Thank you for the well rounded and thought out response!
I agree with pretty much everything you've said, however I don't think Americans still look at diesels as slow and stinky, times and technology have changed and so has the ideas most of the newer generations have on vehicles. With the Hybrid markets falling off much in part to people actually waking up to the fact that they're not all that environmentally freindly, ugly, slow and for a lack of a better comparison, plain piles o crap, diesels are becoming more sought after because they actually perform, get good MPG and on a whole are fairly Eco freindly. So it seems reasonable that GM might take the plunge. Jeep has and is doing pretty well with the diesel powered cherokee.
Half of the time, CAFE ratings are bull, people have to look farther than EPA BS to make a reasonable and well rounded decision now days as the ratings and standards can be bought, hedged, or not even be available, look at a new window sticker for a Duramax powered crew cab- you'll find nothing in regard to EPA or CAFE info, and they use the coo out that it's "heavy duty" when it's been around for 15 years and the data available is substantial
Proof in point
As a previous MK6 TDi owner I achieved a much higher mpg than the 28-36 ratings stated. 40-42 was pretty common on the HWY AND 32-36 was easily achievable in the city. The rated mpg's were way off by like 20% so not only was the emissions footprint sqewed so was the cost analysis, then once I did a few mods and had it tuned if I really tried I could breech 50mpg easily!!! Go figure. And that's living in an area with constantly changing elevations and putting power through the DSG auto trans. Now the ratings are off by nearly 40% on that particular car.
The little 2.0tdi made 140hp/210tq and when I was done made closer to 190/300. You said your wife's Jetta makes comparable numbers to the 2.8 D-max? You're talking about the 2.0tdi, right?
I think GM is sandbaggin the numbers a bit and have the little engine tuned way down and can only hope in the future they turn up the wick a bit.
I wish we could get something like what Audi offers in it's line up, the Audi 3.0 diesels are beastly and can be made to be down right feared with the proper mods.
My left hand drive comment was made based on the fact that vehicles in most other countries (if not all?) outside of N.America are right hand drive, so immediately there's a change to make for the N.A market. While I do realize the crash test standards are higher in N. America, I believe that other countries are placing more emphasis on creating and having safer cars on their roads as well and getting a GM product to pass here in the states vs passing in say, Australia or Thailand wouldn't be as complicated or as involved as getting a VW to pass from euro spec to US standards
Even though we might still get an engine built in Thailand, the chassis would be made in the good ol USofA for simplicity and as you mentioned PR, so i personally don't see crash test data holding back the platform, like you said, it'll be the market and overall demand.
I agree, it'll probably be a long road that could lead to a dead end, but one can hope can't he? Lol. Yes you're right, diesels aren't "dominating" in the American market but Americans are buying everything that's made and everything that's available and waiting list are pretty common for getting a diesel powered...anything, the prospective market has been pretty under calculated causing a wait for production to keep up across almost every platform, I waited more than 7mo for my TDi to get here, put a down payment and ordered a 2010 and got a 2011 model lol. Look into it, people are waiting for the new jeep cherokee diesel package too. Sales of diesel powered vehicles is up 60% from just 5 years ago, that's huge!
I think that allot could be cut from maintenance costs too, VW had a pretty good set up, on my TDi filters were only $6-10 bucks and slid into a stationary filter housing, OCI's were stated at 10k even though I changed it every 5k I changed the fuel filter every 10k when it was suggested at 20k and I did the DSG service at 20k when it was suggested at 40k. I've always been of the mindset "Vehicles love ya back" lol but I know what you're saying and for the most part peoe on a whole destroy their cars with poor maintenance cuz it's either not convienent or too expensive, and hey "it runs"
I agree that Americans are power hungry, v-8 luvin fools, but the current trends are backing down from that trend for family rigs and daily drivers. While I don't think America will ever abandon it's love for muscle, Americans are finding it in diesels, torque rules when it comes time to get a vehicle moving or overtaking/passing a slower moving vehicle, and the ease of how a modern turbo diesel can do just that is starting to become more known, and it's appealing to allot of varieties of people, men and women young and old alike.
But all that said, yes I'm a diesel geek with a skewed perspective and just wanna see more diesel options for our market, even though I do believe they're better for numbers of reasons they are not with out their own set of trade offs and faults.
