Talking to an Audi rep, and Diesels in the US

[Doug Yoder]

OK, dumb question time.

I've heard this part of the explanation before... but it begs the
question "what happens when you put high-sulfer diesel fuel in a
modern TDI engine that wants to drink low-sulfer fuel?"

If the answer is "it kills the engine in 25 miles", then we're back to
the chicken-and-egg scenario.  If the answer is "you get lower mileage
and maybe 10% shorter lifetime of engine components"... then maybe it
behooves the car manufacturers to start importing the new TDI engines,
just to get the ball rolling.

Maybe this is what Audi is considering?  (I've heard rumors that they
will be importing some of their TDIs... supported somewhat by Mr.
Duane's anecdote).  Or maybe some parts of the country (CA?) are
startign to get better diesel fuel.

-Doug

On 5/12/06, audiSean <audisean at gmail.com> wrote:
<snip>
> Auto manufacturers will not import the latest gen diesel engines to
> the US because we do not sell the correct fuel for the engines.
> Refineries will not produce the low sulfur fuel because there's no
> market for it. Who goes first?
>
> On 5/12/06, Andrew Duane <andrew at savaje.com> wrote:
<snip>
> > I've always been mad that Audi doesn't import it's diesels into the US.
> > I love my A6Q, but 20-22MPG just doesn't cut it. He indicated that there
> > are problems with diesel fuel specs in the US, which made it hard to make
> > most new TDIs work well. That seems to be getting fixed, and he indicated
> > that some new A6 and/or Q7 models with TDIs might be here soon.

<remainder snipped>

-- 
Doug Yoder

"Don't tell me the sky's the limit - there's footprints on the moon."