I agree, my current boss does this all the time. He searches high and low to find 1 study to back up his bizaar beliefs and then pushes them on us. Within minutes I can usually provide dozens of studies that point the other way. In my early life I lost a job with a local laundry bleach manufacturer. The plant manager stayed late one night (I worked second shift) and caught me recyling a box (as I was told by the shift supervisor to do to keep it from gumming up the glue machine). The box was supposed to hold 4-1gallon bottles of bleach. The manager approached me and asked what I just did so I repied that I was recycling the box. He asked if I knew how much that box cost and when I replied that I didn't he said that it cost $5.35 -- so everyone defend the manager now, because boxes are expensive and I should have just reglued the box, right! Well obviously I said BS -- the bleach in the box sells for $0.79 per gallon retail. If the box cost you that much you would be losing $2.19 per box at retail, if there wasn't any other cost to make the bleach and bottle it. Of course even though I was right, I was fired
There has been no new refineries built because all of the old ones have been able to keep up with current demand. I have yet to go to a gas station and be told that they don't have any. Furthermore, to my knowledge there has been no thwarted attempts to stop construction of new ones. The only thing that environmentalists have done to stop production is to get regulations on the emissions outputs of new refineries -- the same standards that all new ethanol plants must follow.
im another that dont believe a 4 banger ranger will get 30 mpg. i had an 01 with the 3.0 v6, 19 was common, i got up to 24 mpg on a long distance highway trip with a vinyl cover. i hae been told by many that the 4 banger is underpowered and it only hurts the gas mileage. the same goes for many trucks, liek fullsize trucks with small v-6, they really dont get any better than the smallest v-8 option. id spend the extra 700 for the v6.
the smart car is coming to the US i think next year, they have been up here for a few years now and there 60+ miles to the gallon is looking pretty good to me, ok so they not sporty looking but why couldnt i swap out the engine into a nice little 27 track roadster, for a little engine they seem to have lots of guts as they pass me on the mountain i have to cross to get to the southern part of Vancouver island. no one would know what i had under a hood if i put a hood on it. the US gallon and imperial gallon are different, imperial gallon being some 15% larger so millage would have to be adjusted.
Now there is a quotable quote. Ranks right up there with '"speed costs money, how fa$t do you wanna go?"
The $3.25/mile of energy - Prius - is not just cost to operate, it's cost to manufacture the parts and batteries etc.... The $1.95/mile of energy - Hummer - is not just cost to operate, it's cost to manufacture the parts, etc.... Since the Hummer has no second powering system like the Prius, it doesn't cost as much to produce over all. I think that is what the article is claiming.
I have a 2000 four cylinder Ranger it won't do 30 mpg to save its life, if you do like 60-65 down the interstate you can get close to mid-twenties. The new ones have a different engine though (based off the focus engine as opposed to the old 2.3/2.5 like mine which has Pinto roots), so maybe it is better.
We grow those poplar trees here in northern MN they do grow like a weed. But they are all grown on land that was condemned by the counties and state so that the taxpayers pay the cost of ownership so that the paper factories don't have to shut down (and they still have). I back logging for other reasons related to hunting, but I doubt that when ALL of the costs of virgin timber are incorporated when making paper that the recycled doesn't save money/energy. A buddy of mine worked for a former local company that recycled paper. They shut down because the local haulers were landfilling the paper that went through the local recyling programs instead of selling it. My current boss's family was one of the haulers that was sued because when they got the contracts to do the hauling they were expected to sell the paper. I could even point out all of the charity organizations over the years that have made tons of money by selling used newsprint, because there was a HIGH demand for the CHEAPER overall cost of recycling. Most of this occurred well before the eco craze. If anything the whole environmental thing caused the RETAIL price of recycled paper to go up while the cost of recycling paper has gone down.
Don't take the article out of context. the actually quote is that its $3.25 of energy per mile for 100,000 miles. That is a total of $325,000 in energy costs for the Prius. In my math above at $3.00 per gallon if the Prius got 30 MPG for those 100,000 miles the Prius would burn $10,000 worth of gas for operating. So that leaves the total energy cost of making the Prius at $315,000. That MUST be BS because Toyota is in the business of MAKING money. They would NEVER sell a car that cost them $315,000 for $30,000. If they said that the Prius cost $4000 in manufacturing energy and the Hummer cost $2000 in energy I could buy the arguement, but thats not what they said, they said that the Prius total energy cost was $325,000, Impossible!
i posted this on another site but had to laugh when i read that the demos were going to CRACK down on the auto makers,make them make cars that get better mileage,aren't the auto makers the ones who a struggling with proffits rite now while the oil co. turn in new record proffits every damn 1/4. why don't they CRACK down on oil co. not the auto makers!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Ah ha, FINALLY, someone gets the gist of what I also thought the article was TRYING to get across. The Prius's BATTERY(s) is what ADDS the biggest cost. (and then; where do you dispose of the worn out ones??) But after all the "wrangling" it - the article - started; I'm sure glad that it wasn't ME that wrote it!!
Will the average $21 a week that you will save actually make that much of a difference in your daily life to justify getting the smaller motor.
I drive a 98 S-10 standard cab 2wd with a 2.2 Vortec 4, 5 speed, 3.08 gears, and no options. The best I have ever recorded is 23mpg around town, shifting at low rpm and hoping for flat ground. It's really slow unless you really rev it (partially due to the tall gearing) but it came with a company gas card, so I'll continue to drive it until it drops. With all the 30+ mpg auto platforms out there, it still amazes me that no one has brought out a small truck that will carry 500-600lbs or pull a 1500-2000 trailer. Trucks are run empty 95% of the time, and there should be one out there that will get 30+ empty, but there isn't.
That's becasue men buy trucks to haul shit not get good gas mileage. Don't you pay attention to marketing? j/k
Buy a Diesel and chip it if it is your daily or are there no small diesel trucks in the US? My wife runs a new Ford Galaxy people carrier (minivan) with a 1.8litre turbo diesel. On a 200 mile run it returned 47mpg and that was with me driving and pushing 85mph most of the way. After we had it chipped it did the same journey, returned 54mpg. Car now has an extra 40hp over stock and nearly 80lbft more torque. Point is, as I have to pay to fuel all of our cars, her getting that sort of mileage makes it easier for me to justify my 8mpg (if I am lucky) big block. And remember friends, we pay over $8 a gallon! P.
The problem is that right now producing veggies and grease creates more polution than the use of the products prevent. When you factor in the production of fertilizers the running of farm equipment the processing of the plant material etc you create more polution than you solve which is the point of Hybrids. So you are no better off and as Ray said as the technology improves there will be less waste in batteries etc with Hybrid cars.
My old '92 extended cab Ranger with a 3.0 V6 and an automatic got 21-22 mpg city/highway/uphill/downhill/AC on/AC off. That was the same gas mileage as my 4 cylinder '86 Mazda with a 5 speed manual. I have an issue with the idea of a Hummer lasting 300,000 miles. I have argued elsewhere that people only drive them to impress their friends, and that they will be too expensive to maintain as older vehicles. One there is no prestige in driving it, what would motivate someone to continue to pay the extra money for replacement parts (compared to a Chevy produced in large numbers, with good aftermarket support, for example) and gasoline? I think they will end up being scrapped with less mileage than the average SUV or car because their cost of ownership will be higher than other vehicles. The won't make good beaters. They will be like my Dad's '77 Jag XK12 that I sold for $300 after he died. No one wanted to mess with a beater Jaguar, not even one with a smallblock Chevy in it. It was no longer prestigious, and the fact that it was a high end vehicle was a hindrance as it got older. I eventually sold it to a buddy who pulled the drivetrain and sold the rest as scrap. Slonaker
Wow!!! I never expected to stir up such a storm of controversy with my "gasoline mileage" post. I guess time will tell if buying a 4 cylinder makes sense or not. I have been very happy with the V6 Ranger that I am getting rid of, but at $4.00 a gallon, and $7000 projected difference in fuel consumption, I think that it is a good move. Underpowered?---Maybe, maybe not. As I said, I use it more as a "car with a box attached" than as a truck. I make 3 or 4 major "dump trips" with it each year, and probably lug a peice of machinery around in it 4 or 5 times a year, but mostly its just getting me from "A" to "B". With the manufacturing sector in Ontario slowing down so much over the last year, I find that I am having to make more trips to the industial corridor along the North shore of Lake Ontario to access my customers, and the miles do add up. I will let you know what I find out
Its the other way around. The Mazda is a Ford Ranger the same way a Chevy Silverado is the same as a GMC Sierra. Grills, badges and dealers is about what is different between them. -Bigchief.
I'm hoping that with the new low sulfur diesel the U.S. will start producing smaller diesel trucks and cars. I would love to buy a ranger or F-150 with a small diesel engine in it, the mileage and engine life that you would get would be great! I've heard that Ford is supposed to be making one for the F-150 around 2010.
Actually, the same grease picked up by grease trap trucks can be filtered and used. There's gallons and gallons of the stuff to go around...
http://clubs.ccsu.edu/Recorder/editorial/print_item.asp?NewsID=188 "Through a study by CNW Marketing called Dust to Dust, the total combined energy is taken from all the electrical, fuel, transportation, materials (metal, plastic, etc) and hundreds of other factors over the expected lifetime of a vehicle. The Prius costs an average of $3.25 per mile driven over a lifetime of 100,000 miles - the expected lifespan of the Hybrid." Digger -- do the math again $3.25 per mile times 100,000 miles is $325,000 dollars -- the battery pack does NOT cost $325,000. The article and the study it was based on are total BS.
Well, damn, after reading posts from Ranger owners complaining of mediocre fuel mileage, I'm glad I drive beater S 10s! My '96 4.3/5 speed averages 24mpg on my 20 mile up and down hills drive to work, and gets second and third gear rubber when I'm in a festive mood. I bought the 2.2/5 speed trade in because it's identical to one my cousin has that gets 26mpg in town and 31mpg on the open road. If the best my 2.2 does is low 20s, I'll buff it, wax it, and invest 99 cents in a FOR SALE sign.
ah, those evil batteries... "How often do hybrid batteries need replacing? Is replacement expensive and disposal an environmental problem? The hybrid battery packs are designed to last for the lifetime of the vehicle, somewhere between 150,000 and 200,000 miles, probably a whole lot longer. The warranty covers the batteries for between eight and ten years, depending on the car maker. Battery toxicity is a concern, althoug today's hybrids use NiMH batteries, not the environmentally problematic rechargeable nickel cadmium. "Nickel metal hydride batteries are benign. They can be fully recycled," says Ron Cogan, editor of the Green Car Journal. Toyota and Honda say that they will recycle dead batteries and that disposal will pose no toxic hazards. Toyota puts a phone number on each battery, and they pay a $200 "bounty" for each battery to help ensure that it will be properly recycled. There's no definitive word on replacement costs because they are almost never replaced. According to Toyota, since the Prius first went on sale in 2000, they have not replaced a single battery for wear and tear." http://www.hybridcars.com/faq.html
We will probably see a lot more diesel vehicles in the states once the big three figure out a way to insure catastrophic engine failure within a year of the vehicle being paid off. Building vehicles that run for another 10 years after they're paid off isn't something they're going to get all wet over.
I had a '69 Mark III, 460 that would cruise at 90+ all day and easily get 20 mpg. Also a 312 in a '54 that would get close to 20 mpg. Made me feel better driving either one of those than my 1999 v-6 ranger that gets about 20 on the hiway. Of course in those days the engines had some compression and the regular fuel was better than today's premium.
The Jalopy Journal
