4x4 overtake

Surf-Matt

I downgraded even more - bought a new (in 2005) Astra diesel albeit with the same torque as the R32 (but at 150bhp, a lot less power ). Oh well - the bikes fit in easily and it's been pretty useful. Also invisible to thieves.

Still have a 4x4 - but it's a 2005 Jimny!! About as fast as an old dear on a Pashley!

cee

Bassjunkieuk wrote:

For truly huge off-roaders you can't really beat the Hummer H2 and I have seen a few of those around when I was driving everywhere in my previous job role! They make some other 4x4's look like toy cars!

Oh they are mahoosive, look like they talk a good game, and are really shouty no doubt, but they are totally pants off road.

Bassjunkieuk

Surf-Matt wrote:

Strange fact - the environental impact (materials used, carbon footprint, etc) of a Hummer ans a Range Rover is under HALF that of a Toyota Prius due to the batteries in the Prius being so high in chemicals and being made all over the world.

I hate Priuis' with an almost unholy passion.

Guess I won't let on what my company car is then........one of the good bits about choosing a Prius (asides from the fuel economy and savings on tax) was that I was probably the first and only person to choose one so I was guaranteed a new car and not a second hand Avensis that had done over 100K! My Prius had 32 miles on the clock when I took ownership of her! Needless to say she doesn't get used much now except on the rare occasion I'm working on a site that to far to cycle - which is only one in Woking!

cee

Surf-Matt wrote:

Strange fact - the environental impact (materials used, carbon footprint, etc) of a Hummer ans a Range Rover is under HALF that of a Toyota Prius due to the batteries in the Prius being so high in chemicals and being made all over the world.

I hate Priuis' with an almost unholy passion.

Also, you get more miles per gallon with the new Diesel VW Polo!

Eat My Dust

Isn't there dedicated forums for boyra...ahum ahum car appreciaters.

Surf-Matt

Eat My Dust wrote:

Isn't there dedicated forums for boyra...ahum ahum car appreciaters.

Probably but it's not all that criminal having other interests outside cycling.

SmellTheGlove

Someone pressed my anti-Prius button.

Build a lab rig, style it like a budget domestic appliance, call it a car, then get your customers to do your testing for you. Great business model.

But then, working for a supplier to the electric/hybrid vehicle manufacturers maybe I shouldn't be so harsh?

nortones2

Surf-matt: the Hummer tale is a farago of nonsense, but despite being demolished, still gets recycled:) Main trick in the Hummer apologists fairy tale was the ratio of energy used in the build to energy consumed in the vehicles life. They switched the 15:85 ratio around to favour the <20 mpg Hummer, and gave the Prius a very limited lifetime. The batteries (all 168 x1.2 volts) use nickel, which has been produced for many years in the manufacture of steel etc. Battery usage is tiny as a proportion, and the nickel used is recyclable. I can't see why a car, that is fairly economical in comparison to the trucks the Americans favour, gets such a vehement reaction. Its just another car.

cee

Eat My Dust wrote:

Isn't there dedicated forums for boyra...ahum ahum car appreciaters.

The image in my head is now a load of "boyra...ahum ahum car appreciaters" hooning around in prius's and landrover defenders!

Eat My Dust

cee wrote:

Eat My Dust wrote:

Isn't there dedicated forums for boyra...ahum ahum car appreciaters.

The image in my head is now a load of "boyra...ahum ahum car appreciaters" hooning around in prius's and landrover defenders!

My post was more aimed at the R32ers. (R32/boyracers wet dream)

emdeef

As nortones2 said, this "study" showing 4x4s as environmentally friendly is nonsense. I did an OU course on sustainable energy last year, and I looked into a lot of stuff on life cycle analysis of cars, which is a method of trying to quantify energy inputs over the life of a vehicle. The first conclusion is that the bigger and heavier your car the more energy is likely to go into making it. The second is that most energy is used during the use phase when you actually drive the thing in the fuel you consume and the energy used to produce that, so economy really matters. Most studies seem to show that driving a car for ten years, say 9-10000 miles a year, you use ten times the energy taken to make it.

The Prius is not that different from a normal car except in its electronics, it weighs 1300 kg, the same as a 1.6 Focus and the battery pack is only 50 kg of that. A modern turbo diesel is also pretty sophisticated, think of that turbocharger.

My beef with hybrids is that they excel in urban driving, which is where we should be cycling, walking, using public transport etc., anything but driving.

Eat My Dust

emdeef wrote:

As nortones2 said, this "study" showing 4x4s as environmentally friendly is nonsense.

Can you give the list of environmentally friendly cars?

cntl

>>Can you give the list of environmentally friendly cars?

"An environmentally friendly car" may be an oxymoron, but it is certainly a matter of degree of damages caused, and there is large variation in that. I am buying a Smart soon (City-Coupe, 599cc) and the more I think about it, the more I am convinced I should have done it much earlier. In fact, I do not understand why we do not see that many of them, especially on crowded London roads. We see plenty of "tractors" (4x4 and the like) though. The world is mad.

attica

I followed a ghastly looking Nissan 4x4 the other day, it was all chrome and lo-pro tyres very spangy whilst also managing to look cheap and un-stylish, the sort of vehicle you laugh out loud at. The old couple who were perched inside it looked as if they were aspirational on a budget.

Hideous vehicle and environmental abomination!

redddraggon

On my loop this morning the only vehicles that did a text book overtake of a cycle was some one in a black range rover with tinted windows (I guess they're not all bad), however some idiot in a fiesta that was following the range rover gave me barely 6 inches (I ensured he got an appropriate hand signal)

always_tyred

Within reason, the most environmentally friendly car is a second hand one.

(But if you go and buy Chris Eubank's truck, the carbon emissions may soo outweigh those of building a new Smart car)






("I am a boxther. I boxth.")

cntl

>>(But if you go and buy Chris Eubank's truck, the carbon emissions may soo outweigh those of building a new Smart car)

LOL My new car will be second hand Smart! Can not beat that, can ya? LOL

pete236

I reckon my old girl has a pretty low carbon bootprint thingy - built in '73, 1275cc A-series engine does about 30 to the gallon. The only plastic on it is the distributor cap, oil filler cap and horn push/steering wheel centre! She'll go from Maidenhead to Brighton and back on one fill of the 25 litre fuel tank! (thats with no motorways or dual carriageways either!)