Recommend Me a Car

[Dead Eye]

There seems to be a lot of hate for Diesel engines but I don't find that overly surprising since we are on a bike forum after all.

In case its any help, here's my opinions;

If you go for a youngish car, then sure Turbo Diesels are pretty good, but be sure to look at 2 litre engines or larger. Some of the smaller 1.6 TD's tend to produce almost as much power as their 2.0 counterparts - consequence is worse fuel economy (the Peugeot 2L HDi is much better than the 1.6). The only real exception is for smaller cars with smaller power where the smaller TD's do well (can we see the trend here...)

For older Diesels, I'd be tempted to look at some of the NA stuff providing it has the power - Turbo's can be an absolute pain in the butt and are often expensive to repair and replace.

In the grand scheme of things, most Diesel engines will be quite dull until you get decent power (120+ hp) - you then get a decent amount of torque which can be quite fun I agree with the other sentiments though, that Diesel engines must be allowed to get to a proper working temperature reasonable often - if commuting throughout the week in short distances or start / stop traffic I'd suggest a good weekend drive out to give it a good clean.


That all said, there's a lot of good small, economical petrol engines these days - think VW Bluemotion stuff

I had a 306 1.9 Diesel (NA) which was gutless but a really nice drive - my dad had a 406 2L HDi which was a fantastic car and engine and easily returned 55 MPG.