Biodiesel vehicle! Need help deciding. I am an auto-idiot!?

Question

Hey, I am looking into purchasing either a hybrid vehicle or a diesel vehicle (in a year or 2). My choices so far are the Toyota Prius, the VW 4-door Golf TDI, or VW Jetta Wagon TDI.

Since, as I said, I am not savvy when it comes to cars, I need some insight on what choices are out there, what's reasonable economically, and what is going to be easier to maintain, for the most part.

Any advice, comments, opinions are much appreciated, but keep the aloha!

Answer 1

Hybrids are very low-maintenance.  Diesels can be too, but VWs are notorious for breaking down a lot.  It's also hard to find diesel cars in the USA, and biodiesel can be hard to come by.  Plus you have to make some minor alterations to a diesel to be able to use biodiesel fuel.

The Prius is a pretty safe bet.  It's the cheapest and best hybrid available, and also the greenest car on the planet.

http://www.reuters.com/article/environme...

It's lower maintenance than a gas car because electric engines don't have moving parts that can wear down or break.  Plus its regenerative braking system saves the brake pads.

Although in a year or two there will be some cool electric vehicles and probably one plug-in hybrid which will be even more environmentally friendly than the Prius, if they meet your driving needs.

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;...

If you like the idea of a plug-in hybrid but don't trust a small company like Aptera (discussed in the link above), Chevy is also coming out with a plug-in hybrid (the Volt) in late 2010 (also around $30,000).

So there are lots of good options, but for an environmentally friendly and relatively affordable car, the Prius is a safe bet.

Answer 2

Definitely the hydrogen fuel cell car, it would be 10Xs better than the diesel. In two more years there will be better options for you so just hold off for now.

Answer 3

This is link is to biodiesel america. It is full of people that have or had diesel vehichles. What surprised me was the amount of cars that have over 200,000 miles. This was my favorite. 2002 VW Golf

"I bought my Golf with about 27k miles on the clock, poured a couple of jugs of B100 into it (the car salesman even helped me) and drove it off the lot. It's been running on nothing but B100 ever since. I changed the fuel filter according to the 30k service recommendation and have only performed scheduled maintenance. The car runs great, has zippy pickup and sips fuel. I have been getting between 35-40mpg in the city and 40-45mpg on the highway, and that's driving with the pedal toward the floor. My only complaint is that once in a while the engine light comes on in the dashboard but it doesn't appear to affect performance. Overall, this is the most practical car I've ever owned with the ability to carry 5 people, a full High Definition camera package, surf gear etc. - all on biodiesel. "

http://biodieselamerica.org/flexinode/ta...