Diesel vs petrol

[56OctyVRS]

Buy a cheap run around and keep the GTi for best. The difference between modern day petrol and diesel is coming down. Although I no longer have a VAG car, my 1.6 turbo petrol Titanium Focus does upto 56mpg with just under 200bhp. If you need to buy a diesel, look at other car brands as there are some fantastic cars out there that don't command the premium of Golfs. Hence why I moved to Ford as I needed to cut down fuel costs from my Octy  VRS mk2 TFSi, but did not want to switch back to a diesel or pay over the odds for a car.

[Whitt_tdi]

Dpf's are crap and will cause you problems on higher mileage diesels or if you do a lot of short trips. I found this out when I bought my gt tdi that had 128k on it. It's now been removed and a stage one map and it's great now.  215bhp and 352ft / lb after the stage one map. Diesels are great but if you want the out and out power then it's probably gotta to be a gti. Golf diesels have always held there money well there is some mk4's out there that people are asking mk5 money for

[sub39h]

Before I went back to uni in 2012 I was considering getting a new car - when I compared the diesel I wanted and the equivalent petrol (A5 3.0TDI vs A5 2.0TFSI - both DSG quattro variants, same sort of power and on-paper performance), I worked out that it would have taken 4 years of diesel ownership with my circumstances to see a saving when factoring in initial purchase price, fuel, servicing, tax, insurance etc. etc. Diesel isn't always the cheaper option.

As it stood I did go back to uni so I kept my A3 2.0TFSI. My wife has a A3 1.9TDI. Mine will do 440mi on a tank. Hers does around 600mi on a tank. So my car is roughly 25% less fuel efficient. But diesel costs maybe 10-15% more to buy. When comparing mine and my missus cars, I'd very gladly pay a few more pounds a month in fuel and have a car with twice the power that is more fun to drive. It is a no brainer for me.

Diesel isn't the be all and end all. In a lot of situiations they can be really great, absolutely no doubt about that. But people need to sit down and work out whether it is the best option for them. In a lot of cases it isn't. 

[Shoduchi]

Diesel isn't the be all and end all. In a lot of situiations they can be really great, absolutely no doubt about that. But people need to sit down and work out whether it is the best option for them. In a lot of cases it isn't.

That's what matters really. Do the math before buying a new car.

[J400uk]

Dpf's are crap and will cause you problems on higher mileage diesels or if you do a lot of short trips. I found this out when I bought my gt tdi that had 128k on it. It's now been removed and a stage one map and it's great now.  215bhp and 352ft / lb after the stage one map. Diesels are great but if you want the out and out power then it's probably gotta to be a gti. Golf diesels have always held there money well there is some mk4's out there that people are asking mk5 money for

The DPF on a 2.0 TDI can hold a maximum amount of 175ml ash, after which it needs replacing. You'd expect to accumulate 10ml every 10,000 miles approximately, so roughly speaking I wouldn't be expecting mileage related DPF problems until the car is on 175k miles or thereabouts. This can be checked in VCDS measuring blocks.

During the week I mostly use mine on short town journeys unless I'm heading on site outside London. I find I do enough long distance driving to counterbalance the short runs that the DPF never gives me any aggravation.

I was considering removing it when I get the car remapped but I'm starting to wonder if there's actually any benefit to justify the cost in doing so.

[xjay1337]

My Scirocco's DPF had 119k on it when it was removed and was completely healthy and normal.

As above, you can measure on VCDS and estimate remaining.