What do you drive?

[knoppy1987]

Instead of the swamping headlines at the moment, I thought I'd pop by as I have just added to my collection of beauties. This time a dark blue 1999 156 2.5 V6 with Full Koni Adjustable Shocks (saves me a job). Even better, the engine bay has already been detailed and the chrome inlet pipes on the engine are gleaming. I was pleasantly surprised with the incredible handling as well especially with the heavy lump up top. 

[knoppy1987]

There are the other two drying off. 

[chrisp65]

At the moment all EV cars do is push the pollution away from the end user.

Currently one third of UK electricity is generated using coal. 

 

bahhh, that was supposed to include a quote from Darren

Edited September 26, 2015 by chrisp65

[MakemineVanilla]

Yeah carbon dioxide kills the planet, everything that comes out of a diesel's exhaust pipe kills everything living on the planet.

We need to drive adoption of EV or hybrids if range is a concern. And short journeys should be made using walking or cycling.

Also, a lot more pressure should be put on companies to provide and encourage home working. Way too many people drive a long way to go and sit at a computer.

I am interested in seeing whether government policy incentivised the diesel engine by its tax and fuel-price policy and did the climate lobby's propaganda which made CO2 the planet-killer, over-simplify the problem in the public's minds.

It has to be said that Clarkson always said that diesel engine emissions were far more toxic than petrol engines.    

[chrisp65]

Yeah carbon dioxide kills the planet, everything that comes out of a diesel's exhaust pipe kills everything living on the planet.

We need to drive adoption of EV or hybrids if range is a concern. And short journeys should be made using walking or cycling.

Also, a lot more pressure should be put on companies to provide and encourage home working. Way too many people drive a long way to go and sit at a computer.

The company I work for has a Client we've just bought stand alone laptops for as a 'gift'.

They are a big company with some odd security rules and all their I.T. is firewalled up to the point of being unusable in everyday life. As such they can't get on the interweb and can't use skype or 'join.me' or widex or any one of the hundreds of other sharing platforms.

Its cheaper for us to get them booked in to a local hotel with stripped down laptops for half a day every week, than for us to travel to them and talk through stuff. Two or three hours travel, then a two or three hour meeting, then two or three hours travelling back was nonsense. It's a 3 year contract, the laptops will have paid for themselves in about 2 months.

[darrenm]

At the moment all EV cars do is push the pollution away from the end user.

Currently one third of UK electricity is generated using coal. 

 

bahhh, that was supposed to include a quote from Darren

Yes but then at least you've got the option of making the power generation clean

[leviramsey]

Yeah carbon dioxide kills the planet, everything that comes out of a diesel's exhaust pipe kills everything living on the planet.

We need to drive adoption of EV or hybrids if range is a concern. And short journeys should be made using walking or cycling.

Also, a lot more pressure should be put on companies to provide and encourage home working. Way too many people drive a long way to go and sit at a computer.

I am interested in seeing whether government policy incentivised the diesel engine by its tax and fuel-price policy and did the climate lobby's propaganda which made CO2 the planet-killer, over-simplify the problem in the public's minds.

It has to be said that Clarkson always said that diesel engine emissions were far more toxic than petrol engines.    

I think it's abundantly obvious that European governments in general decided that they wanted:

* passenger-oriented rail

* reduced oil imports

Those two facts imply such an economic reliance on diesel trucks for moving goods that to tax diesel at levels comparable to gasoline would have dramatic effects on heavier varieties of industry (which is also something that European governments in general decided they wanted), with knock-on effects of encouraging diesel cars (which were reinforced by European marques generally being more diesel oriented than Asian and American marques, not an undesirable result either!). That this course meant far more diesel emissions, more smog, and health problems is a small price to pay.

North America largely chose an opposite course of action. The rails are largely for moving goods across the continent at 25 mph (500 miles/day net). Oil imports aren't considered a big issue, nor is the loss of heavier industry. Diesel is taxed at higher rates than gasoline: it's consistently 10-20% more expensive per gallon. Emissions standards are stricter. Less smog, less health problems, less working class employment, less ability to take a train.

Tradeoffs...

[darrenm]

Yeah carbon dioxide kills the planet, everything that comes out of a diesel's exhaust pipe kills everything living on the planet.

We need to drive adoption of EV or hybrids if range is a concern. And short journeys should be made using walking or cycling.

Also, a lot more pressure should be put on companies to provide and encourage home working. Way too many people drive a long way to go and sit at a computer.

 

The company I work for has a Client we've just bought stand alone laptops for as a 'gift'.

They are a big company with some odd security rules and all their I.T. is firewalled up to the point of being unusable in everyday life. As such they can't get on the interweb and can't use skype or 'join.me' or widex or any one of the hundreds of other sharing platforms.

Its cheaper for us to get them booked in to a local hotel with stripped down laptops for half a day every week, than for us to travel to them and talk through stuff. Two or three hours travel, then a two or three hour meeting, then two or three hours travelling back was nonsense. It's a 3 year contract, the laptops will have paid for themselves in about 2 months.

That's crazy. Even the company I work for (huge outsourcing conglomerate) can cope with toeing the line security and policy wise, while still providing a working VPN.

Everything takes 6 months to get past the IT and security changes panel of course.

[MakemineVanilla]

Further to today's Times, there is a letter from the Secretary of state for transport, stating that the UK has been at the forefront of introducing a real-world driving, emissions tests (RDE), but were blocked by Europe in favour of a weaker proposal supported by other member states.

Could it be that national governments were quite aware of the problems with current emission testing and they blocked any changes to favour their own car industries? 

[foreveryoung]

I personally think VW have failed to invest in the Ad-Blue systems for certain vehicles which has probably saved them millons. As previously said Adblue injected into exhaust systems reduces the amount of NOx in the emissions exiting the exhaust. So I think we can say any other vehicles which have this system i.e. Audi. Mercedes, BMW are not going to be involved in the drama. Legalisations on emmisions in certain countries have now made it impossible to build a powerful deisel engine without emiiting illegal quantites of NOx. It either needs to be fiddled, or controlled via other systems i.e Ad-Blue. An yes its basically pig piss.

[snowychap]

VW say 2.1m Audi vehicles also affected by the emissions thingie.

[MakemineVanilla]

Two quotes from the Independent:

Other reports suggested that VW was informed that the software was illegal as early as 2007. The Bild am Sonntag newspaper said that Bosch, the car component specialist which developed the software, had written to VW in that year warning that it should be used for test purposes only

 Yesterday, the Die Welt newspaper said that it had gained access to an internal German government paper which showed that Ms Merkel’s coalition planned to try to delay EU plans to introduce tough new vehicle emissions tests by at least three years. The EU aims to have the new tests enforced by the end of 2017, but Die Welt said the German government would aim to get their introduction postponed until 2021 and retain as many loopholes as possible. 

The link:  http://tinyurl.com/nnodn6p

[darrenm]

Ouch. /popcorn

[Genie]

Two quotes from the Independent:

Other reports suggested that VW was informed that the software was illegal as early as 2007. The Bild am Sonntag newspaper said that Bosch, the car component specialist which developed the software, had written to VW in that year warning that it should be used for test purposes only

 Yesterday, the Die Welt newspaper said that it had gained access to an internal German government paper which showed that Ms Merkel’s coalition planned to try to delay EU plans to introduce tough new vehicle emissions tests by at least three years. The EU aims to have the new tests enforced by the end of 2017, but Die Welt said the German government would aim to get their introduction postponed until 2021 and retain as many loopholes as possible.

The link:  http://tinyurl.com/nnodn6p

I think you need to be careful not to merge 2 separate issues.

The first is what is blowing up in the news currently. VW "allegedly" creating software and hardware deliberately to cheat the test result and give a reading significantly better than it should. A device which adjusts the emissions just in the test cycle and homologation process.

The latter is a side issue which is well know that many of the tests are not really that close to a real world drive cycle and work can be done to improve that correlation. Merkel wanting to delay a new industry test is not really related to the fact that VW seem to be trying to cheat the current one.

I suspect that if VW hadn't been caught out now they would be applying the same technology to a new test as they would the current one.

 

Edited September 28, 2015 by Genie

[BOF]

There are the other two drying off. 

Beauties   Becoming a real rare bird now especially over here.  Are either of them the 3 litre?

[knoppy1987]

BOF - the one on the left (Proteo Red) is a 3.0 Busso V6. Makes the hairs on your neck stand. You can make out the red Brembo calliper in the teledial which is usually the tell tale sign of a V6. However, some people do change the strut and put them on the Twin Sparks so it can be deceiving. I will follow up with some of the 156 when it is home. The one on the right is my daily driver and it is the best looking car that goes on the M25 between the M4 and Junction 9 Leatherhead everyday ;-) (unless there is a Brera about).

[BOF]

I came across a silver GTV on the motorway the other day.  Lovely to see and still in great nick.  I particularly think the 3 litre is going to be a very desireable classic, although they are of course all gorgeous

[Stevo985]

I came across a silver GTV on the motorway the other day

Bloody hell, you must have liked it!

[BOF]

I came across a silver GTV on the motorway the other day

Bloody hell, you must have liked it!

Quite the agile manouver too

[tonyh29]

BOF - the one on the left (Proteo Red) is a 3.0 Busso V6. Makes the hairs on your neck stand. You can make out the red Brembo calliper in the teledial which is usually the tell tale sign of a V6. However, some people do change the strut and put them on the Twin Sparks so it can be deceiving. I will follow up with some of the 156 when it is home. The one on the right is my daily driver and it is the best looking car that goes on the M25 between the M4 and Junction 9 Leatherhead everyday ;-) (unless there is a Brera about).

if they shut the M25 and that was the only car on it , it would still come second  in a good looking car contest