Are old cars greener? And if so . . . | Motoring discussion | Back Room Forum

Mon 13 Mar 2006 19:15

Are old cars greener? And if so . . . - tyro

what might (or should) the government do about it?

We all know that old cars tend to produce more noxious emissions than newer cars.

But, as has been pointed out at various points in the Back Room, most recently by the Lawman (in the Future of Luxury Cars thread) that (and I quote) "You can make a good argument that . . . much of a car's "carbon footprint" is created during manufacture" - and hence it could be argued that it is greener to keep an old banger going, even though it belches smoke, than to crush it and make a new one.

So - is it really more friendly to the planet to run an old banger and keep it going?

And if so, is anything doing anything about it?

I ask partly because I understand that some nations (Japan and Singapore are the places I have in mind) have regulations that strongly discourage the driving of older cars, on the grounds (I think) that these old cars are environmentally unfriendly.

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Mon 13 Mar 2006 19:31

Are old cars greener? And if so . . . - Hamsafar

The golden rule is - the man with the gold makes the rules.

Most enviro-hype is instigated by the wealthy and propagated by the poor. The concept of 'shopping for a better world' is the basis of the modern economies.

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Mon 13 Mar 2006 20:34

Are old cars greener? And if so . . . - Civic8

Some of the older cars ie Austin/Morris 11/1300-Allegro,even going back to Austin A40/Morris 1000 were more economical than some newer cars with electronics.
Maybe these designs should have been improved over the years instead of newly designed engines.
Hillman imp was another engine which did a fair bit to gallon, several others do as well.

weakness on all was component tolerance not being as tight as they are now/engine oils not as advanced as now/even petrol, So possibly if all refurbished with new technology they could be better than newer engines..,
--
Steve

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Tue 14 Mar 2006 07:41

Are old cars greener? And if so . . . - L'escargot

Hillman imp was another engine which did a fair bit to

gallon.....

I had a green(!) Singer Chamois.

--
L\'escargot.

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Tue 14 Mar 2006 12:08

Are old cars greener? And if so . . . - artful dodger {P}

I had a green(!) Singer Chamois.

L'escargot.

You are such a man of class L'escargot. My first car was also a Singer Chamois, except mine was in a deep red metallic. It was slightly altered in that I removed all the chrome trim, resprayed the car and had a broad gold stripe down the sides. Other major work including removing the engine and fitting new piston rings, fitting a new clutch and gearbox. I learnt most of the basics of how a car works with my Chamois. Most modern cars are far more difficult to work on than the old ones.

Returning to the thread subject, we should not just consider the carbon footprint, but the total energy concept. This is the amount of energy the car uses during its life plus the energy required in its original construction and recycling. When judged on this basis a poorly performing car still uses far less energy (and CO2) than building a new one. On the other side are the higher costs of maintaince of older vehicles, especially to pass higher emmissions tests.

--
Roger
I read frequently, but only post when I have something useful to say.

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Tue 14 Mar 2006 10:52

Are old cars greener? And if so . . . - Garethj

that it is greener to keep an old banger going, even though it belches smoke, than to crush it and make a new one.

What about changing the valve guides or rings on the old banger so it doesn't belch smoke?

I think it's good that the MoT checks emissions, so as long as this continues it's a fair balance

A good point above about fuel economy - cars that don't have to haul around lots of safety and gimmick equipment get more miles per gallon in usual driving (not steady speed economy)

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Tue 14 Mar 2006 11:10

Are old cars greener? And if so . . . - Nsar

If cars were kept on the road for considerably longer then it would be "greener" for the reason stated above that a huge proportion of the car's whole life energy cost is in the manufacture. If people behaved entirely rationally they would keep cars for much longer but emotional reasons of fashion/status play an enormous role in car choice and this would be most efficient place to start to encourage people to change cars less but it's a mammoth task. You could incentivise people to hang on to their cars through tax breaks on spare parts and servicing for example but I suspect it would be a fiendishly complex task with so many loopholes as to make it useless.
It's down to the individual so don't don't expect any progress in other words.

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Tue 14 Mar 2006 12:20

Are old cars greener? And if so . . . - Xileno {P}

My view is that keeping an old car well maintained must be greener. Old cars are easier to work on and you can often repair the component that has gone wrong rather than fit a new sealed unit.

What is the Government going to do about it? Well I suspect nothing but then that's no great surprise. The manufacturers are hardly likely to take this one lying down.

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Tue 14 Mar 2006 12:30

Are old cars greener? And if so . . . - tyro

If people behaved entirely rationally they would keep cars

for much longer but emotional reasons of fashion/status play an enormous

role in car choice ...

That's what I suspected.

Well, I don't care about the rest of you - I'm going to try to keep my cars for a couple of decades.

If my wife lets me, of course.

---------------------
An old-fashioned rationalist in an increasingly irrational Britain

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Tue 14 Mar 2006 13:50

Are old cars greener? And if so . . . - Robert J.

There is a whole load of reasons why people change their cars regularly, not just through reasons of fashion/ status. For instance, the arrival of a baby or dog, a change of job leading to more (or less) commuting or even if your local council blights the area where you live with speed bumps.

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Tue 14 Mar 2006 14:15

Are old cars greener? And if so . . . - Nsar

If you're interested in your impact on the environment, have look at this - I've taken out the 'www' so as not to burn up the site's bandwidth .earthday.net/footprint/quiz.asp, so paste into your browser.

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Tue 14 Mar 2006 15:02

Are old cars greener? And if so . . . - Dipstick

If you are interested in an opposing view to "climate change" et al, peruse www.junkscience.com for a while.

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Tue 14 Mar 2006 15:15

Are old cars greener? And if so . . . - mss1tw

If you're interested in your impact on the environment, have look

at this - I've taken out the 'www' so as not

to burn up the site's bandwidth .earthday.net/footprint/quiz.asp, so paste into your

browser.

This fascinates me. What exactly do people think will happen if a direct link is left in the site?

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Tue 14 Mar 2006 15:37

Are old cars greener? And if so . . . - martint123

This fascinates me. What exactly do people think will happen if a direct link is left in the site?

If you look at a link in a discussion, you'll see it isn't a direct link to the outside. For some reason this site handles them in some internal way. We're told that this and links to audio/video files consume HJ's bandwidth and/or connections. No, I don't know why either.

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Tue 14 Mar 2006 16:08

Are old cars greener? And if so . . . - Nsar

I simply felt it was more polite to do it that way. I apologise if my knowledge is not as profound as yours.

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