[ale] way OT - used car buying tips - yea or nea

[George Allen]

Wow. That was a lot of good background info.

For my plug... I bought a used $8k 5-speed VW diesel. My average mileage
two and from work is 40mpg. Sometimes 50 is traffic is even. In town its
35. Compared to my old car, Nissan 300zx, its about a $1500 annual fuel
savings in commute costs. Still miss that old car though.

VW diesels aren't cheap to maintain, but they last a while, so I'll see if
I can get my 250...300k out of this one.

As my ALE tie in, somewhere I saw some slides with an oil-well/car-factory
to turning-wheels efficiency and impact comparison of diesels vs hybrids.
I'll forward if I can find it, and the analysis may have been done with
R-project.

As another side note, my uncle collects turkey fry oil from all his
neighbors this time of year, to make biodiesel for approx 90c/gallon
(assuming the oil is free). Apparently the newer model VWs after 2006 can't
handle biodiesel due to super-fine injectors, and he did do some
modifications to hoses and other parts. I'd heard that biodiesel is acidic
and can eat away at some parts although part of the biodiesel processing
involves titrating to find pH and adding KOH. Methanol is the other added
ingredient, which may be the hose damaging culprit, I'll have to re-read
some.
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