Date: Wed, 2 May 2012 17:04:34 -0700
Reply-To: Scott Daniel - Turbovans <scottdaniel@TURBOVANS.COM>
Sender: Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From: Scott Daniel - Turbovans <scottdaniel@TURBOVANS.COM>
Subject: Re: Still lousy gas mileage
In-Reply-To: <BAY152-ds191A55AF5E1FF8170746C6A02E0@phx.gbl>
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the same argument can be made about all exotic diesel conversions..
sure ..you might go from say 18ish mpg on pump gas to 27ish we'll say on
pump diesel fuel ..
and counting the high cost of acquisition .........plus a failed turbo
here and there ...or other serious expenses and failures..
seldom is that money won back or saved on fuel savings by going to a TDI
or whatever in that category, I suspect.
That's not why people do them though really . There are other benefits.
Just the reward of something you helped create that you're proud of, for
example.
On a purely financial basis ....probably the lowest cost to get around
occurs when buying a cheap rugged used car, then just driving it,
repairing as little as possible. Not safe, and not smart ..but likely
nets out at the lowest per mile cost. )
I am starting to like diesels again some...though not on pure pump fuel
to the very foul smell !
advantages I see are ..
can be less expensive day-to-day to drive, particularly if using veggy
oil in the mix. My stock 82 sunroof diesel vanagon with rebuilt 1.6NA
engine ...while very modest power wise..
on purely level driving in local use, where I don't go over 50 mph
anyway ....barely sips fuel.
I think they are more sure footed at low speeds ...diesels, much better
for slow crawling, if that is one of the intended uses.
I don't like at all that if the timing belt messes up for an instant
..serious and expensive damage occurs.
Driven hard..
they eat up cylinder heads ( pre-chamber VW diesels anyway ) ..
I am sure they wear out rings and cylinder walls more , especially with
a turbo .
and ...in some cases ..
noise...as in racket ....very unpleasant. I have driven in some horribly
noisy diesel westy's ..that's no fun.
it also strikes me that people are happy to be getting really good
mileage even if it cost a lot upfront to get there. ...
and the fact that the upfront cost of the engine conversion or the car
is a huge sum....
just doesn't bother them that much. They are proud of what they
invested even. . They are happy to invest say $ 15K in a conversion to
get say 6to 10 more mpg.
It doesn't really pencil out ..
on paper you can show that it will take whatever.......10 years to earn
back in fuel savings the extra 10K just spent on the engine conversion
.....but seldom are engine conversions done for purely practical reasons.
They are rewarding , after all, in many other ways, when done well.
just for the fun of it ..
run the fuel savings math on a TDI conversion .
let's say ....stock waterboxer reubuild is $6K out the door.
Fancy TDI conversion is ...the range varies ..say it's $ 14K.
$8,000 extra.
if the wbxr gets 20mph at 4 per gallon ..
and the tdi say 27 mpg at 4.50 per gallon
somebody figure that out ..
how far you could drive on $8,000 in fuel with a new waterboxer engine
at 20 mpg and $ 4 per gal.
Take a while to earn that back.
Of course a TDI Whatever will have good resale value if it's in good
shape, much higher than any waterboxer anything.
I like , about diesels..
that we are not totally 'stuck' with The Man about fuel to run it on..
that is one thing very attractive about them all right.
at least there's a choice !
but calculate that fuel saving cost ..it doesn't really pencil out I
don't think.
We drive them for other reasons ..and when it's working right ...some
savings on fuel cost is one of the benefits. Not the main one though I
don't think.
On 5/2/2012 3:24 PM, Dennis Haynes wrote:
> How much fuel can you buy with the cost of converting? Between last November
> and This February I made three trips with the motorhome from New York to
> Florida. At some stops I paid as much as $0.80 more per gallon for Diesel
> than what Gasoline was going for. Yep, real happy I spent the extra money
> for the Diesel.
>
> Dennis
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Vanagon Mailing List [mailto:vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com] On Behalf Of
> Jason
> Sent: Wednesday, May 02, 2012 5:56 PM
> To: vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM
> Subject: Re: Still lousy gas mileage
>
> I have never been happy with the mileage my van gets, so I am fixing it with
> a TDI..... Fuel is just getting too costly to let your vehicle
> get out of tune. If all else fails check compression? Low
> compression will give worse mileage. Take the cat off and look inside with
> a good light too.
>
> Jason
>
> On Wed, May 2, 2012 at 5:47 PM, Dennis Haynes<d23haynes57@hotmail.com>
> wrote:
>> That Cat may be a smaller diameter/more restrictive than what belongs.
> While it may reduce performance I don't know if it will affect cruising
> mileage enough to measure.
>> Dennis
>>
>>
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Vanagon Mailing List [mailto:vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com] On
>> Behalf Of Bryan Feddish
>> Sent: Wednesday, May 02, 2012 4:26 PM
>> To: vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM
>> Subject: Re: Still lousy gas mileage
>>
>>>> Just some possibilties like maybe leaky tired injectors?<<
>> Those are new and are 2 years old.
>>
>>>> I'm only assuming that it's tuned up: cap, rotor, plugs, wires and
>>>> coil?<<
>> All of those are< 6 months old except the coil which is 2 years old.
>>
>>>> Plugged catalytic converter?<<
>> This is on my "maybe" list. it's a 4 year old cheap BD one. Maybe I should
> swap this out just in case. I've been stranded by a bad cat in the past....
>> Thanks,
>> Bryan
