Jeremy Hillary Boob Ph.D Something makes me think when I look over the stats for today that show me what search terms people used when leaving the site this one is going to be high on the list.
I'm always surprised when people don;t know pop culture references like that.... Our dealer holds a halloween party each year and owners are encouraged to dress up their cars - my lic plate on my electric blue '03 JCW was "BluMeni" which most people thought meant the Blue Man group..... One halloween I dressed it up as it's namesake, only one person recognized it even with the plate on it. BTW, should we tell them where it comes from, or leave them in suspense?
Nope, wouldn't own a oil burning mini. If I were to get into a oil burner, it would be a sedan, and either a VW Jetta TDI Cup Edition or a BMW 335d.
Heck Dave let them figure it out. I think maybe you & I are old enough to remember while other's will have to look it up.
Up until gas prices hit $4.00 and diesel trucks got big a couple years ago, diesel was usually less than mid-grade and sometimes even less than regular. I drove a 1982 Chevy Chevette diesel with a 5-speed and regularly got 38-40 mpg. That was a car designed 30 years ago doing that. The newer diesels can be tweaked to give great gains. At work we had two Chevy diesel pickups that were identical. Both 4x4 dura max 3500's. we lifted one and put 35" mud tires on it. You would have thought that would have killed the mileage and it did at first, but the nice thing is with diesel, most of the same mods and computer programs that boost power increase mileage. We did a slight program change to the engine, and on a long haul pulling identical trailers (same weight, equip, etc) the lifted one did much better. Plus most Diesel engines are running strong well into the 200K mileage range, at least the newer designed ones.
Sparke.....back in the late 70's/early 80's you could buy a small import that did the same mileage easily in gasoline, and had way better performance than that dismal Chevette. Same with my diesel Rabbit pickup trucks, they were supposed to do up to 50 mpg but mine never did, more like 35....which my later 5 speed gas version of the same truck did just as well. As to the longevity issue, there are plenty of MINIs running around with well over 200K on them too....we have several in our KC club, one of which still has it's original CVT! I'm just not seeing the advantages, myself......not in current pricing and gasoline vs diesel price fuel conditions.....add in the aforementioned smoke and stink and they'll have a difficult time convincing many people.....IMHO of course. The truck is a completely different situation, when you're towing very heavy loads like that.
The big incentive to run a diesel in Yurp is the fuel price - I pay $8.60 for a US gallon of diesel. Sure, it may be 'only' $8.00 for a gallon of petrol/gas, but then a diesel vehicle will use maybe only 2/3rds as much fuel. Sure a Cooper S would probably be a nicer motor, but then I would be getting maybe 25 mpgUS, whereas I'm actually getting 39mpg from the SD - by comparison, I got exactly 32mpg over 50,000 miles in a justa Cooper. That means fuel cost savings of several thousand dollars over my ownership. The nice benefit of a big diesel engine is that you can get economy car fuel economy when you don't drive it hard but get high performance when you do. With a petrol/gas engine you can make that choice only once, when you sign the order form. I don't suggest diesels are 'better', whatever that means, but they do suit some people better.