Quote:
Originally Posted by RogerM
Dan,
For a grand your not going to get much but you should, if you look hard enough, find a Passat or Golf with the AFN engine (110bhp in stock form). The AFN is the best "overall", all things considered, VW diesel engine. Yes the later PD lumps are hotter in stock form, yes the very recent common rail engines are as smooth as silk. None of those have the bang-per-buck that the AFN can give. The AFN was fitted from 97 to 2000 in Golf, Bora, Passat and Leon.
I know several people with 200K+ old AFN lumps running as sweet as the day they left the factory.
The other thing to consider is that running anything other than regular pump diesel in the PD engines is a bit risky and down right stupid in the common rail units.
Obviously you still have to pay the duty on veg oil if you do decide to run it. The rotary pump on the AFN will run 100% "biofuel" with no grief but the resulting performance and visual emissions will put you off ..... it's like sharing a tent with Doom .... a gradual wind up with an unpleasant exhaust odour! I have personally known people run 80% bio 20% diesel with no issues.
The 90bhp rotary pump engine is just about ok in the Golf but in the Passat it's just not man enough.
If you can find a later PD (Eelectronic Unit Injector based engine) then just make sure it's not the early 105bhp unit ..... its a dog in stock form as it was only really done to make a tax break in Germany! It was very quickly replaced in the UK by the 100bhp unit which was much more flexible and had far more mid-range torque.
The 115bhp units are good but you'll struggle to get one for £1K and they aren't as good on fuel as the older rotary pump based engines.
If you decide not to go VW based be careful and a lot of companies shared their diesels. If I had to make a choice of a non VW it would be either the Vaux' 1.7 TD (Iveco lump) or the Toyota (if you can stay awake long enough to complete the test drive .... all the chassis were crap).
Stay clear of the Nissans, Renaults and Volvos. The Pugs engine was no bad (talking about the HDi unit) but the normal warnings about French cars apply (but you had a 306 S16 IIRC so maybe you won't be so bothered).
Biggest things to look for are smoke on start up and smoke on lift off. A little bit on hard acceleration is common so don't worry about that.
With diesels I'd rather have a high milage car that has spent all it's time on motorways than a lower milage car that's been a town based shopping trolley. It is really important to let the turbo cool after a run, I normally either try to do the last mile off boost or let her idle for 30secs to a minute before switching off.
It's a said thing to say but now I've lived with a VW diesel estate for so long there is no way I could consider anything else for my daily driver!!!
|
what about the skoda fabia tdi or octavia tdi , all the same running gear as above but cheaper to buy than vw , audi ,ect