In case you’ve been living under a rock, Volkswagen was caught cheating on emissions testing with their 2009-2016 diesels. Recently, a proposed settlement including a buyback program (as well as, potentially, a fix) has been announced for the 2009-2015 2.0 liter vehicles. One concern, however, is the CO2 emissions impact of this buyback – both in terms of manufacturing emissions, and in terms of fuel consumption. Continue reading “Dieselgate and CO2 emissions”
Thoughts on my three-wheel vehicle project
For a while now, I’ve been planning a tadpole (also known as reverse trike) three-wheel vehicle that would have tandem seating, an enclosed cabin, and would achieve 156+ miles per US gallon on the highway by using a diesel engine.
I’ve even bought a 654 cc twin-cylinder Ruggerini diesel engine for this project. Here’s the problem though.
That diesel will get me in the ballpark of 16-20 hp. While that will be more than enough to achieve cruising speed, 16 hp won’t get me acceptable acceleration, and even 20 hp will be painful. In addition, the driveline will be rather long, due to having the transmission behind the engine (and a fair distance away to avoid fouling the oil filter), and then the rear wheel behind that.
So, my question to you is… should I abandon the diesel route, and go to a 300 cc single-cylinder fuel injected gasoline engine from a scooter (which means CVT)? Continue reading “Thoughts on my three-wheel vehicle project”
Hmm. Haven’t posted in a while.
So, I moved into my apartment at the beginning of October.
The first weekend I was there, I thought to myself, “self, your car is a piece of shit. I think you need to buy a new one.”
So I did so – a 1992 Mazda Miata.
Rather… different from the Golf, but DAMN fun.
The Golf, FWIW, is awaiting a friend to be ready for it, to part it out.
Anyway, yesterday, I finally got a real camera, and today, I decided to find a nice big parking lot and have fun in the ice and snow.
So I did so. See below. 😀
Well… things are changing…
So, I got on salary at work, with a giant raise to do so…
And, I just signed for an apartment last night, and will be moving in on the 1st of October. It’s 2.4 miles from work, and all along wide 35 MPH streets, whereas I’m currently living 40 miles from work. So, I can actually bike commute.
Speaking of that, I’ve been working on my bike… now it’s got fenders, LOTS of rear lighting, a pannier (and I think I’m going to get another one,) and a new saddle.
In addition, the other day, I worked on a friend’s 1965 Hillman Super Minx diesel. We made a bunch of progress, but didn’t get it going.
Anyway, this is a rather interesting car. From what’s been found, it’s believed that only 100 of the diesel version of this car were produced. If that’s not rare enough, only FIVE were believed to have made it to the US. And, TWO are believed to survive in the US. This is one of them, and my friend got it for DAMN cheap.
The thing is basically a normal Hillman Super Minx, except it’s got a Perkins 4.99 diesel swapped in at the factory, in place of the normal Hillman gasoline engine. Take a look at the photo album I have of this car for more.
Liekomg, no more rice! Oh, and leenooks.
I got rid of my Civic today… I think the pictures will say it all. 😀 (They had a bit of a problem getting it on the trailer without ramps… so they took a running start. 😆
And then they strapped it on their trailer and left! 😀 I’m all of… um… $215 richer. Yay. At least I don’t have that pile rotting up the driveway any more… :p
Now, when they saw my Golf, they tried to get me to sell it, but… I just got that thing running. Glow plugs help a LOT with starting a diesel in this damn cold weather. 😉
So, anyway, the other thing. I’ve decided to start running Linux on this ThinkPad. So, I decided to go with the flavor of the month, to try to make my life as easy as possible. That means Ubuntu.
I burned the CDs of my recovery partition, and saved ISOs of them onto my server. That way, I could restore the system in the future despite proceeding to nuke that partition. After that, I realized that I needed a hell of a lot more HDD space than that… so I started deleting crap, and got myself TONS of room. After some SNAFUs with defragging, then shrinking the partition, Ubuntu installed just fine.
Now, here’s something that is awesome. In my previous attempts to use Linux, I found that I had to install a whole bunch of BS to get the tiniest thing to work.
On Ubuntu… it just… works. Sure, I’ve had to install the occasional package now and then, but Ubuntu’s howtos actually… make sense! And are… helpful! And I’ve not noticed the dependency hell that I found on the RPM-based distros I’ve used. Then again, I am trying to stay within the distro’s packages when possible…
Anyway, I’ve only booted into Windows a couple times. Funny part is, Windows has slowed down a LOT since this… 😆
Long time, no post…
So, since the last Civic post, I’ve gotten a 1986 Golf diesel from oilhammer on TDIClub. The car needed a brake booster, master cylinder, steering rack, driveshafts, and an engine and transmission. Luckily, despite the frontal impact on the Jetta, only one driveshaft was damaged, and that was in moving the car, not in the wreck!
GMARK, Growler, and compu_85 helped out a lot… heck, GMARK even provided the site for the engine swap.
The engine swap went fairly well… just one note for future reference. Make sure you plug in the fuel cutoff solenoid wire before trying to start the thing. 😆
Then, a brake line failed, so had to limp it to a brake shop.
Now, an engine mount’s failed, but that, minor shifter issues, and getting the title transferred (waiting on the title to be notarized) are all that are in the way of getting this car on the road (and the failed engine mount and shifter issues won’t prevent me from driving it for a short term until they’re fixed). Which is good, seeing as the Civic’s driveshafts are shot, and I don’t have the experience to install new ones. And I don’t have any other vehicles to drive.
Oh, and I’m going to see if I can institute Google AdSense on this blog. We’ll see when Google approves the application… 😆
F U C K
I think this says it all.
👿
:rip:
And, even though sometimes she didn’t treat me the best, a :beer: for saving me from ANY injury. 🙂
Update on VW diesel discontinuation
http://forums.tdiclub.com/showthread.php?p=1337107#post1337107 is the source for this post.
Originally posted by febrile:
Below is VWofA response to inquiry on TDI available in 2006/2007:
Thank you for contacting the Volkswagen website. We have been updated with some 2007 model year availability in relation to TDI/diesel engines.
We will offer the 2006 Jetta TDI in 2007. This means there will not be a 2007 Jetta TDI, but there will be an extended run of the 2006 TDI Jetta models. In other words, you will be able to buy a TDI Jetta in 2007, but it will not be a 2007 model, it will be a 2006.
We will also offer the New Beetle TDI the same way as noted above.
We will be offering a 2007 model year TDI V10 Touareg. This will be the only 2007 model year TDI available at this time.
Currently, there are no plans to offer the Passat Sedan or Wagon with a diesel in 2007.
We hope this information is helpful to you with making a purchase decision. Thank you again for allowing us the opportunity to assist you further.
Kelly
Volktalk
So… in summary… confirmation of 2006 Jetta overrun policy. Mention of a similar 2006 New Beetle overrun policy. Confirmation of 2007 Touareg V10 TDI.
Sad day for VW diesels – but there will be one for 2007…
It’s official, everyone everywhere is saying… no more TDI for 2007. 😮
With a twist.
The rumors that VW was ramping up production of the 2006 Jetta TDI to be able to sell stock into 2007 were true. 🙂
The rumors that we were getting the Touareg V10 TDI back for 2006… well, almost false. Some people have mentioned that there’s going to be VERY few 2006 V10 TDIs. However, there’s going to be 2007 V10 TDIs. Want a TDI? Sorry, you get a V10, whether you like it or not. 😆 Oh, and it’s $59,000. 👿
Read the Detroit Free Press article (the one that’s being quoted the most): http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060528/BUSINESS01/605280708/1014