Short journeys

You might consider an engine electric pre-heater, such as this one:

need access to an electric mains. Expensive but it can betransferred to subsequent cars. This sort of device is very popularin Canada. It's the first aftermarket gadget that gets installed there. As has been suggested, the exhaust catalyst will need to be replaced earlier.

Hybrids, which are eminently more suitable, have also been suggested. Apart from Toyota and Honda, now Vauxhall has also come into this market.

Forgot to add: If you use your car that way, the engine oil is said to be in 'severe service' in the oilman's jargon. Consequently a very short oil change interval is in order. How short? That depends on used oil analysis (£20) to be precise.

:-\ I knew this the other way round. Unburned diesel washes off the lubrication in the cylinders ... then has less chance of evaporating from the oil resulting in thinner oil. Right/wrong?

Charles

We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the drugs began to take hold. I remember "Charles C." saying something like:

Right, but that's easily countered by changing the oil more frequently. In the meantime the diesel hasn't washed the bores like petrol would.

You're assuming its internal combustion engine doesn't start for the entire journey? The one I drove did - even on a short journey.

Unburnt petrol is the worst for washing oil off the bores. As regards contaminating the oil it's more the byproducts of combustion on a diesel that mean it needs more frequent oil changes.

Did you stick it into city mode?

Dad demonstrated that in city mode his Prius will drive to and from the freeway to his house (around 1.5 miles) without using the petrol engine... in the morning and in the evening.

That surely depends on the state of charge of the batteries? It can't run on them all the time. Of course if you have a short town run followed by a long open road one you will end up with charged batteries.

In city mode, providing you don't use more than somewhere around 50% of throttle pedal position and keep the speed below 31 mph, it uses the electric motor only.

But, yes. Dad gets somewhere over three miles running on battery only, that's without deliberately charging the batteries. Typically, the current generation Prius sits with its battery meter showing between 50% to 60%. If you deliberately charge the batteries such as going down a gradient or whatever, you can put the battery meter up to full and then you get a materially better range on batteries.

Now of course you need to put the Prius into city mode for this, but Dad also does this at the other end of the commute. He essentially gets around six miles a day running on batteries only plus whatever other benefit he has on the freeway. Those six miles a day isn't too much in the 45 mile commute, but assuming the Prius gets the same mileage as a turbodiesel over the same route, you get 13% for next to nothing. 'Course the Prius does need to recharge the batteries but it does this slowly rather than spends a couple of miles working the petrol engine hard to recharge the batteries.

Now of course, Dad's modified his driving to suit this, since the route from home to the freeway involves 25, 35 and 45 mph speed limits, 'cept he'll stick to 30.

Unfortunately (for many reasons) I own the business.

In which case, there's no reason not to take those few extra minutes walking home for the car.

Why not leave the car at work & walk home?

Or buy a bicycle.

Isn't there? How could you possibly know that?

As it happens I have been planning to jig my days to allow for more walking/bicycle trips between home/work/PO (which is probably going to close) but as it is it is freezing, pissing down, the phone at work is always ringing, there are two of us doing the work of at least 3 and much of what we do has a tight deadline so for the time being at least I would enjoy the comfort of having the car outside the front door.

So do you have an opinion regarding my original post?

Rather prickly, aren't you?

Driving a few hundred yards to work is a pointless exercise. Warming the engine up for a few hundred yard drive is equally pointless. Doing what they did in the Nissan advert a few years ago, driving X number of miles from A and back to point A, may be entertaining but here, it's pointless.

Thing is you did ask Usenet for opinions and we've given 'em...

You own the business, so no-one is monitoring how you work or the time you put in.

I have, but you don't appear to like the answer I'd give, so I won't bother.

I do. I'm fat and not particularly athletic, yet can easily manage a 3mph average walking speed without feeling even slightly stressed. There are

1760 yards in a mile. You say that work is "a few hundred yards" from home. Let's call that 400 yards. 400 yards at 3mph walking speed is 4 minutes 32.72 seconds. It's probably doable in 4 minutes. Or you could get a push-bike and easily do it in under a minute. Or you could simply buy brand new cars, and chop them in when the warranty's up and happily line the car manufacturer's and dealer's pockets, but have very few worries about car wear and reliability, and drive it how you like, and do as many short journeys as you want. Probably won't be an issue within the warranty period.

Im not prickly at all.

I would genuinely enjoy Steve's opinion on the question I asked rather than whether I should make the journey.

I asked nobody whether I *should* make the journey.

You bothered to answer a question I didn't ask, but won't answer the one I did.

That's odd that is.