CL6

Some guy got arrested for not paying those taxes and there was a huge lawsuit. I read this about 2 years ago. I'm sure with some digging on Google you could find it.

TampaRLX-SH

IRS Update


... the current alternative motor fuel issues addressed during the last year, including biodiesel fuel. The IRS regards biodiesel as a taxable fuel; however, since biodiesel does not contain paraffin, it is considered an "excluded liquid" and is not taxed under Internal Revenue Code (IRC) section 4081(a). Currently, biodiesel is taxed only when blended with another fuel or delivered into the fuel supply tank of a truck or train.

http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/policy/23scmin1.htm

Grease is the word, the word that you heard......

black label

Here's a link to an Article in the Boston Phoenix from a few months back. They start talking about the legal issues of running a grease car on page 3, however, the whole article is rather interesting.

http://new.thephoenix.com/Article.aspx?id=50826&page=3

Rexorg

http://money.cnn.com/pf/features/lis...ces/price.html

Mike_TX

I read recently that we use approximately 380,000,000 gallons of gasoline A DAY in the U.S.

That's one helluva lot of used grease, so I hope all you guys aren't planning on using it for fuel ... the cost of french fries will skyrocket.

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black label

I'm pretty sure you are joking about the cost of french fries, but in reality, it should lower costs.

Restaurants are paying someone to take this used oil away to the rendering plant. If someone is willing to take it away for free, they are usually pretty happy about it. The RL "grease lightning" edition would acutally lower their overhead, whether they would turn the savings over to the consumer is a different story.

Mike_TX

Actually I'm not just joking. Just look at how the price of corn went up now that we're using it for ethanol production.

But there are other issues, too. According to figures gleaned from Wikipedia, the annual "production" of used cooking oil in the U.S. from all sources - if all of it were turned into biodiesel (impossible, of course) - is only enough to satisfy about 1% of our fuel needs. And used oil is used for other purposes, too, so there's obviously no way all of it would ever be turned into biodiesel.

So, even if we were wildly optimistic, let's say it might take care of 1/4 of 1% of our fuel needs. Not very promising, except maybe for the backyard chemist who wants to make his own.

In fact, it's almost like the ethanol issue - if every available acre of farmland were pressed into service for the growing of corn for ethanol, it might account for 15% of our current gasoline usage. Again, not exactly the Big Solution.

In fact, this is one of the things that bother me about diesel for the U.S. market - it's fine as a supplement to our gasoline usage, but it isn't the answer to our fuel needs by a long shot. Diesel is produced as part of the refining process, and unfortunately, all of a barrel of oil can't be made into diesel. So diesel production is naturally limited along with the oil supply, just like gasoline, and most of the diesel supply is already spoken for by industry.

A diesel Acura would certainly appeal to a lot of you, but I'd just caution you not to think it's some kind of magic bullet that will solve our fuel supply issues. That will require drilling and production HERE in the U.S., as well as developing alternative (non-petroleum) fuels and engines.

No politics here - just a dose of reality.

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LukeaTron

I don't think there's any one that believes diesel is any kind of solution. I think with the new CAFE standards though, it's going to appeal to the manufacturers as it factors into their fleet economy. I'm not exactly sure about the specifics of that though.

At any rate, it's an appealing near term fuel source but the real, long term solution has to cut any carbon emitting fuel supply out of the picture.

Now where did I leave my Mr. Fusion...

Mike_TX

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TampaRLX-SH

The TSX looks to be 1st. Makes sense the 4 cylinder diesel is aleady launched in Europe.

http://www.autoweek.com/apps/pbcs.dl...7646/1609/FREE

Chas2

For what it is worth, TOV has an article in rumors and news section that announces the TSX as the first i-DTEC car in the US. It will not be part of the 2009 TSX launch vehicles, but sometime later in 2009.

http://www.vtec.net/news/news-item?news_item_id=734677

Mike_TX

I thought all the scuttlebutt was that it would show up first in a Civic!

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larrynimmo

For my business, I just bought a new Dodge Sprinter van with the MB diesel and powertrain. The engine is a 3.5l diesel V6. Wow, this engine was very, very quiet. You would not think it is a diesel. With a little noise and vibration, it reminds me of a gasoline I4 engine. Not a lot of HP, decent torque and unheard of fuel economy.

All of my other diesel vehicles have been Ford Powerstrokes. Hopefully this will be more reliable. This basic Federal Express looking plain white vehicle costs more than our RL's.

larrynimmo

this MB diesel is pretty high tech and produces unbelievable fuel economy, with no smoke or odor whatsoever. This motor has less than 200 HP. The MB e320 blue tech diesel has about 1 second less 0 -60. Are you willing to pay more for a fuel economy diesel that will drop your acceleration

Mike_TX

How unbelievable is unbelievable? I know this is a commercial van, but can you compare the mileage to your gasoline vans and give us some numbers?

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carlover22

I can not imagine anyone who takes driving seriously driving a diesel anything! I could see the RL as a hybrid IF Honda can create a hybrid engine that delivers good performance.

LukeaTron

You seem to be stuck on the diesel engines of years past. New diesel engines are completely different beasts that pour out torque across the entire rev range. It's a mistake to dismiss the idea so readily. Look at Audi that won (handily) the last LeMans with a diesel engine. How much more serious about driving can you get?

Mike_TX

Luke, that's not a good example. First, racing engines and street engines have little in common. The Audi R-10 "... is powered by a turbocharged all-aluminum 90° V12 with common-rail direct injection that generates 650bhp and 811 lb-ft of torque in competition form. The power band lies between 3000 to 5000 RPM, a range so low as to be virtually unheard of in modern race cars. But its primary weakness is weight: the engine is rumored to weigh upwards of 200 kilograms, about 50% more than a comparable petrol-powered engine."

Secondly, (and I quote again) "The concessions afforded diesel-powered cars at Le Mans this year are numerous. Compared with a turbocharged gasoline-fueled car, the diesels enjoy a 50-percent larger displacement limit, a 52-percent larger intake restrictor, and an absolute boost pressure limit nearly twice as high. Additionally, the diesels are allowed variable nozzle turbines in their turbochargers. It is also rumored that Audi successfully lobbied to raise the minimum weight to accommodate the R10's massive powerplant."

The diesels that we'll see in passenger cars will indeed be cleaner and more efficient than diesels of old, but with the new CAFE standards, we can probably expect engines with modest hp/torque output, and they'll most probably show up mainly in smaller cars and in trucks and small SUV's.

IOW, I'll be surprised if they ever threaten the gasoline engine for mid-size or larger cars, and certainly not for cars offering much in the way of performance.

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larrynimmo

the gasoline trucks that we have (loaded with parts & tools) get 30 to 40% less fuel mileage than our diesel trucks. The down side of our diesels is that there are very few people to work on them, and repairs have been astronomical.

With the Dodge Sprinter we are hopefull that with the MB reliability we will have a very fuel efficient engine/powertrain that can go 250,000 miles without a major repair. Every Ford diesel in our fleet has had major work performed under 150,000 miles. Injector failure, oil cooler heat exchanger, high voltage injector wiring harnesses burning up, oil leaks. On the old 7.3 L, we had glow plug relays failing every year. On our manual shift models, flywheels would come apart.

There are so many things I like about the Ford F350 with powerstroke, I just wish it wouldn't tear up so much, or cost as much as it does.

Mike_TX

30-40% is a meaningful difference, even when diesel is running 40 cents a gallon more than regular gas!

"They" claim the recent powerstrokes (6.4-liters) are far better than the last-generation 6.0-liters, but Ford lost a lot of friends with that engine. The old 7.3 was considered by most to be their best diesel.

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TampaRLX-SH

http://www.egmcartech.com/2008/02/11...eline-and-mdx/

Hinting of the V6 diesel for the RL and TL as well.

carlover22

The idea is to substantially reduce the dependence of foreign oil, not create another way to use it. The automobile industry could produce a hybrid or fuel cell engine that would rival the characterisitcs of a high performance combustion engine allowing us - auto enthusiasts - to still enjoy our cars but pass by the pumps!

dwboston

Fuel cells aren't currently economically viable due to high production costs and a lack of infrastructure for hydrogen refueling. It's going to take a while to get there, and to convince people that they aren't driving a potential Hindenburg. And it's debatable whether hybrids do anything (especially right now) to reduce dependency on foreign oil. Hybrids are an intermediate step until fuel cells or some other petroleum-free technology is viable.

Chas2

A little OT, but take a look at the info on the progress of the Honda Fuel Cells. This is true R&D with great leaps forward in efficiency and packaging. From 1999 to 2006, power output is up 67%, weight decreases 67%, size decreases 61%. Very impressive. In the second link, look at the part 2 video

http://automobiles.honda.com/fcx-cla...ell/evolution/

http://vtec.net/news/news-item?news_item_id=722888



I agree that hybrids are an interim step, and what are we going to do with all those dead batteries?

Kind of like the compact fluorescent craze. Great stuff, energy saving, better though not great color rendering, and when the bulbs die, all that mercury going into the landfills, and eventually the ground water? I have a box with a couple of dead CFLs. In a few years, when I have more, I will take them to the local hazardous waste disposal site, but I doubt there are many who have been sensitized to this problem which accompanies any fluorescent tube, CFL or not.

Mike_TX

Some will disagree with me, but I just wish Honda would have made the Clarity more "normal-looking", instead of the uncomfortable humpbacked shape they chose.

Why hybrids and most other alternative-fuel cars have to look so weird (can you say "Prius", or "Insight"?) I can't figure out. I mean, people might actually be more willing to go for these things if they didn't look like they were from Mars.

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LuvMyTSX

I totally agree.

dwboston

The FCX Clarity is a low-production proof-of-concept vehicle. Making it look futuristic and different makes it stand out. Haven't surveys shown that hybrid owners want the vehicles to look conspicuously different to draw attention to themselves? Once hybrids and fuel cell vehicles are the norm I'll bet the designs are just like all other cars.

Wasn't one of the reasons that the Accord hybrid was criticized (beyond the fact that the hybrid was used to boost HP and not really MPG) was that it looked almost exactly like the regular Accord V6?

I love the V8, horsepower king getting riled by alternative energy car designs.

Mike_TX

I love the alternative energy guys getting riled by the V-8 horsepower king.

But actually, some of the car mag reviews I've read actually compliment Honda for making the Civic and Accord hybrids look "normal", as well as Toyota for making the hybrid Camry virtually indistinguishable from the regular one. Ditto for the hybrid Lexus models - RX, GS and LS. And, like me, they decry the cartoonish shapes they've bestowed on some of their other hybrid products.

Some "Greenies" love the attention they get from driving hybrids, but most just want to "do good for the environment" or whatever, and not make some kind of social statement.

The funniest thing to me, though, is how Prius drivers express their penis envy by trying to race us guys with regular cars ... guess they're trying to prove their toy cars really run.

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neuronbob

That is SO true. I can't tell you how many Priuses I see in the fast lane, driving 75 mph. THAT is so against the spirit of having a hybrid. So much for those guys "reducing their carbon footprint"!

krio

If the diesel will be a V6 3.5, similar to the FANTASTIC 3.0 biturbo of the BMW5, that is considered even better of the classical fuel one 306 hp, I am for the diesel in the RL!!
The 286 biturbo diesel of the BMW is fast as the classical biturbo BMW...
500 Nm of torque, big engine, good mileage consum., what you can ask more to a sedan?
the Audi has to launch this year 2 new 3.0L engine, both with 300 hp, one diesel and one not: the same power, but different Nm.
The only thing I don't like of the diesel engines is the awful sound it makes.

BUT!! the best car to get the Diesel in, is a big SUV. Than let's get for the MDX a new big diesel, and I'll buy it for sure...