Safe Speed Forums

If I got a 3.2l V6 in my car, does that make it less hamfull than smaller engine in a 4x4.

length 4223mm

width 1729mm

height 1442

weight 1220 kg

transmission type manual

engine size 3.2

engine power 250BHP

CO2 emissions 287 g/km

fuel consumption ?

list price £20000

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Oct 11 Birmingham Half Marathon. I am running for the British Heart Foundation.
http://www.justgiving.com/Rob-Taylor

? The M5 outputs less CO2 than the Range Rover - neither output less than a Focus. My point is, the Range Rover is a 300 horse V8, the M5 is a 500 horse V10 and does better fuel economy and outputs less pollutants. It's much the same across the board, Land Cruiser Amazon, Volvo XC90, etc.. all have shitty powerplants which drink petrol like visitors to a club 18-30 resort drink Carlsberg.

WHY would you want to stop-start a vehicle that returns 12 mpg the four miles a day to and from the office? It's just an extraordinary waste of resources.

You are taking about the most extreme example. And you still haven't answered my question about where you draw the line as to what is unacceptable.

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"Show me someone who says that they have never exceeded a speed limit, and I'll show you a liar, or a menace." (Austin Williams - Director, Transport Research Group)

Any views expressed in this post are personal opinions and may not represent the views of Safe Speed

The trouble with 4X4's is that they're shit.

For any given amount of money, be £1000 or £100,000, you will get a better car.

They are slower than a normall car, ( a 3.5 Cayenne has the same performance as a DIESEL Civic that costs half the price. I can't belive Porsche lowered themselves to build a 4x4, kind of like Foo Fighters doing a James Blunt tribute album)

More expensive to buy, own, fuel

Everyone thinks you're a tosser,

Won't go around corners as well as a normall car.

And, like it or not are shit tow vehicles. (the weight is on the wrong place and has too much leaverage on the drawing vehicle)

Just who in the name of gods trousers can get 36mpg out of an suv and while towing. Balls. 20 if you're lucky. Ford F350 Super Duty's do 9 to the us gallon.

Oh, my 4x4 is bought to keep my little darlings safe. Well, if you stopped crashing they'd be safer.

I'd rather scoop my own eyes out with a spoon than drive a car that can't decide weather it's a car or a tractor.

The most extreme example is also one of the most popular examples.

Where do I draw the line? When the negatives outweight the positives by more than 2 to 1. Use my easy-to-read guide below when choosing your next city car!

1. Fuel economy, less than 25mpg.
2. CO2 emissions > 250
3. Size, anything bigger than an Audi A4/3series/Vectra style thing.
4. Engine size > 2.0 litre both petrol and diesel.

I think that's more than accomodating personally! Lets take a look at some bad examples and better alternatives which lose out on very little except as status symbols.

Example 1 - need to take kids to school daily, commute to office, do large weekly shopping, visit parents, get stuff from B&Q, etc.. instead of buying the Range Rover V8, buy a Citroen Xsara Picasso 1.7D instead. The build quality is just as bad on both cars!

Example 2 - executive - likes a sporty look, needs to look good at clients, never used for anything except commuting to and from the office. Company car, usually a BMW X5 driver - instead change to an Audi A4 1.9 Avant SE sport diesel and save 220 quid a month company car tax, while enjoying Audi's superior quality and finish! You can fit almost as much in it and it will go off road as often as the X5 will!

I take it you've sold your 4.5L v8 bmw (that fails all 4 of your points) then? Actually, perhaps you'd like to explain why you ever bought it given the views your expressing here.

Nope, but I don't live in an urban area. I also didn't buy the car.

But whether someone lives in a city or a village is likely to make no difference to the overall variety of types of driving they are likely to do. As said before, even if you live in a city you are likely to need to make long-distance journeys carrying 4 or 5 people plus luggage.


Is that any one of of those, or all of them? Is, say, a Volvo S80 V8 4.4 (which fails on all four counts) a bad thing too?

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"Show me someone who says that they have never exceeded a speed limit, and I'll show you a liar, or a menace." (Austin Williams - Director, Transport Research Group)

Any views expressed in this post are personal opinions and may not represent the views of Safe Speed

Well that definitely sounds like "do as I say, not as I do"

So anybody who lives in an urban area (a term as yet, undefined) is only allowed a small car; congestion is not caused by the people who live there, but by the people who travel there to work/shop/etc.

So it is okay for you to have a gas guzzler, but not everyone else. Be carefull not to fall off your horse.

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Oct 11 Birmingham Half Marathon. I am running for the British Heart Foundation.
http://www.justgiving.com/Rob-Taylor

Hmm, found one that should be OK

1. Combined mpg 32.8
2. CO2 emissions 229 g/km
3. 5" shorter than a Mondeo estate
4. Does have a 3.0 litre engine, though...

Will that one be OK?

(it is of course a BMW X5 3.0d)

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"Show me someone who says that they have never exceeded a speed limit, and I'll show you a liar, or a menace." (Austin Williams - Director, Transport Research Group)

Any views expressed in this post are personal opinions and may not represent the views of Safe Speed

Actually that goes for AdamL's whole post. Brilliant.

Correction - Chelsea Tractors are shit. You also have to define 'better car'. I suppose it depends on your useage.



A Porsche Cayenne is as much a 4x4 as Iron Maiden are a soul band. Porsche may as well have built the same body shell and put a 2wd transmission in it.


Not far off the same on fuel as a petrol saloon. Granted slightly more expensive to buy, but no more expensive on tax or insurance. (Obviously I'm not talking about NEW cars here...)



Everyone KNOWS I'm a tosser, I don't need to reinforce it with my choice of car.



Yeah, fair comment.



This is where I have to STONGLY disagree. Im my experience, SUVs make far superior towing vehicles due to their weight. The weight of the trailer is far less likely to 'wag the dog' if the towing vehicle is heavier. Also, the average car will only have a towing capacity of 85% of its weight - so you're looking at less than a tonne for older cars (mine can tow 980kg) whereas most SUVs are plated to tow 3.5 tonne.

As I've already stated, our 4x4 only returned about 32mpg while we were towing in Cornwall. Get the two on the motorway and I'd wager that it'd be about the same as my saloon car - the aerodynamic difference when towing with a saloon car is huge as the trailer adds a hell of a lot more drag. However, with a flat-backed SUV, the trailer is almost completely in the wake of the towing vehicle and therefore suffers less drag. (One of the aero engineers will probably tell me I'm wrong - its been a few years since I studied aerodynamics...)

Also, since the engine is bigger in the SUV it isn't under as much strain as my saloon.



Amen to that though!

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Science won over religion when they started installing lightning rods on churches.

Shall I put you down as a "no" then...?

Actually your post makes reasonable sense. You've explained the decision you've reached and the rationale behind it.

Now please leave everyone else alone to go through the same process!

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Ticketo ergo sum : I scam therefore I am!

I think I drive the Discovery more sensibly than when I am in my own "hot hatch". the fact that the disco is slow, doesnt corner well and is a visible presence on the road means I dont have to compete with the chavy souped up hatches at the lights or protect my lane because people can only drive in straight lines. Anyone who uses the M4 jct16 roundabout will know what i am talking about.....

I can see more of the road ahead, I can judge my breaking distances more easily, and i generally have more time to appreciate my surroundings because I am not trying to keep up with faster cars - I know I cant, so dont bother. In fact its more relaxing to drive than my normal daily driver.

If people want to try and cut me up when i am in the disco - good luck to em. I know who will come off worse.
we should all drive old tdi 4x4's - it could solve some of the "speeding" issues as it would take ages to get up to any decent speed.....almost impossible in "urban" areas.....

Yes, I've noticed that attitude in a lot of 4x4 drivers.

One pulled right out in front of me a while back, so I just steered round him and continued.

He promptly rang up up my work and complained and said something very much like the above. The subtext was very much "because I've got a scruffy old 4x4 I can drive how I like, and woe betide anyone who gets in my way because they'll suffer more damage"

Apparently my manager put the phone down and said "Tosser". No action was taken against me

johnnytheboy - unfortunate that that happened to you. My experience is that people WILL try to cut across me because i am a slow to accelerate vehicle. I do not condone vehicles pushing in front at the expense of others.

My "attitude" is one of - I am in the correct lane for where I want to go, if you try to "push in" because you are in the wrong lane/want to beat the queue then thats your look out.

I have lost count of the number of vehicles in the left lane (low volume of traffic) trying to push across three lanes of traffic to go right...

Ever tried to push infront of an HGV????

Gosh, that's a bit harsh. I'd have thought Safespeed supporters would be supportive of people who accidentally didn't see the signs telling them what lane they should be in (they could be mounted on the same poles as those other ones, what are they called, oh yeah, the SPEED LIMIT signs).

But of course, it's OK to ignore the SPEED LIMIT signs as they are only advisory, but to miss any other sign is unforgiveable.

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COAST Not just somewhere to keep a beach.

A young loner on a crusade to champion the cause of the innocent, the helpless, the powerless, in a world of criminals who operate above the law.

I'd hope that we could change lane without 'pushing in' when necessary.

But the original implication: I'd rather have a crash than let you in pal is pretty seriously wide of the mark too.

If I didn't want to let someone in, I'd adopt the 'bluff and cave' approach and get the best of both worlds. See http://www.safespeed.org.uk/forum/viewt ... 0143#40143

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Paul Smith
Our scrap speed cameras petition got over 28,000 sigs
The Safe Speed campaign demands a return to intelligent road safety

To be fair, I'm sure that's not the implication of the OP. The roundabout at J16 of the M4 is an absolute nightmare. The signage is poor as are the lane markings and there are several places where its not clear which lane you're SUPPOSED to be in.

On the other hand Scamper, I tend to find that people stay out of the way of me in my battered old Rover too.... possibly the glazed, slightly phsychotic expression and death metal blearing out of the sterio don't help matters....

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Science won over religion when they started installing lightning rods on churches.