Gotta love Tdi economy

[stickshift3000]

can someone explain the prius to me please?

The prius is just a means for people to feel a little bit better about themselves as we all fvck the planet up well and proper together.

Yes, car companies claiming to produce environmentally friendly cars is ironic in its own right...

[gldgti]

so my wife who is still on her L's drove the octavia for the first time about a week ago. with her driving, half country roads and half freeway (at 80km/h) we were averaging 4.4l/100km (200km drive)

i know we all know it, but it does make a difference to drive a little slower (ok a lot slower)

also, in the 10,000km i've done with the octavia, i'm certain that it uses between 5-10% more fuel using the cruise control compared with my foot, for my daily commute (hilly freeway).

still havn't managed to crack the 1000km tank yet but i'm sure if i actually try I will, easily... but I'm getting about 950/tank without trying.

[5pot]

can someone explain the prius to me please?

so.... it's better for the environment / more fuel efficient, because in addition to using normal petrol, some big fcking diesel powered excavation equipment digs up a whole bunch of dirt and places it into the tray of a huge fcking diesel powered tonka truck, all the way over in the mines where my dad's a consultant in indonesia.

from there, the coal gets extracted from all that dirt, and it's sent on a 12 km long conveyor belt out to one of the ships waiting at port. once this ship is full, it makes the ~1000's kilometer journey to australia, where it's processed at a power station into electricity to be put into the power grid, which you use to fuel your prius...

so how, exactly, is that beneficial to the environment?

the amazonian tribes that are saved each and every time someone drives their prius - are they saved when the massive CAT mining truck fires up in the morning? or when the cook serves breakfast to the crew who are taking the coal that is required to fuel a prius, to a country 5,000km's away?

You forgot that they need to mine for the NiMH batteries' raw materials too... and then they have to recycle them somehow, if they're recycleable at all... or rather, if it's economically/financially viable to recycle them...

[Gigitt]

You forgot that they need to mine for the NiMH batteries' raw materials too... and then they have to recycle them somehow, if they're recycleable at all... or rather, if it's economically/financially viable to recycle them...

read this... a quick link
The Prius Bad for the Environment?

Main issues relate to:
Dust to Dust study from Total cost of Production to End Of Use.

Then there is the outrageuos Prius battery raplacement program costs to concider.

[wai]

can someone explain the prius to me please?

The Prius and just about all hybrid vehicles are there so that vehicle manufacturers can meet their fleet average gas mileage targets. There is no account taken of the initial charge in the batteries or where the charge came from. As a result, they start the test with fully charged batteries.

[ParaBul]

read this... a quick link
The Prius Bad for the Environment?

Main issues relate to:
Dust to Dust study from Total cost of Production to End Of Use.

Then there is the outrageuos Prius battery raplacement program costs to concider.

This is an interesting topic that's been discussed in various forms on countless websites over the last few years. I've never had much time for the Prius, but because I now need a new car, and will benefit from fuel efficiency, I had another look at Toyota Hybrids, and even test-drove a the Lexus CT200h (hybrid) - and pick up a Golf GTD this Friday.

However, I do think that the Toyota hybrid system is something that people love to hate, and it has received unfair treatment.

The "Dust to Dust" study has been strongly criticised, and is suspect at best. Something like http://www.pacinst.org/topics/integr...r_vs_prius.pdf is a much more scientific assessment.

In my (limited) experience, I noted that the "Dust to Dust" supporters love to talk about the Prius highway economy; a friend of mine owns a Prius, and reports that highway returns the worst economy. Why won't critics talk about city cycle economy, where the hybrid system is supposed to be best?

I had long thought that a replacement battery pack for a Prius is $10k; the Lexus sales rep assured me it's only $2k - but he is a car salesman, and I didn't get it in writing, so I don't know that I should trust him. Is $2k outrageous? Volkswagen told me I should budget $1k for a 60k km service, so $2k after 10 years doesn't sound totally outrageous to me.

It also occurs to me that the original criticism looks at the US market, after shipping the Prius from Japan, and presumably shipping it back again. What happens if the same assessment is performed in Japan, and the H3 has been shipped across the Pacific twice?

I believe that the batteries are recyclable, but how much of the nickel in any given battery is "recycled", I have NFI. I noticed a criticism of the amount of copper in the motors; how much of that is recycled?

Critics of electric vehicles also love to talk up the coal fired power stations creating the electricity (incidentally, much of the coal is mined here in Australia, even if it is crap coal). But Australia also has significant gas powered, hydro, and wind power, so (theoretically) the pollution created in order to generate electricity is reducing, and the current proposed carbon tax / ETS will effectively tax that pollution - but it won't be taxing the pollution that comes from my exhaust pipe. Regardless, in the context of the Prius, who cares? The Prius charges its batteries from its on-board internal combustion engine, so coal-fired power stations are irrelevant.

OK, I think I'll stop now. And before anybody gets too upset, I didn't buy a hybrid - they're too slow.

[sparkie]

Can we get back on topic please? This is a thread about how far people have been getting on one tank of fuel, start something about hybrids vs TDis yourselves (please!!)

[gldgti]

Last tank I ran BP dino diesel instead of biodiesel (got to 0km range and chickened out 10km from my usual servo with B100). Fuel economy for the dino tank was the same on average as my normal b100 average, a little surpised about that. Smoke out the back was up though, and the idle was a little rougher.

without wanting to be responsible for someone putting bad fuel in their lovely TDI, i'd almost say anyone who knows a good quality biodiesel outlet should feel safe enough using it in their PD TDI.... but ofcourse I wont actually say that, will I?

[Buller_Scott]

would conservo fuel qualify as good quality BD? there're a couple of outlets in melbourne.

[gldgti]

would conservo fuel qualify as good quality BD? there're a couple of outlets in melbourne.

thats not something I can answer unfortunately.

As has always been the case, there's still no enforcement of the australian standard. The standard itself exists, and it requires the biodiesel to be as good or better than any european standard for biodiesel (which VW warrant) - so if you know the fuel conforms to the standard, then it should be just fine.

Whether it conforms is really entirely up to the producer/distributor. In my case, I've been able to use the fuel over a long period of time in cars that it didnt matter so much, and found it to be excellent. That, coupled with the fact i've mentioned before that the servo that i get the fuel from has awards for fuel storage clenliness.

As a start, it might be worth your while getting a 5l jerry can full of it, put a jar of it in the fridge and see what happens...As i remember fuel conforming to the standard shouldnt jell above about -6, but its easy enough to google around and find the standard and check. (try starting at dutchaussies website).

Try asking the proprietors about their fuel storage etc... you never know, they might be very helpful. Ask them about how much of it they sell and who buys it, and if they have lots of regular customers.