Fancy a diesel corsa for more mpgzzz? Better keep it for 20 years.

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tummelv

tummelv

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Dunno how many of you read the sunday times but this article caught my eye from the In Gear section last Sunday.

Based on average miles per year they have calculated that the top 10 selling best cars in Britain can take on average a decade to recoup the fuel savings from a diesel after paying for the higher list price.

Their figures don't even take into account diesel specific repairs which surely you're gonna encounter after 20 years in a Corsa diesel! :p

Here's a link to a scan I made of it. Sorry it's a bit ghetto but my copy and paste skills suck. :D

http://i.imgur.com/0Pp03.jpg
 
I totally agree with the sentiment, however there is a slight issue I have with this particular piece of "research". In the small print in the corner you'll notice "the comparison is between the cheapest model for each fuel type".

In actual fact, the cheapest Corsa petrol is £9,495 list price for the "Expression" trim; however the diesel isn't available in this trim - to get a diesel engine you need to move up to the "S" trim which costs £11,625 for the 1.0 12V petrol engine. Amusingly as far as I can see the only thing you're getting for that extra £2,130 is remote central locking and electric windows...

Of course in my opinion this is all irrelevant because anyone who pays £9,495 for a 1.0 12V Corsa is absolutely mental.
 
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In case anyone can't see it at work it's calculated on UK national average mileage which the article says is 12k per annum, petrol at 137.3p and black stuff at 144.7p. The insignia pays off in 2.2 years as the best model.
 
The hose representation of fuel prices isn't accurate though - as the price actually went down in 2009 compared to 2008 :p

Other than that it makes perfect sense as people get too caught up in buying a diesel because it does 10MPG more than the equiv. petrol but don't take into account the cost to buy amongst other factors :o
 
It's easy to see how some get so caught up in the diesel hype. More and more people are leasing cars / buying on pcp and handing the car back so all they look at is a monthly cost for x number of months. The sums inevitably work out cheaper for a diesel motor (not least because diesel lease deals outnumber petrol by about 10 to 1).

I suspect if more were buying cars outright with their own hard saved, hard earned then £100 a year in fuel and £50 a year in road tax (made up figures, clearly) would pale into insignificance beside the increased cost to buy.

Not too dissimilar to people taking out a mortgage over 40 years to save £50 a month in payments who don't have a clue how much it adds on to the total.

Suppose i'm a bit hypocritical really as I own a diesel civic but don't do more than maybe 14/15k a year. I just wanted a well specced 5 door though and found the 1.8 unbearable to drive.
 
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Haven't we always said though that this is the case for someone who covers average mileage?

I thought it was well known that for these kind of mileages petrol is usually a better choice, but for higher mileages diesel becomes more worthwhile.
 
andrewdodd13 said:
I totally agree with the sentiment, however there is a slight issue I have with this particular piece of "research". In the small print in the corner you'll notice "the comparison is between the cheapest model for each fuel type".

In actual fact, the cheapest Corsa petrol is £9,495 list price for the "Expression" trim; however the diesel isn't available in this trim - to get a diesel engine you need to move up to the "S" trim which costs £11,625 for the 1.0 12V petrol engine. Amusingly as far as I can see the only thing you're getting for that extra £2,130 is remote central locking and electric windows...

Of course in my opinion this is all irrelevant because anyone who pays £9,495 for a 1.0 12V Corsa is absolutely mental.
Click to expand...

I thought thats the point, diesel engines are more expensive because most of the time you have to go up trim levels to get to it, and the engine itself is more pricey too.

Stealers make customers who want the mpgzzzz part with lots of money to get the diesel engines.
 
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Is this another article that completely ignores the comparison value of the cars in question after say 3 years?

So many times I've seen people say "the diesel costs £2k more new", completely ignoring the fact that it "might" retain 50-75% of that price difference after 3 years, meaning that the savings are being incorrectly compared.

Just as an example, my E91 petrol seemed to have substantially WORSE depreciation than an equivalent diesel, meaning that it cost the original owner not only more in fuel, but also more in depreciation.
Now, I haven't done the research on depreciation by fuel types, haven't got the time to investigate. For all that, to simply ignore that element of the total cost of ownership for a vehicle is just as bad as burying your head in sand.
 
Brookert said:
I thought thats the point, diesel engines are more expensive because most of the time you have to go up trim levels to get to it, and the engine itself is more pricey too.

Stealers make customers who want the mpgzzzz part with lots of money to get the diesel engines.
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Perhaps. However keeping the Corsa as the example, the only engine you can get in the Expression trim is the 1.0 12V. If you want any of the other petrol engines (there's 1.2 with Start-Stop which is rated at the exact same MPG) you still need to go up to the S trim level. I'd guess at reasoning being they produce a large quantity of these bottom-spec Corsas to sell to people who're looking for a seriously "cheap" (and I use that term knowing myself it's not cheap) finance deal. That's just a guess though, I have no evidence.

Also I should really walk out of this argument, I've had my car over a year and done 9k miles (changed circumstances). It's still not worked out extortionate compared to what I really wanted (Fiesta Zetec-S) but meh.
 
Mr_Sukebe said:
Is this another article that completely ignores the comparison value of the cars in question after say 3 years?
Click to expand...

It touches on it, i think the shocking thing is the guy who was looking at the golf, given the price between petrol and diesel it actually cost more to fuel.

So from that example (depreciation is a bit of a stab in the dark tho)
Petrol golf at £16k losing 50% in 3 years costs £8000
Diesel golf at £18k losing 45% in 3 years costs £8100 and more in fuel

Allow a bit of error above but there isn't going to be a lot in it, but you still need to find an extra £2k to purchase a nice new diesdagadaga. And then if diesel continues to rise in price faster than petrol then it could become quite a big difference in running costs.
 
Literally nobody ever considers that though, least of all people buying new Corsas and stuff. No consideration at all is given to residuals which is why they are all so shocked when the brand new Astra they paid £17k for is worth 50p 4 years later.
 
MikeHiow said:
Whilst i agree with the sentiment, One thing these people don't seem to consider is that despite the higher purchase price, a Diesel is usually worth more when you come to sell it.
Click to expand...

As the price difference between purchasing seems to be growing this is having less of an impact and while the 2nd hand diesel is worth more its not neccesarily enough to counter the increased purchase cost and your not saving much if anything on fuel...
 
I wanted to confirm the initial value price comparison before making a judgement on that article.

Checking the bottom end model specs does indeed seem to show a significant increase for the diesel version - although as already pointed out in this thread they aren't like for like spec vehicles.

However, not all like-for-like cars follow this trend. Lets look at some alternative vehicles with various spec levels:

Exhibit 1:
VW Golf GTD £24650 (170hp)
VW Golf GTi £25320 (211hp)

Exhibit 2:
Audi TT quattro Roadster Tdi Sport S-Tronic £29020 (170hp)
Audi TT quattro Roadster TFSI Sport S-Tronic £29240 (211hp)
(unable to compare the diesel with the cheaper 160hp 1.8 petrol as they don't do the petrol in 4wd, or the diesel in 2wd according to the configurator)

Exhibit 3:
BMW 320d M Sport saloon £29895 (184hp)
BMW 320i M Sport saloon £27780 (170hp)
Quite a big increase here - possibly to maximise the profit from fleet purchases?

Tried a Jag XF, but then realised they only do diesels apart from the uber 500hp+ models

Exhibit 4:
Honda Civic SE 2.2 i-DTEC (Diesel) Manual £20,095 (150hp)
Honda Civic 1.8 i-VTEC (Petrol) Manual £17,995 (142hp)
Quite a big increase on the diesel.

Exhibit 5: (lets go wild)
Porsche Cayenne Diesel Tiptronic £46,338 (245hp) (39.2 mpg) (0-60 7.6s)
Porsche Cayenne S Petrol Tiptronic £56,301 (400hp) (26.9 mpg) (0-60 5.9s)
Not really comparable in terms of performance - but they don't provide the price of the 300hp non-S petrol as its "special order" whatever that means.


Factoring in the relative resale value generally gives a bonus in favour of the diesel. I don't agree with the argument that modern diesels cost more to run than petrols. Both generally come with dual-mass flywheels, a number of petrols are being fitted with a turbo and a direct injection system just the same as diesel, and then on top you have the maintenance of the ignition system which is always going to be more complicated on a petrol.
 
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