Hi,

A question, i am living in the south of spain and wants to buy a discovery 1 Diesel

Which engine do i choose ? The 200 tdi or the 300 tdi

I live in the mountains in the south and make trips to maroco off road buth not heavy duty.

Sorry if my written English is a bit strange

Thanks

 

The engines have the same displacement. I'd go for a 200tdi or a 300tdi that doesn't have electronic controls. There are some major components for the 200tdi that are no longer available, but maintenance parts should be easy to get.

 

I've never owned either. They aren't readily available here in the US. You might have better information provided at a site that has more UK and Australian people posting. Try landroversonly.com they seem to have a good mix of US and Aussies.

 

What are the benefits of switching from a petrol to a diesel? Besides the better gas milage. I mean performance wise are they better or because the LR are so low in HP it doesn't matter? Just wondering, because I thought we lose about 90-100 hp in switching..

 

Hi,

So i am on a USA forum, nice

The thing is that in Europe petrol is so expensive , Petrol 1.60 euro for a Liter and diesel 1.30 euro . So a car on petrol is using like 15 Liter on 100 km and a diesel 9 Liters. So the choise is easy

1 euro = 1.32 $

1 us liquid gallon is 3.8 Liters

So the European price for a gallon of petrol is 7.8 $

Diesel 1 gallon 6.40 $

So thats a very big differce

A discovery 2.5 tdi is using about 9 diesel for 100 km = 11.7 euro for 100 km

15 liters of petrol on 100 km thats = 24 euro for 100 km very very expencive

 

Diesels, as a rule of thumb, last longer due to lower rpm (less wear on surfaces of bearings), more low end torque, their beefed up construction to allow for high compression ratio; reduced compexity shoved down our throats related to emissions, and fewer elecronics in general. An older diesel will run as long as it has fuel, no battery needed, mechanical fuel pump. There's a reason diesels dominate in heavy duty equipment.

In the auto world, Mercedes diesels have vey long life, a taxi cab in Greece racked up 2.8 million miles (three engines, kept rebuilding them). So do Volvos and others.

General Motors ruined the US market in the 80's by rolling out diesels that were not very good, to a dealer network that was not prepared.

Cummins and other diesel engine makers produce top quality engines that last a long time. The Cummins shop near me services a Dodge pickup that has 800K on it (girl friend must be in Key West).

Look around you. Just about everything was carried on a truck. A diesel truck.

So for all the warts - would you like a Discovery or similar Land Rover that got 30+ mpg, and could expect to be driven for 300 - 400K miles with minimal issues? And yes, your Honda can outrun a Mack truck, but not when you are towing 40 tons. With the right transmission gears, diesels are quite serviceable (like the "humvees" that carry the military).

 

So a 300tdi would be a good investment then in the long run? But would it be so in the US? Since we don't suffer from such high prices on gas and the fact that most of our rovers in the US have the petrol engine so parts are more abundant for the petrol engine right?

 

Probably not from a purely financial perspective. Most people that do the conversion report spending $10,000 or more. It would take a long time to make that up, even at 30 mpg. Usually there are other factors, like the I want it factor, that comes into play.

 

Regardless of your political view:
Take not people that our government (REGARDLESS OF POLITICAL VIEW) is making our gas prices in the US more like Europe. Thats bull**** that Petrol is so damn expensive. Why is oil $80.00 and my gas is $3.40 a gallon? Why can't my gas be $2.50 a gallon when oil was $80.00??? Also, the next time some ****head in Saudi land gets pissed at us and raises oil prices to $150.00 a barrel I doubt my gas prices are $3.20 like they were when oil was $140.00. Instead it will be more like $4.50 a gallon. Do you understand people?? WTF? Sorry to rant but why can one day oil be $50.00 a barrel and gas be $2.00 then three months later oil goes up and down and lands at $45.00 a barrel and gas be $3.00?????????????? Someone is screwing us.

 

Our gas prices are nothing like what they are in the rest of the world. In Europe the average price is nearly twice what we pay (in some cases even more). There was a poster on LRO the other day from New Zealand who said it cost over $200 to fill his take with petrol. We are spoiled and we most don't even realize it. Wait until the oil producers start taking euros or renminbi instead of US dollars. Then you will see a significant rise in the cost of fuel in the US without any change in the actual price of a barrel of oil.

The stuff is running out and we have either reached or are damn close to peak oil production. Every barrel extracted is costing more than the last. Sure when the economy in the US slides, the economy in the rest of the world is moderated, demand eases and a barrel of oil drops somewhat but the days of $2 gas are long over. Little short of a worldwide depression would usher prices like that back into vogue.

Think for a minute about the BP oil spill in spring of '10. The Deepwater Horizon was capable of operating in depths up to 8,000 feet drilling to depths of 30,000 feet. That is over a mile and a half into the water and then more than five miles under the ocean floor! Think about that for a moment. That's how far out into the ocean and how deep we have to drill to find oil today.

You may recall that at the time there were comparisons to a similar spill in Mexico from the Ixtoc well in 1979. The only difference was that that well was only drilling to depths of 3000 feet. That's a tenth of the depth of the Deep Water Horizon. Not to mention how close to the shore Ixtoc was in comparison Deep Water. The cost and danger of deep water drilling has exploded.

Don't even get me started with the expense of processing shale oil like what is in Canada on the American Rocky Mountains. The environmental costs are out of sight as well. The amount of water necessary for extracting oil from shale is unbelievable and the pollution of that water is also staggering.

There is no more cheap oil and you need to realize that we have no more right to the oil that is left in the ground in foreign countries than any other paying customer. It may not be what you want to hear but it is the reality of the world we live in, unless of course you're Donald Trump and have some misguided belief that everyone owes us something.

We're like cocaine addicts looking for the last crumbs that may have fallen on the floor. It's not a flattering image.