Another thread on the subject of durability of diesel engines but I didn't want to hijack someone else's thread.
Lots of discussion on here about durability of modern diesel engines. But IMHO, the ones who use them more than anyone else, and who rely on them for their income, are taxi drivers. And they probably have the worst driving pattern for diesel engine failure ie stop start city journeys.
Where I live most of the private hire cars are Octavia diesels, but what sort of engines are in the traditional London taxi type / hackneys? Why do these not all fail due to EGR issues? What have they got (or not got) that your average diesel car doesn't have?
Just intrigued how the advice that always seems to appear is to prevent any problems, avoid stop/start journeys and floor the throttle occasionally. Total opposite from what taxis do?
|
www.lti.co.uk/tx4/engine/ Italian - 2500cc - common rail 16 valve.
|
"common rail"
Shouldn't that read "common fail"?
You would think taxi-drivers would know better.
And all those Octavia taxis - they are probably "common fail" as well.
--
Phil
|
And all those Octavia taxis - they are probably "common fail" as well.
Octavias have VAG PD engines, so no CR there. It will be interesting to see what happens to Skoda when VAG do move to CR -- a good half of the cars sold in the UK are Octavias used as cabs, and if the cab drivers move away from them if the new engines are less reliable, this could seriously dent Skoda in this country, much more so than VW who rely more on fleet sales, where engines blowing up under warranty isn't quite as serious an issue.
|
|
|
|
|
The old Fairway cabs used to have a Nissan 2.7l engine, and before that an old BL lump.
|
Wasnt the BL lump a perkins?
Re BobbyG's comment about Taxis being the worse type of use for diesels, its not the case.
In london black cab diesel engines dont turn off for 16 hours let alone get cold - Perfect.
------------------------------
TourVanMan TM < Ex RF >
|
'Wasnt the BL lump a perkins?'
I used to think that, but was recently told it was based on the 'O' series (1.7L, 2.0L Princess, Ital, Ambassador). Perhaps someone could put us right?
|
|
Transit engines were used at one time.
|
The boxy Metrocabs of the 80s and 90s, with the fibreglass bodies, used 2.5Di Transit engines.
The traditional Fairways of the time used a 2.7 litre Nissan diesel, as did the replacement for a while, I think.
I'd heard that some modern cabs used the newer 2.4 Transit engine, not sure if that ever happened though.
Best history page of various designs of London taxi variants I've come across is this:
www.austin-rover.co.uk/index.htm?ado6indexf.htm
Interesting to see how we nearly ended up with a Range Rover based version, and to see outlandish luxury and stretch version of the classic shape too!
|
|
|
|
I think that Perkins made an engine out of the O series around about 1980: In the event, the story goes that the only part which they kept were the valve guides.
The diesel lumps in black cabs pre dated this by 20 years or so, I guess?
|
I thought the "London Taxi" had been fitted with every diesel ever made, at one time or another.
Perkins, Autin-Rover, Nissan are three that come to mind but there probably are many more.
|
|
In Berkshire the most common diesel taxi cars are probably Toyota Avensis, Peugeot 406 and VAG diesel Passat/Octavia. But I think Avensis 2.0TD and D4-D outnumbers the rest!
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
£25,654was £26,501Details
£28,783was £29,000Details
£33,750was £34,500Details
£17,471was £17,956Details
