My coffin nail for the argument in favor of diesels;
Today’s price at my local (Minnesota):
Regular: $3.679
Diesel: $4.369
You’d have to get almost 20% better milage on that diesel to cover the difference.
Biodiesel? Don’t make me laugh. YOU might be lucky enough to have a local dispenser, but don’t bet on finding them if you have to drive any distance from that one outlet.
The short answer is that diesel engines gain much less than gasoline engines from having a hybrid drive train.
The hybrid system basically does three things.
Diesel engines by contrast aren’t less efficient at part load, so they don’t benefit.
The greater expansion ratio of the Atkinson cycle is less of a benefit to a diesel engine, which already has a big expansion ratio. You could make an Atkinson cycle diesel, but the gains would be smaller.
Huh? There’s no reason you couldn’t put regenerative braking in a diesel (hybrid).
I didn’t say there wasn’t! I said you don’t really get much out of it, and you don’t. (Unless you’re an urban bus!) Fitting a hybrid drive train to a gasoline engine gives you lots of other advantages, AND throws in regenerative braking for free, more or less. With a diesel, the other advantages are far smaller, and regeneratiive braking alone isn’t enough of a plus to bother fitting a hybrid.
The mechanical-electrical-battery-stored energy path isn’t particularly efficient regeneration anyway.
Is the Jetta TDI the 2009 VW that is supposed to beat the Prius in fuel economy?
If this isn’t the VW diesel mentioned abovethread, which one is?
The VW Golf/Rabbit hybrid, which hasn’t been greenlighted yet, beats the Prius. The regular Golf diesel (the one we were talking about as an alternative) has slightly poorer fuel economy but much better performance.
It’s not true. In fact, that report was discussed in a recent Straight Dope column.
How can a car that has not reached production beat a car in production? There’s also a new Honda Hybrid coming next year. But in reality, we have to talk about cars that are available now and have been EPA tested/rated. Note that the Prius had claims of 60MPG before the EPA downrated it. And, with the right driver, a downhill slope and a tailwind it can do it.
The point remains- there are no high MPG diesels out NOW. Nor is the VW Hybrid out.
Fair enough. I wasn’t really aware of quite how poor the selection of diesels available in the US was before this thread.
I just wanted to clarify that Corollas are not cramped inside. We go on long highway trips in our 2005 Corolla; two adults with plenty of luggage fit comfortably inside. We have driven other adults around in the backseat, and they are also comfortable. For an all-purpose, fuel-efficient family car, you can do worse than a Corolla.
Newer Corollas must be bigger on the inside; my 6’3" husband barely fits in my 1998 model, and can’t drive it comfortably because his knees are crushed against the dashboard. I bought it before we met, and hadn’t expected to marry a giant.
He drives a 2004 Aveo, which has a shorter body than my Corolla, but which fits him much better. There’s more leg room because the cabin is set above the axles, and the roof is higher so he has more headroom. It’s a light little Korean-built car, so he gets great gas mileage too.
I felt like I had to share this tidbit even though it’s a bit of the opposite of what’s wanted in this thread…
I was talking about cars on another website and one person said that there “are 5 used Priuses (Priusi?) for sale in a 300 mile radius of Ann Arbor MI. Each one of them is currently selling for ABOVE sticker price for a new one.” So I pulled up our local listings:
Prius 2007 Silver 28,226 $25,995
Prius 2007 Silver 43,603 $24,995
Prius 2007 Gray 35,873 $26,995
Prius 2006 Black 32,415 $25,995
Prius 2007 Green 200 $23,950
Prius 2007 Red 41,840 $24,990
Wow, I bought at the right time. My partner was giving me shiat this past weekend about me having to buy a new car when all they do is depreciate. Now I have an even bigger reason to be smug driving my Prius.
Each one of them is currently listing for ABOVE sticker price for a new one.
I have seen a lot of listings on Craigslist and whatnot on used cars with the price higher than a new car. On one, I was interested- just starting to talk with the guy and he knocked $1000 off.
I just got then new MotorTrend and there’s an article about diesels. A few things:
There are no diesel “commuter cars” or family sedans in America.
Only one is planned for next year- the VW Jetta- but the same tech will go into an Audi Q7 and VW Touareg.
The Mahindra Mhawk 
is planned for 2010 and it might have a diesel hybrid. :eek:
Several are on the LT drawing board.
Diesel fuel has around 11% more energy thu you can expect 11% or so better MPG. But in America, Diesel costs around 20% more, so it’s a net loss.
Horribly-built Indian Jeep knockoffs - and I mean actual knockoffs; Mahindra’s bread and butter model for many years was a license-built Willys CJ3.
Here’s several pictures of them. One poster commented they looked like a cross between a RAV4, a Frontier, and a 1970s vintage Ford Courier.
I can see all those vehicles in those pictures.
A Mahindra diesel-hybrid truck might sound implausible (and it does to me somewhat) but as I remember, the same company exports tractors to the US.