AdBlue

[bigjohn]

I really don't understand anyone who is adverse to AdBlue due to the cost. The range you get between fill ups is massive (you even get 2400km range when the low warning light comes on), so only those who are really really badly organised would be subjected to an extortionate price. A reasonable price seems to be around 50p to £1 per litre which is pretty insignificant in the grand scheme of cost of motoring. I suspect anyone complaining about the cost has some hidden other issue with AdBlue.

My issue is not with the cost of AdBlue its with the cost to the technology attached to your exhaust pipe (Catalyst + DPF + AdBlue gubbins) - There are more than 20 sensors keeping an eye on all of this. At least the DPFs are a bit better now - they tend to be nearer the engine on later designs so passive regeneration possible more of the time. Never buy a DPF car with the earlier PD engine!

 

Personally I tend to keep cars a long time - what state will these things be in 10 years time? When the car is only worth £2k in the future a failure of some of these systems will write the car off

[techno79]

My issue is not with the cost of AdBlue its with the cost to the technology attached to your exhaust pipe (Catalyst + DPF + AdBlue gubbins) - There are more than 20 sensors keeping an eye on all of this. At least the DPFs are a bit better now - they tend to be nearer the engine on later designs so passive regeneration possible more of the time. Never buy a DPF car with the earlier PD engine!

 

Personally I tend to keep cars a long time - what state will these things be in 10 years time? When the car is only worth £2k in the future a failure of some of these systems will write the car off

 

But all those things you mention are not added for a pointless reasons. They are there to bring the cars emissions down to help reduce the amount of pollution produced by them. It will help towards getting cleaner air that we all need to breath. It might only be a small change but many small changes amount to a big change. The emissions might not be a big problem out in the country but within the city, clean transport is important for those who live, work or have to travel to those cities.

[bigjohn]

But all those things you mention are not added for a pointless reasons. They are there to bring the cars emissions down to help reduce the amount of pollution produced by them. It will help towards getting cleaner air that we all need to breath. It might only be a small change but many small changes amount to a big change. The emissions might not be a big problem out in the country but within the city, clean transport is important for those who live, work or have to travel to those cities.

 

Agreed, thats why I've bought a petrol. Shame there isn't an lpg version

[l4wrence]

The pushed incentive of diesels by the government is now falling out of favour with the environment and all these additions like DPF and AdBlue seem like bandaids on a wound. That's why I'm still sticking with petrol and buying a car to keep it for 10+ years.

 

It's been well reported a long term diesel is not such a good investment as people are led to believe. I think if we get out of our throw away society and actaully buy and keep our cars that is better for the environemnt than changing models every 2 or 3 years.

[Jprodrigues]

In Portugal, in any BP fuel station, a 10 litres jerrican costs 26 euros.

So... Considering a estimated consumption of 1 litre each 1.000 km (Superb III's manual instructions announces between 0,8 L and 1,2 L/1000 km) 2,60 euros will be the cost of each 1.000 km.

Or 0,26 euros each 100 km.

I own a Octavia III Combi 1.6 TDI which I bought new in december 2013. But, now, I'm thinking in a Superb III TDI 150 or 190cv version :-)

When adblue runs out:

The refill process (In a Vw - by the trunk)

Edited 21 August, 2015 by Jprodrigues

[BillyJim]

Garden hose behind him and wet all around? How many "takes" before he got his refilling right? Perhaps not the best solution.

[JungleJames]

Agreed, thats why I've bought a petrol. Shame there isn't an lpg version

Petrols emissions have already been brought down to acceptable levels via the use of cats that are seemingly more complicated than cats found on diesels.

I dont see anybody mention the particulates that petrols produce. Just because you cant see them. Thankfully that has pretty much been sorted, so now they are onto diesels. Petrols also produce nitrous oxides (albeit not as much as diesels do), and this has been sorted with the more complicated cat. For some reason this cat wont work on diesels (thats my basic understanding anyway) so they use EGR/ SCR/ both.

Then theres such things as CO. Has the cat completely erradicated this problem? I suspect petrols still pump some of this extremely poisonous gas out. Needless to say, I wont be connecting a hose pipe to a petrols exhaust to find out.

Oh, and finally CO2. Well a diesel wins on that hands down.

 

Sorry, I fail to see this 'diesels are dirty' argument. Both diesels and petrols have needed after treatment of some sort to reduce pollutants, and even after all that petrols are probably dirtier than diesels (CO2). Its just nobody dares to mention the crap (and stench) that petrols belch out.

[bigjohn]

Petrols emissions have already been brought down to acceptable levels via the use of cats that are seemingly more complicated than cats found on diesels.

I dont see anybody mention the particulates that petrols produce. Just because you cant see them. Thankfully that has pretty much been sorted, so now they are onto diesels. Petrols also produce nitrous oxides (albeit not as much as diesels do), and this has been sorted with the more complicated cat. For some reason this cat wont work on diesels (thats my basic understanding anyway) so they use EGR/ SCR/ both.

Then theres such things as CO. Has the cat completely erradicated this problem? I suspect petrols still pump some of this extremely poisonous gas out. Needless to say, I wont be connecting a hose pipe to a petrols exhaust to find out.

Oh, and finally CO2. Well a diesel wins on that hands down.

 

Sorry, I fail to see this 'diesels are dirty' argument. Both diesels and petrols have needed after treatment of some sort to reduce pollutants, and even after all that petrols are probably dirtier than diesels (CO2). Its just nobody dares to mention the crap (and stench) that petrols belch out.

 

Re NOx and particulates - thats why I mentioned lpg, this fuel significantley reduces these emmisions

 

There is also a bit of an irony here  - older petrols that have higher CO2 emissions have very low particulate emissions. The later petrols with much lower CO2 emisisons due to direct injection now have much higher particulate emmisions

[BurialConstant]

AdBlue is just more things to go wrong, I want a hybrid petrol/electric car like the passat GTE, 8 speed DSG would be nice too!

 

Till then the 150 diesel will do me.... with a remap....

[VAGCF]

At least with the new Superb and other cars like the A6 Adblue has been properly designed in i.e. the Adblue filler is behind the filler cap and so if some is spilt when refilling it is at least outside the car and can be easily washed off the paint work.

 

With the Yeti the filler is inside the boot and so any spillages are more difficult to clear up and if not can cause some real damage.

 

Like others I'm happy that emissions are cleaner and I'm not that bothered about the actual cost of refilling the Adblue tank but not so happy with the bodge i.e. the actual use of Adblue and the refilling arrangements on the Yeti that have been used to achieve it and the extra weight being lugged around when Skoda had engines in the wings i.e. 150PS and below, that could have been used and don't need Adblue.

 

Doesn't help with the 4x4 and more powerful engines of course which continue to need Adblue. I wonder if some new design will overcome that problem?

Edited 24 August, 2015 by VAGCF

[techno79]

AdBlue is just more things to go wrong

 

But new tech and safety features are added to the latest cars all the time and they are all candidates for making the car non-drivable when things go wrong, no? I think the overall community benefit from cars with AdBlue vastly out weigh the individual cons for drivers with that feature.

[blahde2]

I am just thinking of stretching my wallet to get the 190bhp version. I can see the UK Gov (or new European Union wide law) deciding in 4 years time that cars will also be taxed on their NOx particulates as well as their CO2 emissions.

If I spec a car with ADBlue now and keep it for 5-10 years, at least I will be covered for that eventuality. The £2200 daylight robbery for 40 ponies and a few gubbins is not great tho so I might just get the 150bhp n save the Cash for the tax if it comes. (N poss a remap after 3 years!)

[techno79]

I am just thinking of stretching my wallet to get the 190bhp version. I can see the UK Gov (or new European Union wide law) deciding in 4 years time that cars will also be taxed on their NOx particulates as well as their CO2 emissions.

If I spec a car with ADBlue now and keep it for 5-10 years, at least I will be covered for that eventuality. The £2200 daylight robbery for 40 ponies and a few gubbins is not great tho so I might just get the 150bhp n save the Cash for the tax if it comes. (N poss a remap after 3 years!)

 

If going the remap root, you'd also need to factor in hassle, headache and extra money for car insurance purposes. Many mainstream insurance companies take a very dim view of modified cars (especially ones that increase the power of the car) so the limited options and increased premium would probably quickly eat into your £2200 saving. If it wasn't declared, then you are on very shaky ground should it become apparent during an accident where they may refuse to payout at all. Central London will already be putting in place an ultra low emissions zone by 2020 where anything less than an Euro 6 compliant engine will see a heavy daily charge (but unlike the congestion charge, this would apply 24/7). I can definitely foresee extra charges being levied for vehicles with (relatively) high levels of NOx and other tailpipe emissions. Purely going on the current push for cleaner vehicles, I'm fairly certain that these would be in the 5 to 10 year time frame too.

[muddyboots]

If going the remap root, you'd also need to factor in hassle, headache and extra money for car insurance purposes. Many mainstream insurance companies take a very dim view of modified cars (especially ones that increase the power of the car) so the limited options and increased premium would probably quickly eat into your £2200 saving.

There's no hassle or headache adding a remap to your insurance policy these days.

It's dead easy, even the comparison sites allow you to spec remaps and other mods, it's just a case of ticking a couple more boxes on the online form.

 

Around renewal time this year, I got my Yeti remapped and uprated the brakes all round, and got a new policy (from a mainstream company) with the remap and uprated brakes declared, that was cheaper than the renewal price of my outgoing policy where the car was standard.

Just had to tick the "brakes - uprated" and "engine chip (11-25% increase)" options on the confused.com quote form, and gots loads of quotes back from mainstream insurers.

I think I'm paying around £250 all in IIRC.

[techno79]

There's no hassle or headache adding a remap to your insurance policy these days.

It's dead easy, even the comparison sites allow you to spec remaps and other mods, it's just a case of ticking a couple more boxes on the online form.

 

Around renewal time this year, I got my Yeti remapped and uprated the brakes all round, and got a new policy (from a mainstream company) with the remap and uprated brakes declared, that was cheaper than the renewal price of my outgoing policy where the car was standard.

Just had to tick the "brakes - uprated" and "engine chip (11-25% increase)" options on the confused.com quote form, and gots loads of quotes back from mainstream insurers.

I think I'm paying around £250 all in IIRC.

 

Fair enough, it's been a long time since I've modded a car in anyway that would need to be declared to the insurance companies so may be things have improved a lot.

[Huskoda]

Fair enough, it's been a long time since I've modded a car in anyway that would need to be declared to the insurance companies so may be things have improved a lot.

You'd be surprised at what some insurers class as notifiable modifications

[techno79]

You'd be surprised at what some insurers class as notifiable modifications

 

Well, the biggest "modification" I've done in the last few years is to install a child seat in the back. If they needed to be informed of this then I'd be very surprised.