I know cars are a lot of what's wrong with the planet today. The vast majority use fuels that can never be reproduced. Many have horrible, choke-the-plants emissions. And I agree that whenever possible, you should carpool, use public transportation, walk, or bike. But I live in a rural/small town area where the distances between things are great and NO public transportation is available, as I know many of you friends probably do. So I was wondering, how many of you drive vehicles that could be considered efficient or clean-emitting, and what are they? How many of you use renewable fuels? On an average day, my '95 Saturn SL gets 40 mpg and has an EPA emissions score of I think 4.5 (the lower the number on a scale of 1-10, the better). On flat land with the cruise set, I can getup to 60. My mom's Nissan Versa is pretty decent. She averages 32 in town, 36 on long highway trips, and has 4.5 for her emissions. My boyfriend's Geo Metro is best, though. 50 miles to a gallon on an average day, 70 when we went across the desert, and 3.2 emissions. Let me know how you guys do. It would be refreshing to hear it, since all we have in this area, it seems, are enormous SUV's and pickups with loud mufflers/tailpipes. Peace and Love!
I ride my Kawasaki KLR650 motorcycle...its the SUV of motorcycles and gets somewhere near 55 MPG or better on the highway.
yeah i love the scooters and motorcycles and stuff like that. i actually forgot to add that my dad drives a yamaha vino scooter....he gets about 100 mpg on the highway, but the interstate is a harrowing experience. :uhoh2:
sunnycynic, thanks for the information about those cars. While I was aware of the efficiency of the Geo Metro, I didn't know that the Saturns were efficient. Personally, I feel that efficient cars are great for improving our efforts for the short term, but in the long run, we even manufacturing cars is a problem.
It sure would be nice if they could make an efficient pickup.I got a 1990 f150 with a 5.0 in it & I'm lucky to get 15 mpg.makes me miss my old vw rabbit,but it would be kinda hard to haul tools & lumber around in that.hopefully we'll get better with ethanol & other renewable fuel sources
yeah, the older saturns, manufactured from the time they began as a company until i guess about a couple years ago, were awesome. they're very efficient. the newer ones aren't as conservative in their fuel use, though they are better than most of the vehicles on the road today. longhair, you are so right about the pickups. there is no excuse, you know? the technology is there, the automakers are just sucking the dicks of the oil companies. i guess your only option would be to get one of those sprinter vans that daimler-chrysler makes. they claim to achieve around 32 mpg.
I drive an '04 Jetta GLS. I get at least 35mpg... and even better if you get a TDI. Some of the new mercedes turbodiesels they're working on right now are getting 80-100mpg at 55mph to 65mph. They both have 1.9 liter TDIs, mine is a 2.0 liter, the new ones have up to 2.5, and they make the V6 (VR6) editions. You really can't get much better than a German car with a diesel engine, when you can use biodiesel... and the good thing about biodiesel is that you can get a tank and pre-order massive quantities at a fixed price rather than have to worry about how much gas is going to cost you next month. Hybrids totally work against the engineer's concepts--rather following the rose-scented fecal matter of the marketing industry, which wishes the general public to get on their knees for their overpriced hype, that of which, the government's tax return; I'm sorry, but unfortunately won't cover your hospital bills if the excessive amount of batteries explodes in a car accident, as well as polluting if they happen to take a spill and that vegetable oil is still alot cleaner than some half-assed pseudodream, of people who shit in one hand, and wish in the other. Stick to simple engineering... and it was also Mythbusters-proven. Daimler-Chrysler is also really nice these days. They used to be pretty squirrely, back before Daimler-Benz got involved... and I'm glad they brought the Sprinter over from Europe/Germany. Volkswagens are probably the most affordable, yet safe, and efficient cars you could ask for--right now they're having the 3 V-Dubs for under $17,000 (Jetta, GTI, and the Beetle) campaign going on. I've always liked that they weren't afraid to be traditional, yet progressive, at a fairly low costs... they've had some shitty expiriments (the fox, the rabbits could be squirrely, but the gas in those things are great). If I ever took in a notable sum of money, I would buy a few cars like that... or like an Audi TT Quattro or something and an old turbodiesel mercedes convertible from the 70s, and do the biodiesel deal. Instead of that Rolls-Royce, Maybach, or Bentley... why not just get just recycle and restore some cool old-ass cars like that, or diesels, and use bio, you know. If you ever wish to cut your throat and get a hybrid, please just wait at least five years, and rest assured, you're going to find them hitting 100mpg soon, but alas... they're already working on that with the biodiesel concepts and even with top-of-the-line Mercedes models, as well as the lower-priced conceps (think E-class), and Volkswagen has developed V-10s and V-12s that are getting way better gas mileage for the people that absolutely have to have that in a car/suv (Phaeton, Touareg).
Ethanol burns hotter... why do people want that, except that it's cleaner. In fact, some of the cheaper gas stations (such as mapco, wawa) have been using Ethanol for a long time, which is why if you go to Citgo or Shell or BP, Texaco, etc. your gas would have generally lasted longer, but now they use up to 15 percent ethanol minimum, I do believe. The only good thing is that the money could be able to go back to your country and support the families and corn farmers and people who are the ones who really deserve and could use the money, unless, of course, the industries just grow their own on their own land in some ridiculous location like Brazil or somewhere.
in a few weeks well be converting this to run of veggie oil. used french fry oil, it already has solar & a eficient gas backup i might wanna add more pannels cuz wouldnt mint a lil lan with sat net... otherwise wont be postin alot eventualy wouldnt mind goin electric (thats a lotta area u could cover with pannenels.. & have a veg deisel backup generator.... could maybe get what 80 of throw away oil? who knows... i wanna try it
