June 26, 2008
With gas staying over $4 per gallon for me (damn my car and its appetite for premium gas) I started wondering whether I should have looked for a diesel engine instead of my gas-powered one.
OK, my car went 294.1 miles en route to its last fill-up, at which it took 12.276 gallons -- my worst mileage in a while. Instead of the usual mi/gal measurement, I'm going to flip it over to a more European measurement style and figure it in gal/100mi.
That gives a slightly more accurate way of measuring usage -- I don't set out to drive a certain volume of gasoline. Just remember that small numbers are better now.
12.276 gal/294.1 mi = .04174 gal/mi, or 4.174 gal/100 mi. Not bad.
Using similar math, a Jetta TDI tops out at about 1.667 gal/100 mi. Kick ass. 2.222 gal/100 mi (45 mpg) is closer to normal usage, so I'll use that.
Now we need to convert this to dollars per 100 miles, since diesel costs about 60ยข more per gallon than 93-octane gas. I'm using $4.099 for gas and $4.729 for diesel, which is where things sat Monday morning.
VW Jetta 2.0T = $17.11 / 100 mi
VW Jetta TDI = $10.46 / 100 mi
So basically, I'd be saving about $900 a year compared to now, considering how much I drive over a 12-month period. And I knew gas was going to stay expensive when I bought the Jetta.
I never said I was bright.
