More New York Diesels

Diesel fuel now costs about the same as premium gasoline. At that price, if you need a large SUV, diesel is a no-brainer.
Here Is an Audi Q7 TDi parked/planted on 56th street on Monday







And here is the rest of it.

Yellow Oil Burner

Changing times, a VW Jetta TDi yellow cab in Manhattan.




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"A track day is the Ultimate Sunday Drive"

...or for that matter, any other day of the week in our books! 

One thing I'm not clear about, the Euro spec BMW 330d claims 50 mpg while the US spec 335d with a touch more horsepower and marginally quicker performance gets about half the milage? 

Perhaps BMW might have considered the 330d in order to better highlight Diesel's "green" advantages. The 330d and 335d both have 3 liter turbo engines, not sure if one is just a detuned version of the other or if they are different enough that they would need to be crash tested separately. In the latter case then you have the answer to the riddle since it makes no economic sense to go though the homologation process for two diesel engines in the US.

Marketing considerations aside, Vicky Butler-Henderson proves once again she's the tracktard's perfect date!






And here is the rest of it.

The Diesels are coming... Audi Q7 Tdi.

Sorry for the crappy iPhone picture but I saw a flotilla of Audi Q7 Tdi Monday in New York City, a press event I'm sure.

BMW is also about to roll out an X5 diesel next month. What do our US readers think, interested?








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Finally!!

Call me crazy but I find this exciting: BMW will finally be making available their wonderful diesel engines in US market vehicles in the fall.   The X5 will finally start making sense and a 335d wagon would be a fantastic family car type thing.

By the way, The Freep was first to notice that in a recent well circulated rave review of the BMW 135i, Jeremy Clarkson made a basic mistake with his understanding of the BMW 3.0 twin turbo gasoline engine.   

In the article he describes the two turbos as being of two sizes, one smaller and more easily spun for low r.p.m. and a larger for added thrust once the engine is up to speed.   In fact the 3 liter turbo has parallel turbos of equal size.   

What Clarkson did do is perfectly describe the BMW 3.0 liter Diesel 6.   At 265 HP and 425 lb-ft @ 1750 rpm BMW claims 23/33 mpg in the 335d and a slightly disappointing 19/25 for the X5, but then again not bad considering it weighs as much as a 50' Hatteras convertible.  

The engine is quite clean because of a process I was not familiar with,  urea injection. 

The Diesels will have an auxiliary tank for the urea solution (AdBlue in marketing terms) which when sprayed into the exhaust system will help turn nasty nitric oxides into nitrogen and water vapour.  Not really clear how involved replenishing the tank is but that's  certainly not an issue during the free service period.

Anyway....  sorry about this sensible motoring interlude, back to your regularly scheduled motoring insanity!