f there’s enough customer demand, Ford may consider selling passenger cars with diesel engines in the U.S. market. That’s what Ford director of powertrain research Dan Kapp told Ward’s Auto when pressed on the availability of turbodiesel cars on our shores. Currently, Ford only offers diesel engines in the U.S. in its large pickup trucks but turbo-diesel engines are available for almost all of Ford’s European-market cars. Kapp said that he’d like to bring diesel-powered cars to the American market — they could help Ford meet stricter fuel-economy requirements — but doing so depends on customer demand.
“I love diesels and want them to be a solution,” Kapp told Ward’s. Ford will continue to evaluate customer demand for turbodiesel engines and will offer them here “if there’s market demand.”
Part of the issue lies with cost. Kapp claims a diesel-powered car would cost 10 to 15 percent more than an equivalent gasoline-fired model. Moreover, diesel fuel typically costs a little more per gallon than gasoline. However, diesel engines tend to be far more fuel-efficient than gasoline models. “It’s a tough economic challenge.” Kapp said. “Will customers pay more for a diesel? Will they get a payback?”
There certainly is precedent for bringing diesel engines to American-market cars. Chevrolet recently announced plans to offer a diesel engine for the Cruze sedan starting in 2013, and Volkswagen continues to find thousands of buyers for its clean-diesel TDI products. In fact, 24.1 percent of all new Volkswagens in this country are now sold with diesel engines.
If Ford were to bring a diesel engine to America, it would likely slot it into the compact Focus or Fiesta. The next-generation Ford Escape would also be a strong candidate, as Volkswagen plans to bring a diesel version of its similarly sized Tiguan crossover here by 2015.

 

Red Star, you have a really strange enthusiasm for "senseless vehicles" but it's nice to see someone who thinks outside of the box for a change. It's kind of a refreshing break all these Boss threads. Keep em up man.

 

That's what you get growing up in a country where Volkswagen Golf and Yugo make majority of vehicles.

Anyway ...

I never really paid much attention to diesels until I bought one here in Serbia. With gas prices being $8.00/gallon here, majority of people drive diesels.

And I'm still unsure what to think of them ... They're really economical, I'm averaging over 45 mpg city, but for some reason they're much less economical in the USA. Jetta TDI (rated at 32/40 mpg), for an example, is barely more economical than Focus (not to mention costing $5,000 more). I don't know Ford's diesels, but Volkswagen's diesels are really noisy. Heck, my F-150 V8 is quieter than my Golf TDI.
So if Ford offers a Focus diesel in the USA, I'll take it for a test drive, but I'm expecting Civic hybrid's numbers (35-40 mpg city, ~50 mpg hwy).

 

Honda Civic Hybrid
EPA rated: 44 city / 44 highway
Autoblog observed: 37.6 city (in "Eco" mode) / 50.5 highway

Chevrolet Cruz Eco
EPA rated: 28 city / 42 highway
Autoblog observed: 42.7 city / 39 highway

Volkswagen Jetta TDI
EPA rated: 30 city / 42 highway
Autoblog observed: 43.1 city / 50.3 highway

"The Civic Hybrid struggles to keep up from time to time, and the Cruze will require some downshifting for passing. The Jetta TDI just devours the miles with very little driver effort required."

"As expected, the TDI's excellent highway manners resulted in 50.3 mpg here. In fact, in many other experiences with driving the Jetta TDI on the highway, we find that 50-plus mpg is significantly easier to achieve than you might think."

"Another plus about the diesel engine is that we rarely had to downshift while entering a turn to get us out of the corner. The Cruze takes some downshifting, as the engine prefers to rev a bit to squeeze out the most power..."

"We may have chosen the Cruze Eco as our favorite, but we prefer the Jetta TDI's diesel engine to the 1.4-liter turbo in the Cruze."

http://www.autoblog.com/2011/07/06/h...nd-volkswagen/

 

Its that 'world view' of yours.

 

I remember that review. Jetta TDI still has a base price of $22,000 which, IMO, is little too much for a compact. I would rather drive a Prius for the same price, mostly because I have more faith in Toyota's quality than Volkswagen's.

This is one comment from Motor Trend that I agree with:
There is a market, how large it is depends on the diesels efficiency. Take a look at this:
Focus XFE: 28/40 mpg for $18,500.
Cruze Eco: 28/42 mpg for $19,250.
Jetta TDI: 30/42 mpg for $23,000.
Diesel fuel retails for ~7% more than 87 octane gasoline, making the Cruze and Focus far smarter buys than the Jetta TDI. So, if Ford is going to charge just a 10% premium for their diesel, and the fuel generally costs 7% more, then the Focus XFED would have to achieve at least 33/47 to be cost effective. The question is for Dan Kapp: Is this possible? Answer that. The demand will be there if the product is right.

 

I think a lot of it comes down to marketing of the car and diesel on general. Plenty of people buy Hybrids because they're the 'hip' thing to buy even when many don't actually make sense financially. Even if you use the market leader Prius as a comparison, the break-even point for gas savings to catch up to the higher purchase price compared to a Corolla or Elantra or similar is many years... Several years longer than most people keep new cars nowadays. That being said, all the other hybrids make even less financial sense than the Prius. For instance, Honda would sell ZERO CRZs if it were all about dollars and cents.

 

They don't sell that many of them anyways ... July sales of CR-Z were 878.

 

Yeah, it certainly helps for the car to make some sense, unlike the CR-Z, but it's obvious that many people buy hybrids, at least partly, because of reasons other than saving money on gas.

 

I think it all depends which diesels we will get.

European Focus is offered with the following diesel engines: 1.6L (94 hp and 113 hp) and 2.0L (113 hp, 138 hp and 161 hp). The USA will most likely get either 138 hp or 161 hp.
I wish they would also offer a smaller 1.6L since ~100 hp in a car of Focus' size is just enough. And fuel economy is much better than 2.0's.

 

Hmm, I don't know about only 100hp in a Focus, but I suppose it would have more torque than you're typical 100hp gas engine.

 

My 2002 Volkswagen Golf TDI 1.9L diesel is rated at 100 hp and 180 lb ft torque.
Since I bought it in May I drove it for over 8,000 miles, including a 600 miles long trip to Croatia (I'm going there again on Friday) and have no problems with power. Just enough for city driving, I gotta say it doesn't feel any less powerfull in city driving than my 2000 Mustang V6. Highway driving sucks due to diesel's noise (not because of power), but the main reason for that is outdated 5 speed transmission (at 75 mph RPMs are at over 3,000 RPM which is pretty noisy for a diesel). The newer 6 speed is much better.

 

Is it possible for Ford's diesel Focus to achieve 50 mpg? Considering the 2011 Ford Focus ECOnetic Diesel achieves 67 mpg in U.S. gallons, I'd say it's entirely possible (keep in mind that diesels are almost always WAY more efficient than what their EPA numbers suggest). It'll surely outperform the Prius, too. I guess to some, performance doesn't really matter, but I view my car as more than just a "transportation appliance."

http://www.treehugger.com/files/2011...tos-europe.php

I wish everyone could drive a BMW 335d just once. The twin-turbocharged 3.0-liter inline-six diesel engine in this car is an example of how great modern diesels are. Not only will it throw you back in your seat and pin you there from a dead stop -- and make tremendous power throughout its entire rev range (up to 5,000 RPM) -- it achieves over 40 mpg in the process. This is with all the performance and efficiency-robbing emissions equipment in place, too (dpf, urea injection system, etc). Oh, and it's just as quiet as any gasoline engine I've driven, too -- maybe even quieter. We'll see just how efficient these DI gassers are when they're forced to utilize diesel-like particulate filters in the not-too-distant future because of the size of the PM they emit.

 

True, modern diesels are great when it comes to power and how quiet they are, but they're much less realiable and less economical now than they used to be back in the 1980s.

My aunt has a 1985 Volkswagen Golf with a 1.6L engine (54 hp), the red car from the picture. It has over 500,000 original km (almost 320,000 miles) on the odometer and still runs. I drove it plenty of times when I was in Serbia over the winter, even at -20C it started with no problems.
However, my 2002 Golf 1.9L diesel (100 hp) is a lot less realiable. I had few issues with turbo at 180,000 km (~110,000 miles) and something tells me that it's not gonna last much longer (it also burns much more oil than the old 1.6L).
Another thing is - 1.6L is much more economical than newer 1.9L, I was averaging over 65 mpg easily with 1.6L. The 1.9L is averaging 45 mpg. Still pretty good, but much less than 1.6L.
There was a week when turbo didn't work on my Golf and I noticed how much better the fuel economy is.

I wish they would start offering non-turbo diesels again. Not only are they more economical but also much more reliable.

 

I'm not sure what you mean by "less reliable." I haven't heard of anything negative regarding reliability when it comes to modern diesels, sans the issues with the 6.0L Ford Powerstroke of yesteryear. You're referring to a Volkswagen -- they aren't exactly known for their reliability, whether referring to their gasoline or diesel powertrains (a turbo isn't exactly diesel-only fare these days, either). I don't think that has anything to do with modern diesels as a whole, though. On the point of efficiency, they aren't as efficient as before because they're all corked up with emissions equipment, but they're still more efficient than hybrids and GTDI vehicles, all while providing almost-equal or better performance. Again, I'm of the belief that future direct-injection gasoline engines will require emissions equipment similar to what today's diesels don in the name of fighting pollution. We'll see just how efficient they are when that time comes.

"...Still, the diesel gets better mileage than the hybrid, giving more
ammo to our argument that modern oil burners are the smart choice for
America’s long-distance demands. In its two weeks with us, the S350
returned 26 mpg to the 24 we got in the hybrid...."

http://www.caranddriver.com/reviews/...take_road_test

"...Better yet, the beastly diesel returns 37 mpg on the (hopelessly optimistic) European combined cycle...."

http://www.caranddriver.com/reviews/...t_drive_review

" ...The all-wheel-drive, 3.0 liter, V6, S Class diesel is expected to
average 20 miles to the gallon in the city, and 31 on the highway... "

"...The S-diesel's fuel efficiency is also better than the current S
Class hybrid...." [S-class hybrid = 19/25/21 @ EPA 5-cycle

http://professional.wsj.com/article_...DExNDgyWj.html

 

Unless the turbo is extremely well designed and has a proven history of reliablility, I would choose a non turbo diesel. I have had a bad experience with turbo diesel, and I really do not trust them.

It would be nice if they sold more clean diesel cars, but realistically, ultimately we need to find something to power our cars that does not make Saudi Arabia any richer. I do not think we are able yet to have a realstic biodiesel solutuin, but I would prefer that to a hybrid. The summer heat of Phoenix kills batteries. I would rather use something that years of 110+ heat will not damage.

 

When it comes to diesel engines - nobody beats Volkswagen, followed by Mercedes. They were one of the first companies to offer a diesel in a production car.
Volkswagen Golf Mk 1 & 2 and Mercedes W123, all three with diesel engines, are some of the most realiable cars ever built. I still see plenty of them in driveable conditions, with original engines, here in Serbia and they're over 30 years old.

One thing that people always seem to ignore is how much more diesel costs compared to regular gasoline. In Wisconsin diesel was always $.30-.50 more expensive that gasoline. So even at 2 mpg better fuel economy, owner of diesel powered S350 spends more on fuel than the owner of the hybrid S350.

 

I'm guessing it doesn't quite accelerate as fast as the Mustang (not that a 2000 V6 Mustang is *fast* ), but for around town it has a nice amount of torque.


And the good news is that it doesn't have to drive around advertising you're getting that kind of mileage by driving a hideous car like the Prius/Insight. Honestly, my buddy has a MKV Jetta TDI and it's a great looking car AND it gets 41mpg hwy.


Does anyone even MAKE non-turbo diesel passenger cars? There aren't many, that's for sure.

 

That's why I didn't buy a TDI Jetta Wagon a couple years ago. The GTI would have cost the same to operate even though it got 31mpg compared to the TDIs 41mpg because diesel was $1 more than premium at the time. Of course, the MINI gets even better mileage than the GTI would have, so that's a small part of why we ended up with that ultimately.

 

Whoops