New car- petrol or diesel

[Peronipony]

Sorry for the boring topic.

I need a new car. Can’t afford one but that’s a different story. I need something big, have 3 kids and 2 dogs. Ideally not another people carrier because mine got scraped underneath constantly on rural potholes contributing to its trip to the scrap heap.

Im looking at either a rav4 or skoda kodiaq. Any thoughts on the above? I have a budget of 20k for something 2018 and up so can’t afford a Volvo or anything prestigious with the crazy prices at the moment.

Ive always had diesel but had lots of problems with EGR valves and DPF filters. Should I think about petrol instead? Will I get terrible mpg? I can’t afford electric so that’s not an option although I think the rav 4 is a hybrid (although smaller which is putting me off)

Any thoughts much appreciated as car shopping is the worst.

I have a diesel Skoda kodiaq, bought it with 30k miles on the clock for circa 27k. After 2 years and 10k miles they said we needed a new DPF which cost £3.5k. I had never even heard of DPF despite having diesel cars for the past 10 years or so. I will never buy a diesel ever again, because evidently unless you drive for 30 mins on motorways regularly (eg weekly?), this is likely to happen. I think this is a huge scandal that people are sold diesel cars without being informed in very simple terms about this.

What sort of journeys will you be doing?

How many miles a year do you do and is this short/long trips?

DPF filter problems suggests that you don't do the mileage to justify a diesel, although they're less attractive due to ULEZ requirements and image/perception, so the historical price premium might not apply any more. So if you don't need to enter cities, it could be worth buying diesel if you see one for a good price and then make sure you do a regular (fortnightly?) 10 mile blast on the motorway to clear out the filters.

Alternatively, if you go in cities/urban driving and do lots of short trips that can be done on a battery, a hybrid is probably a better option as long as you can charge it or it's self charging, because hybrids where you don't use the battery are pretty awful on economy due to dragging around a useless lump of a battery all the time.

You could get a second hand electric skoda. Is this an option?

I don’t which is why I’ve had problems I think. I do a long trip to work twice a week which is 20 miles each way. The rest of the time it’s a mile to school then nursery so stop start or popping to the shops.
I’ve had 2 diesels now with EGR and DPF filter issues hence wanting to avoid if possible but I’m not sure if I’ve just been unlucky.

The rav is a self charging hybrid but smaller. I was also worried about it going wrong and being expensive?
The Skoda petrol. I haven’t been able to find a hybrid version for my budget.

If you don't do long journeys where you're regularly going at a decent speed then go for a petrol.

Get petrol. I’ve got a petrol mg hs as I do some short journeys but I’ve just brought it on a long holiday journey and the mpg wasn’t bad at all, then once we were here the fuel didn’t drop dramatically when we were back to short journeys like the diesel used to. Did about 420 miles with a full tank, and whilst we’re here driving to beaches etc it’s doing better than the diesel would have. Diesels are better for lots of long journeys motorway miles.

@Peronipony it doesn't sound like you do sufficient mileage to justify a diesel. I've always had diesels, and have only once had an issue and that was when I did short journeys for a while. 20 miles isn't a long journey for a diesel, you need to get them up to temperature for long periods for their systems to work properly (think 60 miles plus).

Essentially, they recirculate the exhaust gas back through the engine (the EGR - exhaust gas recirculation system), and the filter what eventually comes out of the exhaust pipe to reduce particulates (the DPF - diesel particulate filter). Servicing is more expensive on diesels anyway as there is more to do, which is why they are generally not recommended unless you do >20k miles per year, however the above recirculation systems degrade the engine oil making that need a change a lot more frequently. The problem is that people do not wish to change the oil more frequently, so manufacturers give an extended service interval in order to attract customers to their brand despite this not being so good for the engine.

Personally, in your position, I would go for a petrol or a hybrid. As it happens, we bought a Rav4 in 2016 which is one of my first petrol engines as a result of not doing so much mileage these days, and it has been fine. I am selling my diesel van, again due to reduced mileage (and ULEZ) although an still doing a 100 mile trip once a week just to get the DPF up to temperature to clean it out. This is a waste of fuel really, so it has to go unfortunately.

My previous diesel engines have all done well over 200k miles, and the petrol Rav4 is on 80k odd and hasn't missed a beat (touch wood).

I don't think the boot in the rav4 is great for dogs. We ended up getting a Toyota Corolla which has a much nicer boot (and we put a grid between the boot and the passenger area).

I get my Lab in mine comfortably, but there isn't room for much else.

Petrol is cheaper than diesel now, diesel is now not seen as the economic or environmental option. Yes also filter issues. Resell will also become more difficult. We are getting a petrol care next time.

@HappiestSleeping yes I can believe it. I guess it depends how big the OP's 2 dogs are!

Petrol may have a slightly worse fuel consumption than diesel but there used to be (maybe still is) a saying that you needed to be doing I think 16,000 miles a year for a diesel to be worth it over a petrol. Remember diesel is more expensive at the pump. You are supposed to get them serviced more regularly. There are sometimes issues with dpf but this can vary from car to car so look for reviews of the specific make and model down to the engine size and see what they say.

i average 8k a year and always drive diesels. I know I should have petrol cars. One reason for me is that I tend to run my cars into the ground and diesel cars will last longer. So I have a car for a bit and then pass it onto dh, dh does a lot more miles. His previous car was a diesel Vauxhall which got well over 200,000 miles on the clock. A petrol car might not have lasted that long.

So what are you car buying habits? Dh currently has my 14yo old diesel Focus which now has about 140,000 on the clock and the car is moaning that there’s something wrong with the dpf. If it’s 3.5k to fix it then it won’t be worth it.

Thankyou everyone. Going for petrol.

This seems to be ruling out the rav for me. I have a Newfoundland.

I would consider an estate but the back seats seem much smaller in an estate than in the kodiaq or rav. Plus I liked the elevated driving position and also that the seats move independently.

I could do with a van but can’t afford one or to run it sadly.

Petrol / hybrid is the way to go. With your journeys the particulate filter of a diesel is often a problem; but without that, the cost of diesel vs petrol right now means you need a lot of mileage vs consumption to even things out.

My dog walker has a Skoda Kodiaq and loves it.

Btw I always think that estates are good dog owner cars, better than an SUV. Nice big low boot which if you have bigger dogs is easier for them to get in and out the car as they get older. If you have smaller dogs and can lift them it might not be an issue. Estates seem to be a dying car form though, hard to find. Have you looked at Kias?

X post about estates 😁

Have you looked at a Seat Ateca? Same sort of size as the kodiaq and according to DH good mpg. I'm very happy with the size of the boot!

I haven’t looked at estates too much, an Octavia and a Volvo v60 were considered but I was drawn to an SUV type, don’t know why! I have a people carrier at the moment but I dislike it a lot.

I haven’t looked at the Seat. I thought it was too small as I ruled out a Tiguan but I’ll look again 😃

If you have a look at a car based van, like a Citroen Berlingo / Peugeot Partner, they are reasonably priced, and come in petrol and diesel versions. I am moving from a VW T5 to one of the aforementioned and there are loads around at reasonable money.

Do be aware though that a commercial vehicle is limited to 60mph on dual carriageways. Not that you'd know seeing how most of them are driven.

I have a petrol Volkswagen Tiguan love it. X

Also I have three dogs. X

I have an Octavia saloon which has an enormous boot , so the estate version should have plenty of room for 3 poeple nad 2 dogs. Mine is diesel bought when I did a lot of long journeys (+60mpg) but still OK even though I am doing shorter journeys and less mileage and can be serviced by anyone rather than main dealer as VW based.

Petrol sounds best.
Also estate cars better for big dogs to get in and out rather than SUVs.

The Seat Ateca isn’t the same size as a Skoda Kodiaq, it’s the same size as a
Skoda Karoq. Both are slightly smaller than a VW Tiguan. A Seat Tarraco or a VW Tiguan Allspace are the equivalents of the Kodiaq.