Diesel or Hybrid
 

I was looking at cars the other day and was wondering which would be a better Ecomodder car; a Toyota Camry Hybrid or a Volkswagen Jetta TDI/Diesel. They seem to get similar mileage but which would create a small carbon footprint and which fuel is the better way to go?

I like them both for their potential ability to be modded to reduce fossil fuel use.

- The Camry will undoubtedly have an aftermarket plug-in pack option available in the near future, a la CalCars Plug-in Prius. Though this mod will be mighty expensive.

- The Jetta could be potentially run on renewably sourced biodiesel, or a combination of bio-d + regular diesel.

I'm partial to the electric drive in the Toyota (I enjoy the added dimension/options it gives to efficient driving).

Having recently had success with blocking up the radiator in my diesel cee'd (3L/100k at 80 to 100kph!), i would go with the diesel jetta.

ollie

As I don't feel comfortable with doing EOC, I'd prefer having an hybrid which has been conceived to stop&start the ICE when unneeded/needed.

It will depend also on your own routes. If you do a lot of stop&start then the hybrid may be the best.

From the third document cited in the thread "http://ecomodder.com/forum/showthrea...ions-5083.html", the CO2 numbers are the following :

• 1 liter petrol = 2.32 kg CO2
• 1 liter diesel = 2.54 kg CO2

When a prius consumes 4.3l/100 (55mpg) then a diesel has to consume only 3.9l/100 (60mpg) to not generate more CO2.
Diesel also generate particles, but these are short time; ie when not generated anymore, these disappear rather quickly : in London after a few months of city toll a lot of child had their asthma to regress.
At the other side, if a gasoline isn't well maintained it will generate CO which is rapidly converted to CO2, which takes tens of years to disappear.

We should change our car in 1-2 years. When we'll have chosen the short list, we'll certainly rent these cars to see which one we are more comfortable with. Your car must fit your needs first.

Denis.

Neut, sorry to steal your thread
 

ollie, this is impressive numbers. Could you show us your gaslog ?
I think it is important that newcomers can see as much gaslog from others as possible, so they can see that ecodriving and ecomodding do work. I'm also curious to see how others are evolving so I can compare myself with others.

I have just seen your introduction : http://ecomodder.com/forum/showthrea...land-2562.html
Can you show us your grill block ?
Do you think your wind deflector for tire improved your mpg ?

Thanks in advance,

Denis.

I would base the decision on specific driving needs. Lots of city / stop-n-go driving? Hybrid for sure. Lots of highway? Diesel with aeromods.

I currently drive a 1985 1.6na VW. And even if I drive the $#!+ out of it I get 47mpg. If I practice some good driving habits ( and mostly highway) I can easily get 50+. The most efficient my car can get is 265g/kwh. The tdi's best fuel efficiency is 200g/kwh so with all things being equal the the tdi's could get 66... without even trying.
But on the other hand you should consider maintenance, if your trying to save money tdi's can be very expensive to maintain. A 600 dollar timing belt change every 60k isn't unheard of.... and with interference engines the scheduled maintenance is manditory.

I'm partial to diesels but still...

New VW Jetta Diesel Tops Prius in Fuel-Economy Marathon Test

The Prius is still the best in the city though. I've never driven a prius, or any other hybrid for that matter, but I'm pretty sure a TDI is more fun to drive. Heck, a TDI is more fun to drive than any other gasser daily driver I've ever driven. The Camry and the TDI should have the same consumption in the city, but the TDI will definitely dominate on the highway.

my 2¢

Some data: on our CleanMPG cross-country drive back in March, we saw these kinds of numbers:

2007 Honda Civic iCDTi Diesel .... 60.43 mpg / 3.89 L/100km
2005 Honda Civic Hybrid (gen1) . 59.29 mpg / 3.97 L/100km
2007 Toyota Prius Hybrid .......... 56.50 mpg / 4.16 L/100km
2008 Honda Civic Hybrid (gen2) . 56.04 mpg / 4.2 L/100km

That was all highway driving, New York through Chicago to San Francisco. Note that the Civic iCDTi has a big 2.2L diesel. The smaller TDI engine would likely do better. The Prius has proven its worth in city driving many times.

So Neut, what type of driving do you do most - city or hwy?