Date: Thu, 21 Feb 2008 16:30:40 -0800
Reply-To: Zeitgeist <gruengeist@GMAIL.COM>
Sender: Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From: Zeitgeist <gruengeist@GMAIL.COM>
Subject: Re: Bluetec diesel
In-Reply-To: <000001c874e5$a347bea0$6501a8c0@TOSHIBALAP>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
I've owned something like 15 VW/Mercedes/Cummins diesels. Early VW diesels
had all sorts of issues, though I did manage to coax 275k out of an '80
Rabbit. The Bosch VE pumps are prone to problems, 'cause they're entirely
lubricated by fuel, which is left to the vagaries of maintenance and fuel
quality. Timing belts are just plain a stupid idea for interference
engines, but that's not a diesel-specific problem.
Mercedes diesels can typically run for the life of the engine with the
original injection pump, 'cause they're lubricated by engine oil.
I owned a '96 Passat tdi that went 105k during my ownership without any
diesel-specific problems--oh, and it got 40mpg while doing that. I'd say
that's way way cheaper to own than *any* other comparable gashuffing midsize
vehicle from that era.
I've had great luck with them and will continue to run diesel in the future
'cause they make so much more sense than gashuffing wheeze-boxes.
On Thu, Feb 21, 2008 at 3:58 PM, Scott Daniel - Shazam <
scottdaniel@turbovans.com> wrote:
> We shall see.
> There are exactly 4 advantages to diesels I have identified so far.
> All the rest our downsides or disadvantages.
> And I drove a TD vanagon for a long time, so it's not like I'm not
> familiar
> with the beast.
> I even own 3 vw diesel engines and 2 diesel vanagons right now.
> If all we had were diesels, people would be nutso over getting smooth
> quiet
> gasoline cars to drive.
> It's 'the cool and different factor' that really motivates people to drive
> diesels.........
> And the fuel economy is a short term gain........
> Why heck, just a few minutes ago ...............typical deal............on
> the diesel vanagon list.........guy's injection pump is binding up inside.
> Pump repair or rebuild time.
>
> Long term, diesels are not especially cheaper to operate than gasoline
> cars
> and the older ones for sure are polluting, rougher running, harder
> starting,
> and have expensive parts on them like injection pumps to go bad........
> And you know..........this is REALLY FUNNY
> ..............BECAUSE.........traditionally they used to say 'diesels are
> more reliable' and 'there's no tune up on diesels', and so forth, and
> yet........in modern times gasoline engines are CONSIDERABLY more reliable
> and under less stress than diesel engines., and last better than many vw
> engines, and are under far less stress, and some of them are
> non-interference engines.
> Your timing belt gets off for second on a vw diesel, it's the sound
> of
> hundred dollar bills being cast to the wind by the handful.
> Try to explain that to your wife, if you have one. Women, being more
> practical around things like cars, in general, don't get 10,000 + dollars
> being spent on a vanagon engine conversion, and regardless whether vw
> diesel
> or subaru or whatever, if a catastrophic event occurs that wipes out
> thousands in a second, they are not going to be very simpatico at all.
> Just had a case the other day - the reason for the hole in the
> side
> of the new VW TD engine isn't known yet..............but I'll will have to
> say.........it's *extremely unlikely* ( though possible of course ) that
> that same thing would not have happened, or at least not so
> catastrophically, to a gasoline. From the sounds of it maybe 3 rods and
> the
> head are salvageable........the rest is gone money, big money. I guess
> it's
> the macho factor about diesels- maybe that's it.
> There's these nice rednecks near me that just love to fire up their
> monster diesel Ford pickups, which they mainly use for a one person
> commute
> car, at least between hunting seasons, and fire up two big fords and let
> them sit there idling away at 80 decibels or whatever it is for 25 minutes
> while they shoot the bull. "Me big strong man, me have big diesel truck'
> ..........yucko baby.
> I made the comment recently that a rebuilt injection pump on a tdi
> jetta costs 250 gallons worth of fuel to get rebuilt and one guy said that
> the IP rebuilt on his Chevy diesel or whatever it was wiped out two years
> worth of fuel cost savings over gasoline.
>
> So.........other than the 'I want to be different than the masses'
> ............and 'I love the better fuel economy' ..........and I suppose a
> bit of 'more low end torque' ........as long as we can get the gasoline at
> a
> good price, and other than the biofuel/veggie oil ability, there's no
> real
> reason to drive a smoky vibrating blows-up easily vw diesel - sorry !
>
> If we can't get fuel, or we barely can, or we have to be really miserly
> with fuel, then I'll get one of my diesels going.
> As it is a barely need to drive anyway, like I can go 4 months and only
> put 1,000 miles on my car if I'm not doing trips. And when I do go on a
> trip, I am happy to get 20mpg on gas and have all that wonderful smooth
> power and easy 80 mph cruise, and that's a 20 year old turbo gasoline car
> that I got for about 300 dollars. 160 hp is very decent power in many
> vehicles, and not even that uncommon or hard to get in gasoline engines.
> And it's so smooth and quite and not smelly too !! Plus a
> non-interference
> engine in many cases.
>
> But everyone do what ya 'all like of course. But if you want something
> reliable, durable, trouble free, not under huge stress all the time, plus
> instantly starting, and smooth and quiet ..........get a nice
> non-interference gasoline engine.
> If you like lots of vibration, expensive parts like an IP that gas
> engines don't have, and a critical engine under a lot of stress.....yeah,
> then do vw diesel. I would so love to document or research how many VW
> diesel heads get ruined. I've got lots of them and have seen lots of
> them.
> Vw diesels that is. Bottom line, if I can't really trust it, I don't
> care
> if it does get better fuel mileage. Btdt.
> It ain't fun being a long, long from anywhere when things blow badly,
> and
> diesel vw's are far more prone to that than many, many other engines out
> there. They just cost more to drive except for the lucky few that get
> many
> hundreds of thousands of good miles out of them.
> Scott
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Vanagon Mailing List [mailto:vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com] On Behalf Of
> Zeitgeist
> Sent: Thursday, February 21, 2008 2:16 PM
> To: vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM
> Subject: Re: Bluetec diesel
>
> Pfft, whatever...yer livin' in the past, dude. Audi just won the 2007 24
> hours of LeMans with a diesel powered R10 tdi
>
> Diesels rock, by their very nature
>
> On Thu, Feb 21, 2008 at 1:58 PM, Scott Daniel - Shazam <
> scottdaniel@turbovans.com> wrote:
>
> >
> >
> > and Honey, sorry to say it, but they just ain't no way around it that by
> > their very nature, diesels are noisy, dirty, expensive, and slowish.....
> > ( and not to deny that there are now fantastically quite and very, very
> > powerful diesel engines in the automotive world ) . But I notice
> Ferrari
> > and Porsche don't mess around there.
> >
> >
>
>
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