hmmmmm, wonder if the midget would take LPG……………..
Probably not worth it though, getting arround 40mpg already on a motorway run at 60 and any faster the nose just lifts up off the road!

Still waiting for someone to bring out a 150mpg diesel electric hybrid engine like the Volvo prototype.

I've yet to work out the savings involved with using a bike for the commute, but I think it might be enough to pay for the bike in a reasonable timeframe.

Well, being as you have a car anyway, it's mostly only fuel you're saving.

My last commuter owed me £450. I did nearly 5k miles on it, and sold it for £100. At around 10p a mile on fuel at the time, I reckon I made about £150 on the deal.

My new commuter owes me about £250. I've already done 600 miles on it, and I'm looking at about 12p a mile on fuel now, so I've already saved £72. I recon it'll do the 4-5000 miles again, so I should save £240-ish plus whatever the bike is worth at the end. 🙂

Some diesel engines will run OK on staight vegetable oil SVO.
Get used stuff from restaurants etc.
http://www.journeytoforever.org/biodiesel_svo.html

maybe use your bikes more? a bit leftfield i know but it could work.

I remember people getting their collective knickers in a twist back in 1975 when petrol went to £1 a gallon (?).
Them's were the days!

I never get much mpg from my m'bikes as the throttle position only has two settings, 1 or 11, Ducati forgot settings 2-10 inbetween!

I would love to be able to bike to work but my journey is 30 miles round trip daily and i work shifts, don,t fancy that in winter or summer come to think of it.I also have to be on call covering a site in Essex as well 45 miles away.

I hate it when folks start getting all righteous about car use, i HAVE to use one end of, it makes me bloody angry the gov't giving large about using public transport….its sh*t and doesn't help shift workers ffs.

More of us have to work away from our local area as there are not enough good jobs locally, i would love to be round the corner.

I was/am a bit of a petrol head, but nowadays i just can't afford the cost of ripoff insurance, the ridiculous car tax increases and the woeful price of fuel. I have recently just traded in my old Alfa 156 for a Pug 307 1.6HDi not exciting but good mpg average 56-57mpg and only £90 a year to tax, which compared to the Alfa ave 36mpg and £205 a year to tax. More economical but no fun, which sums up life in Britain nowadays 🙁

why not rip the engine out and put some pedals in!
http://ridethisbike.com/2008/03/pedal-cars-not-just-for-kids-anymore.html

I think there is (See my last post above)

£3400 @ £1.10/l (Average) = 3091 l
3091 / 4.55 = 679.3 gallons
8000 miles / 679.3 = 11.8mpg

Which can't be right.

At 18000 miles it works out to be 26.5, which is closer. I reckon it's a typo.

Sorry guys I did mess up. When I reset trip computer 8000miles ago it must not have reset the gallons consumed part.

My car has done 20500 miles. I was working it out at £5 a gallon for quickness. I've used 685 gallons. 29.9mpg.

Still I think it has to go.

think your self lucky – at least you get pep for those 30mpg …. my last car with the bike rack on (how it spent most of its life) would get 25-28 – and it was gutless !

my van is slow but gets 50mpg without any effort – more if i try and carries alot more

its all very well saying buy a small economical car till you try and stick bikes in it/go a long distance…. was looking at an aygo for the missus but she needs to carry a bike periodically for going straight to track training from work ….. aygo = nogo …. fiesta much better.

I wouldnt own a VXR without a fuel card or something similar! I had great fun in a 2.8lt Golf but it killed me at the pumps.

Trail rat- Our second car was an Aygo its an awesome little car.

Hora- Totally agree with that comment, you could really enjoy a car like this with a fuel card.

Sold my Discovery and my business van, my wife doesn't work anymore so I've nicked her Punto. I only have short commute and when I check the computer it's giving me 54MPG average.

Hated the small car at first, but now I like it. Just waiting for a Thule rack and I'll be happy.

Will look at a new car at the end of the year, but I'm hopelessly out of touch with cars as I've been using Landrovers for the last ten years.

Edit, yes fuel was getting silly, and I no longer needed a work/commercial vehicle so I've gone from 28 to 54 MPG. Like the little cars so much I went to look at a hot little 500 to skate about in HOW MUCH 😯

I think b r has it. His figures will be the depreciation of his vauxhall. Then there's his fuel on top.

Yeah if I had payed the list price for it!! I didnt. I got a 22k car for 15k

two years on they still selling for 15k+.

My model is Astra VXR Nurburgring Edition. I had similar thought about buying a vauxhall at beginning to but I couldnt afford a S3 and the price was right for a brand new VXR.

Sorry guys I did mess up. When I reset trip computer 8000miles ago it must not have reset the gallons consumed part.

My car has done 20500 miles. I was working it out at £5 a gallon for quickness. I've used 685 gallons. 29.9mpg.

Still I think it has to go.

Phew! My VXR is being delivered this afternoon. I was basing my calcs on getting 20 mpg. Got a bit worried there for a second!!

Dave_r you'll love it. 29.9mpg is good for a 240bhp car. Just getting to expensive for me now. I cant justify spending that amount a wedge just to get to work quickly.

What bothers me more is the increased VED. I can live with lowish mpg but not £400+ a year tax. Sounds wierd when you factor it all out but for me its the nail in the coffin 🙁

Nice cars those VXRs

Personally I'm not fussed about the price, despite doing 20,000 in the last 10 months I always get around 60mpg unless gunning it! 71.6mp is my best…

… The car 174bhp 0-60 in 7.4 seconds 298lbs/ft torque 😀

Just read the opening post, monthly payments on a car I couldn't do that as well.
That said I was offered 54K for a vehicle by the bank two years ago. I was tempted to buy an RS4 then dismissed it. Probably could have sold one now for what I would have paid 😥

When we move next month I'll be 8 miles from work instead of 43, going down to 1 car and spending the extra cash on getting me some decent all weather riding gear!

Hope the VXR drivers have some money left over for a chiropractor. The ride is rather, ermm stiff!!

What bothers me more is the increased VED. I can live with lowish mpg but not £400+ a year tax.

What's the threshold for the high VED rate?

Yes got sick of it a while ago. Got two cars and both are smallish modern diesels. Still gives me a pain behind the eyes when I have to fill up but at least it doesn't happen very often.

Coopersport 1. Way to go. I did that years ago. 6 miles off road to work now. We do have the 1 car, but diesel. These days I get satisfaction by accelerating tediously slowly and trying not to brake.

Fuel prices? – Higher the better as far as I'm concerned. If a Government with some balls doubled the price and fired all the new tax into energy conservation and renewables, then we'd have something to smile about.

Yeah my golf gi averaging 32mpg will be going for a boring diesel with a fuel card , have only had he car 4 months and will probably keep it for around a year which is a shame as its the best car i have ever owned, glad i din't by an R32 though.

I think the threshold is 225g of CO2 per km, although 1st year tax is higher. To put this into perspective, my Focus ST falls below this so you can get a reasonably high performance car without paying the higher rate. Quite why the additional cost bothers anyone is beyond me though as the duty on petrol for such a car is far in excess of the annual VED.

rkk01- not sure but I think its over 220gm's that it starts to ramp right up (i.e. circa £200 then suddenly £400+)

Saying that…..

the Renault 5 Sport is still sporty yet not too bad on fuel……

will – Member
Nice cars those VXRs

Personally I'm not fussed about the price, despite doing 20,000 in the last 10 months I always get around 60mpg unless gunning it! 71.6mp is my best…

… The car 174bhp 0-60 in 7.4 seconds 298lbs/ft torque

Impressive – which car is that then? Does its computer say you get 60mpg or is that calculated?

We've got an LPG converted 4×4 which is cheapish to run – price per mile is on par with the medium sized td hatchback despite having a 4l V6! Once the gas hits empty though you need to fill up quickly…

If you're after a big car/4×4 then they're worth considering but I'd only really recommend one if you're doing a fairly consistent journey such as a daily commute due to the relative lack of LPG stations. There are more than there were but some aren't signposted so you'd never know just driving past.

Obviously this is less of a problem in a 1.0l Aygo than in something a bit beefier.

Obviously this is less of a problem in a 1.0l Aygo than in something a bit beefier.

I don't know; some of these cars have microscopic fuel tanks, and get slightly less MPG on LPG.

You can fill up with petrol in the normal tank an flick between the 2 can't you?

With LPG the mpg isn't the important thing, it's pence per mile which is key. It's no more efficient than petrol but is less than half the price so you might fill up more but spend less.

Once you hit the LPG switch it runs on that till it runs out and then switches automatically to petrol. Bit of a lag during the changeover but it's pretty seamless and then you're on petrol till you fill up the LPG and switch it back on. (Edit: you can switch manually back to petrol and not use the LPG but I can't see why you would. Possibly if one leg of a journey is all uphill and one downhill then saving the LPG for the uphill might work if you know there's nowhere to top it up)

The LPG nozzle is next to the petrol nozzle on ours so it's easy to fill both in one stop. Interestingly this sometimes resets the pump at certain garages so only the price of whichever we topped up second registers on the cashiers display…

We generally run it on LPG all the time and only a 1/4 a tank of petrol so we're forced to keep on top of it rather than just running it as a petrol vehicle until we get around to putting LPG in. Mainly because when pushed hard I can get sub 8mpg showing on the mpgometer of the 4×4!

Swalsey – Member
Impressive – which car is that then? Does its computer say you get 60mpg or is that calculated?

Seat Ibiza 1.9tdi Re mapped.

Computer said 71.6mpg but 60 is calculated 😆 I drive like a right granny some time!

Yeah if I had payed the list price for it!! I didnt. I got a 22k car for 15k – two years on they still selling for 15k+.

Thats good, but you still needed to finance the £15k and you've probably lost some anyway:

http://www.bristolstreet.co.uk/U111368-aexp/vauxhall_astra_2.0t_16v_vxr_nurburgring_3dr?utm_source=DMR&utm_medium=CPC&utm_referrer=DMR

This is known as the 'hidden' cost, as its not until you actual sell that you know the true running cost of any car.

@will – still impressed!

@IvanDobski – sub 8mpg! Just as well you're on LPG! Thanks for the info 🙂

The issue of getting a certificate from the people that fit it so that you can show your insurance company is, a myth.

Tell that to my insurance company, it still needed a certificate from a competent assessor before they'd touch it.

Neither Norwich Union nor NFU where interested, in LPG cert, when I insured with them.

I'm pricing up LPG conversion for my petrol t4 at the moment. looking like it will pay for itself in a year with the mileage i'm doing.

The LPG tank is in the car and takes up a lot of space. Even if it is put in the spare wheel well, where do you put the spare wheel ?

Don't carry a spare? That's what i will be doing with mine and a can of this

(unless i'm going on the continent fully loaded where i can put it in a trailer of something)

You carry 2 cans of Holts tyre gunk. Or find a space saver the same PCD and leave it in the boot. I had a Saab 900 2.3 N/A on Lpg. Did 25 – 28 mpg , sold it at a profit too. Insurance co were ademant that they had to see the installer cert. Then ran a CarinaE 1.8 on LPG , that was a shed but did 30 mpg on gas. Big ends failed but I got alot back on 'bay.
Just sold my Cooking oil converted ZX . Lost £20 in depreciation in 55,000 miles. Cost around £100 in parts. Bought 1750 ltrs of clean unused cooking oil , adn that saved over £500 in fuel costs. Got 55 – 60mpg on veg oil.
Now running a td pd Passat . By rolling and in gear coasting run that at over 60mpg, not bad for 225,000 miles. Thats actual, not fuel computer , which actually underestimates a touch. Still hurts to put the 9 galls or 41 ltrs in each week.

I always carry tyreweld. Two punctures sir? A flat on the motorway Sir?