Gas/Electric Hybrid or Diesel?

[merwin]

Poll question: Gas/Electric Hybrid or Diesel?

Which do you prefer for your car? Take into account biodiesel as well as current innovations in Diesel emissions and noise (vastly reduced from old Diesels).

[Dogmudgeon]

1. Micro-Cars

Being marked under the name "Smart Cars" --

High-efficiency super-lightweight cars with fiberglas bodies and light, strong "skeletons". One such car, a Volkswagen being sold in Europe, gets over 200 miles to the gallon of gas.

--p!

[merwin]

2. Is the Smart Car made by Volkswagen?

They're the funniest looking things... all over Europe (I can't blame them, most of the city streets are tiny to begin with).

[CanuckAmok]

6. Marketed in Canada through Mercedes Canada

I thought they were built by Daimler Chrysler.

[Kellanved]

17. no, that's a Mercedes Spin-off

The VW Smart-Car ("Lupo") is likely to be discontinued. As is the Smart, for that matter. (For the record: the Smart is not very effective - too much effort for the design left little space for that).

[NomoBreaks]

3. Alcohol/Electric would be better, IMHO

nm

[merwin]

4. Some fool would try to drink it n/t

[ghostsofgiants]

11. Dammit, I wasnted to post a picture of Homer Simpson drinking "gasohol"...

But I couldn't find one.

"One for you, one for me! One for you, one for me!"

[CanuckAmok]

5. Biodiesel!

Check this out:

"Biodiesel is a safe, non-toxic, biodegradable, and renewable fuel that can easily be used in unmodified diesel engines.

Fuel markets that can benefit from biodiesel include bus and truck fleets, heavy equipment, diesel cars and boats, electric generators and oil furnaces.

Biodiesel is produced by chemically re-acting an alcohol with vegetable based oils, animal fats, or waste cooking oils, in the presence of a catalyst. This process removes the glycerine from the oil in order to make it less viscous, or thick, enabling it to be used in any unmodified diesel engine."

http://www.wiseenergy.ca/

[merwin]

7. There's a bill goin through WA State to lower taxes on Biodiesel

for certain situations (any form of mass transit, namely schools and city buses). It would make it about the same price as regular Diesel.

[Dover]

8. Willie Nelson just bought a biodiesel company and will be selling

to trucking fleets as well as to regular car owners. I'd like to think he is informed enough about the future of biodiesel to have made a good business decision.

Diesel engines seem pretty versatile in the fuels they'll accept.

[merwin]

12. I actually heard about that for the first time yesterday.

I'd buy from Willie :-)

Basically, it seems you can put any relatively thick fuel that has a higher flashpoint into a diesel engine. I'm not sure how good it would be for the engine though. Greasecars (Diesel engines modded to accept filtered kitchen grease) will get your engine a bit sticky, so you have to clean it out every so often.

[Dave Reynolds]

13. Hot rodder and car builder

Gale Banks is working on performance parts for diesel engines and I heard him say on television that biodiesel would ease dependence on oil.

I wasn't quite sure about his statement (slight paraphrase) "We send oil money to middle-eastern people who want to kill us when we could send it to a midwesten farmer who doesn't" .

[CanuckAmok]

19. More to the point...

...the source for the oil used in Biodiesel is already being produced as a by-product of the food industry.

In thory, high-yeild crops like soy and hemp could be used to produce the oil for biodeisel, if it becomes popular enough to warrant it's own manufacturing source.

I'm currently shopping for a new (to me) Toyota Land Cruiser, and I'm hoping to swap in the (unavailable in North America) 1HZ diesel motor, and running biodiesel. I just need to find an economical way of shipping the engine from Australia or South Africa!

Side note: Jaguar has a 2007 model mid-engine convertible coupe which is going to be powered by a diesel engine. a gas engine isn't even an option on that model.

Part of their research is an "electronic" muffler, which will generate opposing sound waves in the exhaust system, reducing the "diesel clatter".

[billyskank]

9. I'd get a diesel

just because modern turbo diesel engines are so good. They combine good efficiency with good performance. Also they seem to develop lots of power much lower down the rev range than petrol engines do, so you can get them to go fast without having to thrash them like you do petrol engines...although you of course lose efficiency if you do that. The only drawback is that they still sound, well, like diesels, but you can't have everything!

[merwin]

10. I'm happy with my Jetta TDI. A ton of low end torque, but not much on

the upper end. But, since I live in the city, it doesn't really matter.

[Justin54B20L]

14. I'd go with Diesel, and maybe someone can give me sound advice here.

I'm looking at getting rid of my 2001 Saturn Coupe and getting a New Beetle TDI. I've become very mpg minded since I tend to drive quite a bit, and I'd just like some input on the Diesel Beetles.

[Kellanved]

15. certainly not Diesel

Biodiesel is a tricky affair and by no means as eco-friendly as the lobby wants to make one believe. Also, only very few Diesels are equipped with micro particle filters - driving a filter-less Diesel in a city is a no-no; by comparison smoking in a child daycare center is a responsible thing to do.

[ronnykmarshall]

16. Diesel

Vin Diesel

[gizmo1979]

18. I'm waiting for the cold fussion model!

[Technowitch]

20. We have a 2004 Prius