Labor Day Travel and Gas

[Joe VanCleave]

I bought my VW Jetti TDI back in '98, when gas was $1 per gallon. People thought I was nuts, driving a diesel car.

I guess I feel better about it now, in an odd sort of way. But I'd still rather be paying $.95 per gallon of diesel and have folks say I should've bought a gasser.

As for reliability, its been okay. Actually, my Toyota truck had worse problems than my VW. A leaky battery was the root cause for power steering leaks - common problem on VW's. Get a red-top gel-cel battery, you're good to go.

But the real problem with diesel cars here in the US is that the EPA mandates EGR systems. These recirculate exhaust gasses back into the intake manifold, which may not be a bad idea on a gasser. But for a high particulate exhaust like a diesel, all it does is clog up the intake system. Its very expensive to have your intake manifold disassembled and cleaned, and the EGR intercooler manifold replaced for clogged tubes.

There's a reason diesel cars in Europe aren't required to have EGR systems - its bad for the car, and it doesn't really improve emissions, since the reduced power and fuel economy from the EGR system causes you to stomp on the pedal harder - causing even more pollution.

Hybrids are interesting, but their highway mileage and torque has to improve to warrant replacing my TDI. I'd like to hear what "real world" mileage is on a hybrid, if you fill her up and run her down the highway till she's empty. There's a good chance the TDI will go further.

[Rainer]

For comparison only:

gas/diesel prices

US: $ 3,- / gallon

Middle Europe: $ 5-7,- / gallon

car prices:

VW Touareg V8 US: MSRP $ 45.000,-

VW Touareg V8 Middle Europe: $ 90.000 - 100.000,- incl. and still $ 70.000,- excl. taxes

That means, that anybody here, who is stu... enough to buy a car like this, subsidizes another one sold in the US.

European car companies are taking us for fools here and people just put up with it ...

[Mike Cockerham]

No refineries in 25 years, no new oil exploration, no nuclear plants, wind energy but you must keep the birds from flying into the turbine. We are sitting on enough oil reserves to last us but the enviromentalist wakos will not allow things to move forward. Everything must stay natuarl and perfect. It is silly to not make use of the resources we have in our own country.
When are we going to stand and say that we need energy and that there are safe and effective ways to get it.

[Frank Petronio]

Europeans pay the same market price for oil that Americans do. But their government extorts more taxes, creating the higher prices. While they do have micro cars capable of 90 mpg, they are hardly practical outside of a dense urban area (which Europe has plenty of and the US has little of.) Driving a "Smart" car across Wyoming would be suicide.

Artificially increasing the cost of energy through taxation is unlikely to spur alternative energy development - instead it just decreases consumption and stagnates the economy with a high unemployment rate, which is Europe's current situation. It takes better engineers - like Toyota's - to bring real alternatives to market. And genuinely high raw energy prices. Our current situation may end up spurring more alternative energy development from private enterprise than all the government bogus programs ever did.

Government should get the heck out of the way other than making sure alternative energy gets a level playing field against big oil.

[Ed K.]

Diesel is not the only answer
Diesel eh? Diesel engines were designed for running at a constant speed for endless hours, not accelerating and decelerating all the time. Using them for cars in cities, and having people use them that can't keep them in perfect running order because they want cheap only is a recipe for smog and ill health. It seems that photographers especially should be concerned about the global smog layer, and so far, today's versions of diesel, whether corn-fed or deep fried are not clean. On a trip to Sequoia National Park, there were all kinds of signs about smog advising people to say inside. The pollution from the valley below that has all the diesel trucks, as well as everything else, had risen all the way up into the highest points of the park - smog in the mountains! I remember how bad it was to sit in traffic years ago during the 70's gas crisis, when all the rich people went out to buy $70,000 MBZ cars so that they could save a couple hundred a year on fuel costs. I'm sure that there could be cleaner diesels, however our local transportation companies studied it and then went to LNG instead because cleaner diesels cost way more than the LNG conversions.





Gasoline cars could be way more efficient. BMW made a 5 series car ( okay, it had some problems ) called the 528 ETA that got 30+ on the highway, in a nice big sedan with leather and power everything. It was fun enough to drive even though the typical 6 cyl. sedan of today would leave it in the dust. The point though, is that it's fuel, ignition and friction control systems were way better than what they make today, because people were worried about fuel economy. The car makers could make more efficient cars, both large and small.





What about hydrogen fuels?There are many who are working on cheaper ways to make hydrogen. Supposedly, there are some ways to do this that are not being researched well enough ( okay, play the conspiracy music if you want, or the economic report if you want ). As photographers - we need some way to keep clean air, get there reliably, and keep costs in line. Of course, since Kodak and other companies are laying off people and closing plants everywhere, maybe just getting a few out of work lab technicials would be cheaper than biodiesel, especially if you fed them beans first!





More than just the pump
Perhaps more frightening than the cost of fuel, or for some, the prospect of both increased polution and increased fuel costs, is the increase in price for everything else we use that is based upon oil, including most of our photo & computer stuff ( plastics, right? ) along with the prices of shipping, which are already getting outrageous.





So who do we write to? How to solve it?
The current gas situation is partly a distribution problem, partly gouging at by the middle man. There are still laws regarding monopoly/oligarchy ( Sherman Act, Clayton Act and others ). Unfortunately, because so many people blindly allowed leadership to let the monopolists win, there is little competition in each area. How many stations can you select from today, compared to 20 years ago? And for them, how many suppliers can they choose from? No competition, so they can do what they like and make whatever excuse they like ( middlemen, suppliers ).





Those who bought the huge Hummers and 4WD Schoolbuses had enough money for it not to upset their style much, however they didn't help all of this either. I don't feel sorry for them. I do feel sorry for the moms and families that bought the tow package extra huge V8 suburbans, they've got to be feeling a lot of pain at the pump.





So photogs - how about instead of gas prices keeping you home instead of shooting, just take a little longer trip afield, and combine 4 trips into one sometimes? And without hugging trees too much here, some of us do like a clear day once in a while. Meanwhile, anyone got time for a letter to their representative?

[mark blackman]

one small point: UK mpg is not the same as USA mpg, 1 US gallon = 3.785 litres, 1 UK gallon = 4.545 (the difference is due to the variance in a pint).

Hence any UK mpg values should be multiplied by 0.83 to convert to US values.

[John Cook]

Let me gently make one obvious point which seems to have escaped the entire human race.

Conservation is not about the size of your vehicle nor about the type of fuel you consume.

Conservation is about the amount of fuel you consume. Period.

Someone who drives 2,500 miles per year in a Suburban is no more wasteful than one who unnecessarily drives 50,000 miles in a hybrid.

A recent Toyota TV commercial aimed at younger buyers seems to advocate frequent fuel-efficient coast-to-coast vacation trips in their economical little model. How foolish.

Before you vote to ban vehicles which will hold a family with four children in safety, perhaps you might consider rationing gasoline.

No ecological difference between burning your five gallons per week in a minivan than in a Prius.

Next time you feel the urge to torch somebody’s Hummer, look at the odometer first...

[John_4185]

Frank P Europeans pay the same market price for oil that Americans do. But their government extorts more taxes, creating the higher prices.

Frank, Americans pay a lot of tax on gasoline. It is in the form of diplomatic gifts to nations sitting on top of the oil or very near it, used to protect our interest in the oil, and of course taxes which support war in terms of $ and human welfare.

[Matt Powell]

I don't know a lot of people who buy $40k Ford Excursions or Hummers so they can drive Granny to church once a month.

I've got to have a truck for work (a Prius just won't carry a palette of tile or sheets of drywall, though I've been silently coveting one), wish I could afford the Chevy hybrid - a V8 with more power than my current Ford V6 and better gas mileage.

[Ed K.]

Apologies to those who have working trucks, be they Hummer or Suburban - work trucks at least work for more than one person. And of course, who would not want their family to be safe, with a large family. No intention to offend them.

I live in the Los Angeles Area, which might have most of the cars per capita / square mile in the United States. Many people here live in the suburbs about 100 miles one-way from Los Angeles, then drive their urban ( or Suburban ) destroyer to work, with just one person in it. Also, many people here got huge vehicles for nothing but show or intimidation, something like the “gross broadside weight” of an old ship of the line. It’s a free country still, and they can do what they like; it’s their choice how to spend their money and decide what is important. I can also understand why many people bought new remakes of classic muscle cars, or just some of the new high powered machines for the thrill - who knows if this is the last chance to enjoy them; sort of like the last chance to enjoy Kodak film before it’s all gone.

I use a truck for work now too - because the one I got gets 4 mph average better than the Acura sedan I traded it for (Acura RL = 17mpg on premium, on the highway), and it fits all my work gear. To conserve gas, I try to consolidate trips more. I moved my office to 1 mile from home so that I can walk if and when I want - it beats a 200 mile per day drive that some people have to do. And as much as possible, I use the Internet to communicate with clients, which of course makes calculating the gasoline impact of it more difficult overall ( power costs? ). I’m not positive, however I think that using UPS, USPS, FedEx or some other method of shipping is better fuel wise, because their routes are optimized for efficiency in order to stay competitive - so I do have things delivered quite a bit too. As Cook points out, driving less is a big part of it. And the Prius is pretty expensive. Seems like the little Civic does a lot better than 12mpg. Unfortunately, it’s starting to look like those of us in the US will have to get better mileage or drive less miles in the future, as the demand overseas is swelling. Think of it, these are the good ol’ days!

If this thread is any indicator, perhaps the Internet does save gas - anyone responding to this isn’t out doing field photography - or are they?? Wi-fi from Yosemite?

Again, sorry for the Hummer / Suburban reference. It’s a left over from driving a small sedan and getting run off the road by a huge vehicle with one person sitting in it, throttles wide open, horn blaring, and turning left in front of me on a green light…in my neck of the woods, such people exist. The rest of you nice people know who you are, and know that you drive courteously. With the summer heat, I’d rather pay a buck more for gas than get into a broadside battle with any of you heavy first-rate ships