[Vwdiesel] WSJ article on Diesel

[LBaird119 at aol.com]

In a message dated 5/10/2006 11:41:10 PM Pacific Standard Time, 
vbriggs at stny.rr.com writes:

> I for the life of me can't understand why they are getting such crappy 
> mileage with the new diesel cars, to include the jeep liberty. They 
> should be able to get at least 35 to 40 mpg of diesel with the new 
> technology. The jeep liberty is reported to get 22 to 25 mpg with the 
> diesel, My old cherokee got 25 on the highway, big deal. I bought a 
> 1981 pontiac gran prix that had a 350 diesel in it in 1982. {remember 
> the bad attempt by GM with that converted 350} Anyways, I got around 33 
> mpg with that POS for the first 3 years I had it, then it started 
> failing like all the other junk 350 diesels did, even the boat MB 300D 
> gets better mileage than what these new diesels are getting.

  Dad had a '79 pickup with the "almost diesel" in it.  Actually it did 
quite well.  It had a considerably lower gear ratio than most they put 
out (it had 3.43 I think and many had 2.70) and made about 21mpg 
where thej others made 25 to 27mpg.  It had sufficient power though 
where the others didn't.  Pump died but when sold at 70k + the only 
thing wrong was a starting issue it'd had ever since the pump repair.
Proper oil and full coolant does a LOT to keeping those things going.
   Bad mileage can probably be attributed to two things.  Weight and 
gearing.  Cars keep getting heavier so most of the diesels out ther 
now, weigh about what a late 70's/early 80's car weighed when mostly 
loaded!  Secondly I don't understand why car manufacturer's engineers 
don't understand that a diesel needs to be cruising down the highway 
somewhere near torque peak.  Even the TDi's are almost 2200 (iirc) @
60mph.  1900 is peak torque so it's off even more at higher speeds.
Also many manufacturers don't fully utilize the turbo.  They still seem 
to think it's for performance or something.  They're much better than 
before but many are still lagging.  ;-)
  When Audi came out with the '84 model/body style, I remember the 
turbos were SO much better than the  previous (gassers here).  The old 
ones had about 7:1 CR.  When pulling into traffic you had to floor it, 
almost get rear-ended and then wham!  Back in your seat you went.  Then
you were speeding.  None of it was impressive.  The newer ones were 
smooth, had compression and were driveable.  Still nothing huge but 
certainly useful.
  In a lot of respects things haven't changed much.  I remember an 
article on diesel pickups.  The downpipe is crimped at the factory, 
to restrict flow!  Just cut back the fueling a little and use a bigger 
pipe!  Ugh!
     Loren


 If the car 
> 
> manufactures would only take the hint from the UK and Germany, we could 
> have some really great cars {very, very loosely said}
>    On a side note, I had the chemist at work test that diesel secret 
> stuff , largely paint thinner with coloring and some minor extraneous 
> chemicals that are supposed to make it harder to tell what it is, at 
> least thats what the chemist said. The MSDS for the stuff is accurate.
> On May 9, 2006, at 10:01 AM, Dan Sloan wrote:
> 
>