Petrol or Diesel
 

During these strange times we find ourselves living in, nothing is for certain right now.

However, starting with one speculation at a time, I wonder...

If like me, you are investing in a mid 2000's car with a view to keep it on the road for as long as humanly possible, would you buy a petrol or a diesel? Both are getting bad press for their own reasons, but which one in your own opinions will survive the inevitable assault and battery from... well, batteries?

Answers on a postcard please, and your reasons.

Mid 2000s I believe you're into DPF/no DPF territory so really would depend on how you use the car if a DPF is fitted.Personally I've never owned a diesel car and for the use my cars now get[even pre-pandemic]I'll stick with petrol.

What is your anticipated annual mileage?

Get a early diesel and research to ensure

1). No DPF
2). No duel mass flywheels.

They will literally go on forever!

Buy a petrol and have it converted to LPG, you'll get similar running costs to a diesel car now but won't have to pay the financial penalty of owning a diesel when the fuel goes up.

Secondly, diesels spew more carcinogens than enough out and cause breathing difficulties.

Also petrols warm up quicker, so you're not likely to be either cold running all th time if your journeys are short or only just getting the engine up to temperature by the time you reach your destination.

Also if you plan on keeping it a while, i'd suggest a pre-2000 with either, post-2000 petrols had to have Type Approved cats (£xpensive!) and were full of electronics. Diesels had to have dpfs from (i think) 2004 and again from 2000 were full of electronics.

On many cars various parts of the fuel system are coded to the car so even a relatively cheap component failing can cost a fortune having the replacement coded.

Again, a pre-2000 car will likely be at the bottom of its price curve now so you'll get it cheap and the chances are, it will improve in value of you maintain it correctly.

I think that’s a really good post. Very true.

Only comment I have (and it has not gone down well in these forums before) is that I have been in 5 or 5 LPG powered cars and not one ever ran right without EML, lumpy running or some sort of other problem.

Again the late 90s diesels have no DPFs, no catalytic converters, no DPF and in those days went further than the petrols (debatable I admit).

I'd say there was something wrong somewhere in that case! My first LPG car was a 4.0 Jeep Cherokee that i bought to scratch two itches - first that of owning a Jeep Cherokee (i'd wanted one since about 1983/4 time when i first saw them outside Course & Beacham) and secondly of owning an LPG car. I'd wanted to do a conversion for a long time but like you, had heard horror stories which meant i decided to buy a ready converted car to try it and see what happened.

All good until the original LPG ECU died but fortunately because i'd had my suspicions, i had another (better) ECU to fit and rewired it correctly and rerouted the plumbing, set the vapouriser up how it should be and had very good economy and running from it.

Next i converted my 827 Coupe (now sold) and yes, i could provoke the EML on that due to an idiosyncrasy on the engine management system and the fact the vapouriser couldn't respond fast enough to the sudden change. Had i done it with a sequential gas injection system it wouldn't have happened.

Notwithstanding those examples, all oher LPG cars i've known have been smooth, haven't triggered the EML consistently and have generally run as well on gas as they do on petrol, in some cases better on gas.

I'm in the process of converting my 760 and will then also be converting my other car - both will be gas injection and i don't envisage any problems except maybe the initial set up. What i'm looking forward to is fuel at ~£2.25/gallon (based on 50p/L for LPG) or thereabouts.

My annual mileage is around 12-15k, 40 miles daily on the motorway during the week, and occasionally towing a small caravan (1100kg) My experience of petrols is that they're generally cheaper to repair, but I have no experience of Volvo diesels so I'm open to be converted if they're worth a shot.

I have my heart set on a 2004- facelifted V70 manual, but I haven't yet decided which engine to opt for, which led me to wonder everyone's thoughts on the future of IC engines generally.

The other thing to consider is that the Classic Car Industry isn't going to shut overnight and most of them are petrol so the long term guarantee (for want of a better word) of fuel and parts availability is arguably better for petrol than diseasel.

The modern Volvo diesels are similar in architecture to petrol so if that's your main concern there's very little to choose between the two.

That's an excellent point, although thinking along the same lines, I wonder how that weighs up against the long term guarantee of diesel based on the vast needs of commercial and marine engines?