Forum help with choosing next car please.

[Viral_Jim]

What about a late mondeo Mk3 3.0v6 (think they could be had up till about 2006/7).

You could probably have the very best there is for significantly less than half your budget.

I had an early 2.0TDDI, pretty much bulletproof for the 60k (60 to 120k) that I had it for and the v6 is a simple soul. Not the most economical engine in the world but meets most of your criteria I would think. 2.0 petrols could also be usable. Either the hatch or the estate would comfortably accommodate the mut. 

2.0 ecoboost Mk4 might also work, but I have no experience of them

[tunnie]

 

Diesel cars have just become vey anti social. I expect them to be taxed into oblivion in the very near future.

Historically the government don't alter VED tax in a significant way, they just introduce new schemes. March 2006 came in with £500 band for large petrols with high Co2, cheap for diesels.

Now in 2017, it's all change and Co2 is now not an issue, it's purchase price which adds extra levy. All cars registered previously are unaffected, so it's the same all again.

Diesels perhaps not as social, but their tax rate won't change to crazy rates, just go up with around inflation charges. Neither will will ones, the new scheme won't change in any big way for a good few years.

Also given that most cars 2005ish to present, a vast majority are diesel, no significant bans will come in near future. Vans/Trucks ect won't be able to deliver anything 

[tunnie]

I'd also add the I'm not convinced on new petrols either, they have gone for small 1.4's in things like the Mondeo, or even 1.0's with a Turbo. Small, highly strung petrol engines, that need spanking rev wise all the time to get anywhere Vs a slow lazy diesel?

[Viral_Jim]

I have to say I'd agree tunnie.

I suspect the new highly strung petrols will suffer in the same way that the circa 2005 dpf diesels did. First of a new generation and all that.

Nothing will happen to diesels until the world (and Europe particularly) works out how you farm, produce and (most significantly) transport everything we use day to day without it.

Unlike cars, there's currently no viable alternative out there for diesel HGV's. My guess, you've got a good 15-20yrs of diesel before it even starts to fade. And you can forget big retrospective changes to VED, they're a desperately unpopular move and would be unprecedented.

[Varche]

You may be right about change being slow to come.

Mrs V makes a good point about how can diesel owners drive around knowing they are contributing to ill health? She says cancer. You only need the health lobby to get on the bandwagen to raise money for more hospitals and staff. Who would have thought cigs would have ended up the price they are - forty years ago?

You only need some more battery breakthroughs and government backed scrappage of diesel for a new electric car scheme and tax increases.  Could happen .


Dont know how that would work out in Spain as just about every car is a diesel . Not only that but you dont see any old cars. It is like they swapped mules for a new car.

[tunnie]

You may be right about change being slow to come.

Mrs V makes a good point about how can diesel owners drive around knowing they are contributing to ill health? She says cancer. You only need the health lobby to get on the bandwagen to raise money for more hospitals and staff. Who would have thought cigs would have ended up the price they are - forty years ago?

You only need some more battery breakthroughs and government backed scrappage of diesel for a new electric car scheme and tax increases.  Could happen .


Dont know how that would work out in Spain as just about every car is a diesel . Not only that but you dont see any old cars. It is like they swapped mules for a new car.

Does she tell the bus driver that? 

Or the parcel delivery man, or the driver of the Tesco delivery truck? 

Given I often see 55 seater coaches and busses empty, yet still drive about with their massive diesel engines. I'm not too fussed what comes out of the pipe of my diesel 

I bet there will be scrappage schemes for old electric cars and hybrids, get rid of the batteries! What happens when they fail/leak?

[Kevin Wood]

Indeed, an alternative to diesel for haulage and public transport is a way off yet, but these larger more expensive vehicles can be fitted with better and more expensive emission controls than the current generation of cars and I would imagine there is probably less incentive for their manufacturers to lie about their true emissions levels and / or add cheats to avoid using the systems for performance or economy reasons. Their usage regime of generally running all day is also cleaner than the stop-start nature of private car use.

Diesel private cars, on the other hand, are entirely avoidable. I suspect they will end up increasingly being banned from city centres. Congestion charging systems can easily look up the fuel type from the reg. number and apply fines or punitive levels of charging for tractors on days when air quality is poor, at peak hours, or all the time. They'll probably become the preserve of rural motorists eventually.

The other possibility I can see is that fuel duty is reduced for public transport and haulage diesel and hiked for private cars, but the logistics behind providing two separate supplies of fuel are not going to be trivial.

[Varche]

Agreed Kevin.

We, as nations, have sleep walked into the current situation helped by the manufacturers fiddled emmissions data.

Here is an article where diesels will be banned from 4 city centres by 2025. It includes Madrid. It doesn't take a genius to realise that other cities will jump on the bandwagon in a desperate bid to meet pollution reduction targets.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/dec/02/four-of-worlds-biggest-cities-to-ban-diesel-cars-from-their-centres

It isn't a personal comment about diesels and their drivers. On a personal note I find our diesel 4x4 superb in certain conditions. The torque for Towing and accelerating in gear for example.     

[Viral_Jim]

I think you're right about city centres, as they're an easy target to implement, justify and fund. There's also no need to affect buses etc as they can all be distinguished based on number plate. I suspect you'll see some cities going for bans (probably the wealthier ones) and others going for a congestion charge type scheme as a money maker under the guise of helping the environment.

[Doctor Gollum]

Marine diesel is a two tier system and has been for some time. No issues there

[TheBoy]

Spain will have completely different taxation rules Mr Tunnie.  And in so many European cities, they are getting nearer and nearer to banning soot chuckers, esp given VW's antics of lying and claiming their engines were just dirty, rather than the truth.


Something has to happen to keep the worse cars out of cities.  And governments have to find a way to implement it.  I think by now everybody realises that diesel cars in cities has to be drastically reduced.

That can be achieved by either taxation and/or outright city bans.

Taxation on fuel isn't that difficult - we already have red diesel for agricultural purposes.  Wouldn't be that difficult to have another layer of taxation on the fuel.  Taxation on Excise Duty is even easier, but less effective. Banning in Londonium would be easy as the infrastructure already exists, but expensive to implement elsewhere.

[aaronjb]

We don't need to reduce the number of diesel cars in cities.

We just need to reduce the number of people in cities.

[Kevin Wood]

We don't need to reduce the number of diesel cars in cities.

We just need to reduce the number of people in cities.

FTFY. Over to TheBoy to decide which ones are up against the wall first.

[TheBoy]

We don't need to reduce the number of diesel cars in cities.

We just need to reduce the number of people in cities.

FTFY. Over to RumpelStiltSkin to decide which ones are up against the wall first.

Its a long list. Lets start by thinning out tree huggers and do-gooders. Opti's avatar can go up first.