Petrol or Diesel - Big Deal -So what?

blacksta

I drive a 1.6 auto focus zetec and on the motorway i get an average of 43 Miles to the Gallon. Although i do 138 miles round trip daily - Some posters says i am driving the wrong car. Please tell me why i should shell out an equivalent of almost 3k for the same car in diesel. I have read here that MPGs are a false economy especially on diesel ( How much does it cost to deal with DPFs and turbo's going wrong) A friend's Audi a3 turbo diesel went wrong the other day and cost £1500 to rectify and a year later turbo broke again - who needs that stress. definitely not me :rotfl:

TadleyBaggie

I've been drving diesel cars since 1995 (30K+ a year) and have had none of the engine problems that others seem to use as scare tactics.

jwruk

I'm currently driving a diesel car, previous cars were diesel/diesel/petrol/diesel/petrol/petrol. I've never suffered a DPF or turbo failure, my driving style and needs make a diesel more economical for me over a petrol.

If I didn't care about where my money went then I'd probably have a thirsty petrol engined car.

It's all about preference. I prefer to drive a diesel, you prefer to drive a petrol.

funkycoldribena

I've got Diesel and Petrol and had no problems with either,I think the problems with diesel come about when people use them for just pottering about.

Ranger8

blacksta wrote: »

I drive a 1.6 auto focus zetec and on the motorway i get an average of 43 Miles to the Gallon. Although i do 138 miles round trip daily - Some posters says i am driving the wrong car. Please tell me why i should shell out an equivalent of almost 3k for the same car in diesel. I have read here that MPGs are a false economy especially on diesel

If your achieving 43 mpg with a petrol auto 1.6 Focus you`ll be able to improve those figures by at least 20% with an equivalent diesel.

almillar

That's 35,880 miles per year, assuming 5 days a week, every week. And they're long journeys. I love my petrol, and I do 7,000 miles per year - but you are the PERFECT diesel driver, that's all there is to it. Whether you want to spend the extra money (did you forget about the money you'll get for your petrol car?) is up to you. Tax may be cheaper too for diesels, but it all depends what make/model you go for.
Definitely a more sensible solution than yours of installing a huge petrol tank ;-)

Hintza

You only bought your new car a few weeks ago. Was it not sensible to think about this then?

Where does the extra £3k come from?

payless

Can't say for Fords ( nor auto's) .. but looked at Puegeots
I would expect a family hatch diesel to cost no more than £2000 more from new.

Likely get 55+ mpg ( so even with price diff -saving at approx 2p per mile, on 35K miles pa , thats £700 pa)

lower insurance

lower tax ( my 1.6 diesel is £30pa, some newer ones are even less)

Engine lasts longer

some of the extra cost will be recovered on resale

rodenal

If it makes you feel even better, my 2.0 tdci focus averaged low to mid 40's on a 80 mile a day return. Unfortunately for the argument the 1.6 tdci my friend had averaged mid to high 50's over almost the same journey.

merlie

I'm much happier now with my 1.6tdci 06 Focus than I was with my 1.8 Y Zafira.

Zaffy 33mpg
1.6 tdci 50mpg :j

motorguy

blacksta wrote: »

I drive a 1.6 auto focus zetec and on the motorway i get an average of 43 Miles to the Gallon. Although i do 138 miles round trip daily - Some posters says i am driving the wrong car. Please tell me why i should shell out an equivalent of almost 3k for the same car in diesel. I have read here that MPGs are a false economy especially on diesel ( How much does it cost to deal with DPFs and turbo's going wrong) A friend's Audi a3 turbo diesel went wrong the other day and cost £1500 to rectify and a year later turbo broke again - who needs that stress. definitely not me :rotfl:

You spend around £5000 a year on fuel to drive a 1.6 Ford Focus??? :eek:

£5000 used of your net pay is probably £8000 of your gross pay, so even IF you were earning £40,000 a year, then every monday of every week of every year you're working just to fuel a Focus 1.6

If you're earning say, £25K then its even more horrifying.

Ouch, ouch, ouch, ouch, ouch!!!!

Mate, just to clarify, i dont care how much you're earning you ARE driving the wrong car.