Porkyd's Forum Comments
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Diesel still better than hybrids?
It always seems to be the eternal argument and unless a diesel hybrid comes along, which should smash all records, we'll never know.
I'm in the UK and gone from a 2.2 Diesel to the Prius Hybrid for various reasons, MPG being one of them. There's lots of diesels out there that will claim to do 70-80mpg but the one I had struggled to do 40mpg and Id had it for three years since new. I suspect a lot of the diesels that claim to do high MPG are just the small cars (Polos, Fiestas in the UK - not sure what's in the U.S.). The Prius is classd as a medium sized family car over here. If they did the same set up in a little mini car I suspect they could get some astounding MPG figures.
The battries don't need replacing every few years, you don't have to plug them in and as far as I am aware the production of the batteries and their effect on the environment have come on a long way since they first started to produce this type of battery. At the end of the hybrids are just another option for the motorist day.
I suspect if you drove the Jag XF diesel doing 0-60 in 5.9 seconds from every time you stopped you might not get 51mpg out of it.
Everyone will have an opinion but there's no right or wrong answer and I'm as much against eco campaingers plugging the hybrid as the saviour of the world.It's just a car with a petrol engine that just happens to have a battery that helps it out now and again!
posted by Porkyd January 21, 2010 at 2:01 PM