New MOT regs

fields5069

I think the diesel I'm picking up on Saturday has a little elf pissing on the exhaust fumes to make them cleaner. So I'm OK.

randella

Sporky said:

randella said:

@Sporky - don't rock the boat too hard fella, it's this camp that's just helped me snag a nine-month-old Peugeot 308 GT Line 2.0 BlueHDi with 8,000 miles on it from a main dealer. 

For a shade over half its original list price.

Sorry!

It just irks me when people come up with these insane, unjustifiable claims just so they can earn smug-points on the inferweb, while they're still burning a slightly different sort of dinosaur-gravy in their cars and pretending nothing bad comes out of their exhausts.

Utter hypocrisy.

Yep, I'm with you.  Anyway, I can pretty much guarantee that I'm now polluting the globe slightly less than the day before yesterday when I was fouling up the dual carriageways of Cheshire with an 11-year-old Ford Duratec petrol unit wearing 100,000 pretty unsympathetic miles.

I've now got a DAB radio too so we all win.

VimFuego

fields5069 said:

I think the diesel I'm picking up on Saturday has a little elf pissing on the exhaust fumes to make them cleaner. So I'm OK.

it was the elves that caused climate change in the 1st place. They pinned it on fossil fuels cos they have really good PR and marketing people.
Elves are scum and should be wiped out.

fields5069

VimFuego said:

fields5069 said:

I think the diesel I'm picking up on Saturday has a little elf pissing on the exhaust fumes to make them cleaner. So I'm OK.

it was the elves that caused climate change in the 1st place. They pinned it on fossil fuels cos they have really good PR and marketing people.
Elves are scum and should be wiped out.

So much word.

m_c

The big emission thing would be if fines were brought in for anybody found to of tampered with a vehicles emission system, along with far more spot checks.

Even with the additional testable items, any car/van driver will only have to pay to refit a cat/DPF with no penalty for running without one.
HGV/PSV operators face the prospect of fines on top of having to pay any duty they've saved by running at the cleaner emission limits.

Bucket

Sporky said:

Bucket said:

The majority of diesels (even Sporky can't argue with this) are orders of magnitude worse than petrols in terms of particulate emissions and harmful greenhouse gases other than CO2.

Are you really claiming that diesels are at least 100/1,000/10,000 times more polluting? 

If so then you're definitely in the hysterical camp. Or do you not mean "orders of magnitude" in the defined sense?

Not in the defined sense I guess - I remember reading somewhere that they're about five times worse than the equivalent petrol, which is still bad. Since I live in London and it's already polluted due to soot and smoke from diesel-powered vans, lorries, buses and taxis, I'd feel pretty bad about buying a diesel car, unless I really did "need" one.

Have now rephrased my original post though.

AncientOwl

Whitecat said:

ICBM said:

Whitecat said:

It's all cars (ie, any cars that have to have an MOT), and the new rules mean that some serious faults must be repaired before the vehicle can legally be driven away, even if you've got time left on your "existing" MOT.

I can't see any reason why this should currently be legal, so good. If a car is dangerous then it shouldn't be on the road.

Legionreturns said:

Not so great for the people that bought diesels when the government loved them mind. 

If they're properly maintained then it shouldn't be a problem.

(But you know I'm a diesel-hater anyway .)

I agree completely. There used to be a loophole though where if you car failed the new MOT there was no obligation to have it fixed until the last second before that one expired. So dangerously poorly-maintained cars could be on the road for another month...

AncientOwl

all cars past and present once failing an mot are NOT allowed to be driven except to and from the test station even if it had remaining days until old mot expires the new refusal/fail issued is on the mot dvsa database and so the car ISNT road worthy. it’s been the same way for years, new regs on dpf are failure for visual smoke (tampering/removal) has been a failure for a while. cars over 40 years old no longer need an mot, but hefty fines if not kept roadworthy

p90fool

Wolfetone said:

lonestar said:

I love my Passat sport TDI. I’d do my damnedest not to look at a Petrol car again tbh. 

I absolutely love my diesel. I'm also not convinced that they're as dirty as people claim. 

Even brand new diesels stink and make me sneeze when I'm following them on my motorbike. 
They're certainly cleaner than they were a few decades ago, but I'm never in doubt as to which type of car I'm following. 

Sporky

Bucket said:

Not in the defined sense I guess - I remember reading somewhere that they're about five times worse than the equivalent petrol, which is still bad. Since I live in London and it's already polluted due to soot and smoke from diesel-powered vans, lorries, buses and taxis, I'd feel pretty bad about buying a diesel car, unless I really did "need" one.

Gah.

Sorry; I over-reacted. Shitty couple of weeks.

In general I agree that city centres aren't the place for diesels. They're probably not the place for internal combustion at all, but let's ease into that.

I think what irks me is that there wasn't an equivalent petrol when I bought my car last year, and I do about 14,000 miles a year, naff-all of it in town or city centres, but I still get tarred with this brush of being an inconsiderate baby-murderer. And most of the anti-diesel stuff is either about quite old vehicles or is just made-up numbers, neither of which helps us have a balanced "fleet".

VimFuego

I think that's what also grates with me, round here diesels are the sensible choice, due to the nature of the roads and the distances between places. But we all get tarred with the same brush, I find it difficult to believe that with all the technology available they couldn't devise a more sophisticated system that takes account of where people are driving, and not just what they are driving. 

randella

Sporky said:

Bucket said:

Not in the defined sense I guess - I remember reading somewhere that they're about five times worse than the equivalent petrol, which is still bad. Since I live in London and it's already polluted due to soot and smoke from diesel-powered vans, lorries, buses and taxis, I'd feel pretty bad about buying a diesel car, unless I really did "need" one.

Gah.

Sorry; I over-reacted. Shitty couple of weeks.

In general I agree that city centres aren't the place for diesels. They're probably not the place for internal combustion at all, but let's ease into that.

I think what irks me is that there wasn't an equivalent petrol when I bought my car last year, and I do about 14,000 miles a year, naff-all of it in town or city centres, but I still get tarred with this brush of being an inconsiderate baby-murderer. And most of the anti-diesel stuff is either about quite old vehicles or is just made-up numbers, neither of which helps us have a balanced "fleet".

While you may feel you overreacted, and that was a very dignified apology by the way, the point still stands. If I switched my Euro6 diesel for a petrol tomorrow, I’d not be helping one jot. 

What we *all* need to do is get off the dino juice altogether. The pace of change to more sustainable power just isn’t quick enough though.

I’m hoping it’ll pick up and, if I get eight years out of this Pug, I’ll be looking into something else altogether. 

Garthy

Sporky said:

Wolfetone said:

lonestar said:

I love my Passat sport TDI. I’d do my damnedest not to look at a Petrol car again tbh. 

I absolutely love my diesel. I'm also not convinced that they're as dirty as people claim. 

They aren't, but the hysterical hand-wringing brigade has successfully convinced too many people that they are, while ignoring that petrol engines and power stations don't just output butterfly farts and happiness. They'll be all outraged when the government turns on petrol next.

My next car will probably be petrol, but to compensate it'll probably be at least a V6 with a rotting cabbage hanging off the back bumper.

What do you mean, turn on petrol next? They turned on petrol in the 1990s and really turned the screws ten years ago.

Bucket

Sporky said:

Bucket said:

Not in the defined sense I guess - I remember reading somewhere that they're about five times worse than the equivalent petrol, which is still bad. Since I live in London and it's already polluted due to soot and smoke from diesel-powered vans, lorries, buses and taxis, I'd feel pretty bad about buying a diesel car, unless I really did "need" one.

Gah.

Sorry; I over-reacted. Shitty couple of weeks.

In general I agree that city centres aren't the place for diesels. They're probably not the place for internal combustion at all, but let's ease into that.

I think what irks me is that there wasn't an equivalent petrol when I bought my car last year, and I do about 14,000 miles a year, naff-all of it in town or city centres, but I still get tarred with this brush of being an inconsiderate baby-murderer. And most of the anti-diesel stuff is either about quite old vehicles or is just made-up numbers, neither of which helps us have a balanced "fleet".

Not to worry - I made an error in my wording and you pulled me up on it, as you should have.

As I said, I can see the legitimate reasons for owning a diesel although I don't think it's for me. I do around 10,000 miles a year myself, which is quite a lot but given that I live in London, relatively centrally in fact, quite a significant amount of my driving is either within London for journeys I can't do on public transport (ie with a lot of gear), or going through London on my way out of town. So I probably do enough miles in total to justify a diesel, but too much of it is in town for me to be comfortable with the idea.

ICBM

I've said this before I know, but in my opinion the big problem with the market for diesel and petrol cars is that diesel is far too cheap per litre compared to petrol. If both fuels were simply priced equivalently for their energy content, it would remove a lot of the idea that diesel is cheaper to run. It *still* would be for drivers who do large mileages - where the true slightly better efficiency of diesel is its advantage - but would not be for city drivers where diesel is no more efficient than petrol and can be worse.

To level the playing field relative to energy use and carbon emissions, diesel should be 16% more expensive than petrol per litre simply because it contains 16% more carbon per litre - currently it's around the same price or sometimes even cheaper. Whether you do it by raising the price of diesel or cutting the price of petrol, or both, is open to debate - but it would avoid the need to twist the VED rates again or distort the market in any other way.

After that the question would be how to phase out both of them in favour of something even less pollutive, but it would still be a simple and effective start.

crunchman

VimFuego said:

I think that's what also grates with me, round here diesels are the sensible choice, due to the nature of the roads and the distances between places. But we all get tarred with the same brush, I find it difficult to believe that with all the technology available they couldn't devise a more sophisticated system that takes account of where people are driving, and not just what they are driving. 

If you read the latest transport policy for London from Sadiq Khan, they are openly talking about exploring road pricing, with different charges for different types of vehicles.

p90fool said:

Wolfetone said:

lonestar said:

I love my Passat sport TDI. I’d do my damnedest not to look at a Petrol car again tbh. 

I absolutely love my diesel. I'm also not convinced that they're as dirty as people claim. 

Even brand new diesels stink and make me sneeze when I'm following them on my motorbike. 
They're certainly cleaner than they were a few decades ago, but I'm never in doubt as to which type of car I'm following. 

I'd agree with this.  The air on my cycle ride to work stinks.

What's really worrying is the number of 67 plate diesels I still see, bearing in mind that I'm in London.  People driving in London really shouldn't be buying new diesels.

I don't know whether this token new tax for Euro 6 diesels that don't actually meet Euro 6 will help.  At least it will force the salesman to point out that it doesn't meet the limit.  That should be an annual thing, not just a one off when you buy it.  Then it would significantly reduce sales of cars that don't meet the limit.

Bucket said: 

As I said, I can see the legitimate reasons for owning a diesel although I don't think it's for me. I do around 10,000 miles a year myself, which is quite a lot but given that I live in London, relatively centrally in fact, quite a significant amount of my driving is either within London for journeys I can't do on public transport (ie with a lot of gear), or going through London on my way out of town. So I probably do enough miles in total to justify a diesel, but too much of it is in town for me to be comfortable with the idea.

At 10,000 miles per year, you probably wouldn't save any money over a petrol.  If most of your driving is in London, then you run the risk of clogging up the DPF, which would actually make it a lot more expensive than petrol.