Petrol or Diesel for me?

[T84]

Hi all,

I was > < this close to deciding on getting an Accord 2.2 CTDI but after reading the horror stories I'm starting to have second thoughts!

I do about 10,000 a year, but at my budget (£7K) Diesels aren't really any more expensive than Petrols to buy, and they would give me a lower monthly fuel bill, which is more important than purchase price IMO.

But, the thought of a £1000 garage bill popping up randomly scares the complete bejeesus out of me, should it?

I thought I was playing it safe by going for a Honda Diesel, but it appears not! (Lots of clutch problems, it seems!)

[XitUp]

lpg

[pilchardthecat]

Cheese.


Sorry, petril.

[T84]

Curse you Cheeseoid!

[V88Dicky]

TBH, I don't think your 10k miles a year is enough to warrant buying a diesel over a petrol.

Just buy a petrol and enjoy the refinement and not having to wear plastic gloves when you fill up


Can we turn this into a 'what car for £7k' thread now?

[anonymous-user]

petrol I would say

[T84]

V88Dicky said:

TBH, I don't think your 10k miles a year is enough to warrant buying a diesel over a petrol.

Just buy a petrol and enjoy the refinement and not having to wear plastic gloves when you fill up


Can we turn this into a 'what car for £7k' thread now?

I've already had a 'what car for £7k thread' I'm afraid! In fact, I've had quite a few! :-O

I was up for the Mondeo ST220 until I realised that that too had a DMF...

[2 Wycked]

I do close to 30k a year and I still tend to buy petrol powered cars. I had a Vento TDI for four months and, whilst averaging 60mpg was nice, I wasn't fond of the engine's characteristics.

On the other hand I also know people that don't do many miles at all but still buy a diesel because they prefer how they drive, nothing to do with fuel economy.

Test drive some of each and make your decision based on whichever car is your favourite.

[T84]

Gah, I just want something interesting that's not going to throw up MASSIVE bills out of the blue!

[LuS1fer]

Sorry, did you say an Accord diesel was interesting as we may be on different wavelengths. I have a 2.0 Mk IV Mondeo which does 29-32mpg but probably isn't "interesting".

[T84]

Doh, no I didn't mean that, I decided to look for a Diesel because spending less on fuel a month appealed to me, and after reading some of the Diesel horror stories I'm back at looking at petrols again, and the petrol cars that I most wanted (ST220 / 330Ci) have reliability problems of their own.

Argh.

[SWH]

At 25K miles per year I went for a diesel, pretty sure at 10K miles you'd be better off with petrol - I'll resist cracking out 'the' spreadsheet though!

I budgeted for a nasty repair bill at some stage, well it is a Laguna so maybe two nasty repair bills.... and with high 40s to the gallon, the devil's fuel option still wins.

[halo34]

I missed the what car thread so not sure what you are looking for.

If you want to keep monthly bills down then diesel is a way to go. The petrol VS D debate always ends up in a mess on here however.

Alot of people focus on the overall cost however if your purchase price is set then its a case of working out what weekly budget you want to bear.

Diesels all have scare stories and no-one can re-assure you it wont happen. Having said that most petrol cars throw up some interesting bills from time to time.

On 10,000 miles (and as a diesel user) I would be tempted to say get yourself a nice petrol barge with a big capacity low stress engine.
LPG it if you want to lower the weekly costs!

[davidjpowell]

Pretty sure any car can throw up big bills. Had very few diesel related bills.

Last one was a injector refurb, at 130,000 miles and I suspect would have cost the same as a Petrol.

[halo34]

davidjpowell said:

Pretty sure any car can throw up big bills. Had very few diesel related bills.

Last one was a injector refurb, at 130,000 miles and I suspect would have cost the same as a Petrol.

Funnily enough if I look back on 10 yrs diesel ownership now across various cars the only diesel related problem I had was injectors on the last Volvo, which the warranty took care of.

List of diesels in last 8/9 yrs

Pug 306 HDI
MK4 Golf GT TDI
Seat Leon FR TDI
BMW 330d M Sport
Fabia VRS
Volvo 850 tdi
Volvo V70 tdi (twice)

None had turbo failure, 1 had injector probs (which I think was present all the time) - otherwise all bills have been wear/tear.

Edited by halo34 on Wednesday 27th October 15:15

[V88Dicky]

T84 said:

V88Dicky said:

TBH, I don't think your 10k miles a year is enough to warrant buying a diesel over a petrol.

Just buy a petrol and enjoy the refinement and not having to wear plastic gloves when you fill up


Can we turn this into a 'what car for £7k' thread now?

I've already had a 'what car for £7k thread' I'm afraid! In fact, I've had quite a few! :-O

I was up for the Mondeo ST220 until I realised that that too had a DMF...

[T84]

halo34 said:

I missed the what car thread so not sure what you are looking for.

I don't really know myself! 75% of my driving is commuting to work along motorways/dual carriageways, the other 5% would be very long distance trips and 20% is trips to the shops, etc.

Any chance I get to have a bit of a blast along the way is great as well. So I want a car that's good on the motorway and not stressed, I'm driving a 1.8 Focus at the moment and it does 3,000 revs at 70mph and the cabin noise is horrendous!

The ST220 suited me really well but I'm a bit worried about the MPG, I averaged 31 MPG over the last 7,000 miles in my 2000 Focus.

[T84]

V88Dicky said:

T84 said:

V88Dicky said:

TBH, I don't think your 10k miles a year is enough to warrant buying a diesel over a petrol.

Just buy a petrol and enjoy the refinement and not having to wear plastic gloves when you fill up


Can we turn this into a 'what car for £7k' thread now?

I've already had a 'what car for £7k thread' I'm afraid! In fact, I've had quite a few! :-O

I was up for the Mondeo ST220 until I realised that that too had a DMF...

It does, there's been a couple of threads where people have had £1,000+ bills when the DMF mashed itself, on Mondeos it can take the starter out as well, which is more £££.

[V88Dicky]

T84 said:

V88Dicky said:

T84 said:

V88Dicky said:

TBH, I don't think your 10k miles a year is enough to warrant buying a diesel over a petrol.

Just buy a petrol and enjoy the refinement and not having to wear plastic gloves when you fill up


Can we turn this into a 'what car for £7k' thread now?

I've already had a 'what car for £7k thread' I'm afraid! In fact, I've had quite a few! :-O

I was up for the Mondeo ST220 until I realised that that too had a DMF...

It does, there's been a couple of threads where people have had £1,000+ bills when the DMF mashed itself, on Mondeos it can take the starter out as well, which is more £££.

Sorry I've just clicked. Dual Mass Flywheel yeah?

Early ones are problematic iirc, newer ones not so much.

[T84]

Cool, thanks for that