels gutless against the 330D...The Impreza I admit was damn quick at motorway speeds but the 330D is not slow by any stretch of the imagination.

In terms of cost of running, it costs me 1p per litre more for deisel and I get twice the mileage from the tank than I did from the Impreza. It costs me roughly £300 a year less to insure even thou I'm doing 3 times the mileage. The cost of the car is marginally more than me buying a STI8 PPP with 18" Prodrive wheels so thats a plus in the Scooby side but then I get free servicing on the BMW which more than compensates for that and its much higher spec'd...shall we go into depreciation as well????

But each to their own, the 330D fits my requirements quite well thanks.

Steve

One of the nearest diesel vs. petrol comparisons you can get like-for-like is the Golf GTI 130bhp diesel vs the 150bhp turbo petrol.

Prices: £16215 (130 diesel) / £16585 (petrol)

Performance (diesel / petrol):

0-60mph: 7.8 / 7.9
0-80mph: 13.7 / 13.5

30-50 in 3rd gear: 3.6 / 4.8
50-70 in 4th gear: 5.4 / 7.1

test fuel consumption: 49.7mpg / 29.1mpg

The 130 diesel matches the petrol turbo for sprinting, beats it for lugging and p1sses on it for fuel. The PD150 Golf is quicker again, but costs £1500 more.

Anyone got figures for the 330i vs. 330d?

As I said each to their own.

Also it depends whether you think the Golf or the Beemmer are performance cars in their petrol versions or not.

tiggers.

In the case of the PD130 Golf, I think things get more interesting in terms of performance. Spending 400 notes or so on a Jabba remap gets you 190ish bhp and a shed load of torque. A remapped 130Tdi Golf puts in similar figures performance wise to a remapped 1.8T petrol.

Regarding the insurance quotes something interesting I noticed was that with Liverpool Victoria the Impreza Turbo UK with mods as mentioned was cheaper to insure than an Integra Type R (by £20) and a whole £100 cheaper than an Accord Type R.

As far as in gear performance goes a problem I noticed with even the more powerful turbodiesels is the relatively small power band. For example you pull out to overtake a couple of vehicles and find yourself having to make a gear change while overtaking rather than the single change I have to make before commencing the move like my Impreza for example. You have to significantly change your driving style to get the best out of a diesel.

I think the key question here is "are they money savers?"-they undoubtedly are but when I did the sums the amount of money saved was relatively small compared to the loss of performance.

I have to drive TDCi Focus/Mondeo's and Vag PD's often through work.

To be honest I no longer find the powerband a problem. Maximum torque is usually around 1800-2000rpm and most modern diesels will pull to around 4500rpm+.
So if we say 2500rpm usable powerband its probably only the same as the powerband in a Vtech or say overtaking from 4000rpm to 6500rpm in a standard petrol.

It's more of a driver issue as anyone used to petrol engine find the idea of starting to overtake in a high gear with only 1900rpm a bit frightening. :)

These aren't performance cars but that's not what the title of the thread asks.
For me it's a car on car issue, for me the economics of buying a big diesel wasn't worth the extra I would have to pay over a V6 petrol. On the other hand if I was buying a Focus I would choose the TDCi over the 2.0 anyday. The economics may be touch and go wether the diesel is cheaper long term but the TDCi is a far better car than the Zetec petrols.

Lee

Nacro,

Your last sentence sums up my feelings exactly!

I guess it really comes down to horses for courses. I cannot imagine parting with similar money to an STI8 PPP for a 330D, but then that's just me. I'd rather sacrifice the extra running costs for more performance and not having to queue up with the truckers :D

tiggers.

Insurance for me and my GF was £1200 Scoob, £520 Audi A4 Avant TDi 130.

I can't really understand why people would buy a diesel in the UK as you don't seem to save that much (unless it's a company car of course)

What a silly statement. The UK has the most expensive fuel in Europe if not the world :(

I save bags of money on fuel as I now have it in my pocket rather than giving it to$$ers Brown, Bliar and Co to piss away.

Not really - diesel is more expensive than petrol, diesel cars are more expensive than petrol cars (generally), cost more to service in a lot of cases and many of the turbos don't have quite the advantage over petrol economy wise that people believe.

As for having the most expensive fuel in the Europe/the world - not true except in the case of diesel so why would you buy a .... well you get my drift.

tiggers.

Diesel costs you more per litre than petrol. You need to realise that negates any savings to some extent and when you work out the savings per mile you have to do a hell of a lot of miles before you start to save. For example gazoil costs about 50p ltr in Spain, compared to 65p ltr for 98 RON SUL. The UK's tax system is set up, once again, to shaft any ideas one might have of paying less tax.

If you really want to take tax revenue away from those robbers then I suggest breaking the law and using red diesel, either that or an LPG conversion to a petrol car.

So deisel 1p per litre more so thats 60p a tank on average or if you run your scooby on super or optimax 2p per litre less and then twice the MPG(ish)...nope unless my maths is somewhat iffy (which it could well be) the running costs of a deisel, in fuel only, are significantly better in the deisels favour...and thats on a 3 litre deisel the 1.8 TDCI focus is even better.

I've done the scooby thing, probably go back at some stage, but the comfort and ease of driving 500+ miles a week makes the BMW a much better choice than the STI. I hit a decent speed turn on the cruise control and sit in climate controlled leather luxury in a quiet environment all the way to work.

Steve

And unfortunately outside the car it sounds like a tractor - only kidding :D :D :D

tiggers.

Tell you what, I do like the sounds of the Volvo D5 and 330d motors when they're pressing on: very gruff and throaty.

quote: "I hit a decent speed turn on the cruise control and sit in climate controlled leather luxury in a quiet environment all the way to work."

Sounds like exactly the kind of work modern diesels excell at- my average use goes something like this- 30 mile drive through mountain dual carriageways, 10 mile drive on Autoroute involving 3 standing starts with maniac French lunatics who seem to aim their cars at each other leaving peage booth, 1 mile drive through light traffic to work. That being the case it sounds as if we've each found the correct car for our needs.

I still don't see how a diesel is going to save me significant money (in the UK that is). Here in France I could save a fortune by going diesel as it is so cheap, however I'd rather have something fast.