Safe Speed Forums

Ahh, I understand now, not what I meant at all. The Impreza is worth every penny of the fuel it uses when I drive it for myself and I was tempted to keep it, despite the cost of running it for work, as I enjoy driving it. The post came about as something I had noticed as a byproduct of trying to minimise the cost of driving the less interesting parts of my journeys. I was surprised that actually slowing a bit more made driving slowly a better experience for me.

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Driving fast is for a particular time and place, I can do it I just only do it occasionally because I am a gentleman.
- James May

Indeed. And that's just ONE of the things wrong with NuLab's energy policy, and is why I said to Toltec
I perhaps should have said "diesel prices" instead of "diesel duties", but let's not get into semantics.

NuLab COULD have done as other EU countries have done, in setting diesel duty to a lower level than petrol duty. That way, more people would be driving around in diesel cars and getting 50/60mpg or more, instead of getting only 30/40 mpg with the equivalent petrol car. This is borne out by the fact that by 2004, 60% of cars in some of the other EU countries (Austria, Italy) were diesel, compared with only 34% in Britain.

Diesel contains about 10% more chemical energy than petrol iirc, so if it costs more surely you are not really being ripped off?

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Driving fast is for a particular time and place, I can do it I just only do it occasionally because I am a gentleman.
- James May

Yes, diesel has a higher "energy density". You gave a figure of 10%; I've seen it quoted as high as 17%. Not only that, but more diesel than petrol can be made from the same volume of crude oil. I take this to mean that our nation's fuel requirements for motoring could be met using a smaller volume of crude oil, were we to make a mass switch to diesel. But because of the higher level of pollutants in diesel, additional refining is needed which adds to the cost. This is particularly apparent in the production costs of ultra low sulphur diesel.

According to this report from the US Department of Energy, the refining costs of diesel are nearly twice as high as the refining costs for petrol. The breakdown of costs is quite interesting, as the level of fuel duty in the US is the same for petrol and diesel, as in Britain.

the price discrepancy between derv and unleaded is down to supply and demand. As most people in western Europe in particular are a bunch of nimby's, no body wants a oil refinery near by so there is a shortage of refining capacity for diesel. If Gordon reduces his tax to make derv the same price as unleaded, even more people will buy oil burners which will bump the price back up.

going back to the OP, I only have a small engined car and it's not worth much any more so it makes no sense to spend 8K on a newer on to save a bit of gas. So I've backed off the accelerator a bit, no a lot and my fuel bills have almost stayed the same.

It has taken some time to adjust but I don't think my journey times have dropped as much as I expected. Backing off has given me more time to look head and allowed better forward planning which seems to be clawing some, but not all of the time lost by cracking on. I have cut my driving around for the sake of it right down mind. In a recent trip in to London in a work van I don't think I could have saved much time by trying to go much quicker and the 300,000 mile old van probably thanked my restraint.

Just for th OP's knowledge.

Trucks cruise at 56 (unless your a paddy)
Accelerate to hit the speed limiter... wait for a downhill ( so you ensure you get that last 000000.01mph) run then activate cruise control. Around 14 litre turbo engine pushing hard up against limiter... Cruise Control refusing to let it drop below = LOCKED at 56mph ZERO deviation for mile after mile ( unless a steep hill up or down arrives !!)

Naturally there is some deviation between vehicles... more play in linkages in older vehicles etc... Some naughty boys "donking" limiters.. Or... If your a paddy... changing the wheels on your your drive axle to ones that have tyres 99.9% worn out and then having your limiter recalibrated back to 56mph... Then replacing worn tyres with fresh ones. End result = around 60mph+ but tacho only showing legal limited 56mph. ( Larger circumference wheels).

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The Box said "Windows XP or better" ... So I installed Ubuntu

There I was thinking it was 90Kph



Thanks, that would explain the trucks doing 60 along the M20, not sure if they are Irish but definitely foreign plates.

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Driving fast is for a particular time and place, I can do it I just only do it occasionally because I am a gentleman.
- James May