Tacoma Diesel Swap (VW or otherwise)?

4BT is around 750lb wet.

 

Heavy: Hell yeah - around 750lb wet.
Loud: Maybe - as it isn't a passenger car engine...
Hard to do maintenance: I could not disagree more. Stone ax simple engine.
Made to commercial type vehicles: It was a popular engine for delivery vans, etc. I agree that the NVH isn't to passenger car standards.
Stick with dd4 Toyota: Do you mean D4D? Great engine, but how does that compare to a 4BT? Have you seen the pricetag on a D4D swap?
Reliability in question: Hope you don't mean the 4BT. They've more than proved their reliability...

 

Maybe then you could explain the billions in government money GIVEN to the oil co. in the 70's to drill for oil. OK opec was cutting oil and we needed it but the money still flows, in the 70's we imported maybe 5% now 60%+ but the drilling still is given billions all though we now import far more then we drill the ideal was to reduce the dependence on foreign oil noble ideal but the money still flows and the oil doesn't. We even pay for the oil spills! Yes some comes from the oil co by we foot most of the bills. Yes the Brits pay close to 50% in taxes but they also have a VAT tax and it covers more then just petrol.

 

The brits pay much more than 50% and that is the point whether or not it covers other things. The point was made that the price Europe pays is closer to the real price but that is untrue. Much more than half of their price is taxes. The real price of oil is it's untaxed price, not the taxed price. A tax price is an artificial price created by governments. And the VAT tax is added at each stage of oil production in addition to the 20% levied on the final consumer. It's a "VALUE ADDED" tax so whenever the oil changes form, it's taxed again. So it's taxed after it is refined and it is taxed for the final consumer.

As for me explaining payouts, maybe you could provide something concrete so I could see what you're talking about (link?). Oil companies aren't paid money to drill anything. That comes out of their exploration budgets. There is no taxpayer money flowing to the oil companies. What the pundits are calling subsidies are actually tax cuts for the cost of doing business (exploration). It's a fiscal parlor trick to convince the taxpayers that they need to raise taxes on the evil oil companies. Cash isn't flowing from the coffers of the US government to the oil companies.

 

Also no mention yet of military spending that goes to secure our oil economy.

this is dated, so you can add some $$
http://www.progress.org/gasoline.htm

this one wasn't exactly what I was thinking but worth a look anyways
http://californiawatch.org/dailyreport/us-gas-artificially-cheap-what-we-dont-pay-pump-10692

 

Wow! Do you have a weight for VW's 2L RV 16v tdi? It's a cast iron block but so is the 2tr-fe (right?)
That engine would go nicely in a taco, but too much work and $$

 

291 million Google hits on "government money given to oil co's".

 

Both of these articles are useless for the argument at hand. They're social activists who want gasoline to be taxed to offset the cost of infrastructure and pollution. It has nothing to do with subsidies to the oil companies or the commodity price of oil.

 

Then it should be easy to provide a reputable one to support what you're saying.

 

It would be impossible when the brick wall we are talking too disregards very relevant information.
You have provided links to charts showing % of tax on fuel. You also cited Mother Jones(!), then you dismissed my sources as "social activists". Really?!

 

The charts show what price consumers pay in the world relative to the taxation. It was stated that they pay closer to the true commodity price of oil. Based on that chart, it shows that they do not. It's also not a US-based article (Australian) so it can be reasonably assumed that it's not some government cover-up to hide our "gas subsidies".

I didn't dismiss the article because the author is a social activist. The articles you provided are not relevant because they're not really talking about how close the price we pay for gas is to the commodity price of crude. He's talking about a socially-set price based on what he thinks it should be. No one in the world charges what the author of those articles is suggesting ($15/gallon). He thinks we should include the cost of road infrastructure, pollution and other things in the price of gas that have nothing to do with the commodity price of oil. For example, road infrastructure costs would be the same regardless of the fuel type, including electric vehicles. What he's arguing is that the drivers are subsidized because the government is making up for what consumers of oil use (vs the entire tax base). He's suggesting an use-based pricing to cover the cost of those things mentioned earlier. He's not suggesting that the government is subsidizing the oil companies. You saw an article that stated what the true price of oil should be and made the connection that the government is subsidizing the oil companies. But it's not stating that.

Also, those costs are already taken care of in the form of taxes. He just thinks the consumer should be paying for it at the pump instead. All he's doing is shifting when it gets paid. That's why it's not relevant. I'm not saying his point is right or wrong, just that it's not relevant to the discussion of whether or not the government is subsidizing the oil companies.

The Mother Jones article is relevant to the claim that ethanol is not subsidized. It is pointing out that ethanol is still subsidized because the manufacturers still receive government cash through guaranteed sales volumes whether they sell it or not. It's the similar to a farm subsidy where growers are paid not to grow a particular crop. That is a subsidy. It doesn't matter that the article is from an activist magazine. One thing about evidence is if you and someone who is a polar opposite agree on something, it's probably true. That's why I cited it.

 

I heartily disagree with you. You can't correctly deny that a mind-boggling amount of money is spent by our government to safe guard our oil economy, delivering artificially cheap gas to US consumers.

Either way we have steered this thread off course--

 

Despite the cost of running our economy and protecting our interests, it's not a subsidy to the oil companies. Using that logic, even our police force budgets are a subsidy because they help protect gas stations from theft. It's not artificially cheap because it's sold worldwide at the same commodity price. Refineries in Europe pay the same price for a barrel of oil as we do.

 

so your taco weighs 6k+ lbs?....typical jetta/golf/beetle tdi tips the scales @ 3k +..... I did a VW TDI swap in my 96' taco and I've put over 25k troublefree miles on it since driving it out of the shop in march 11' (aside from three clutches ) .... it has plenty of power and knocks down 32mpg tank after tank best I could muster with the stock 3rz gasser was 22mpg...so 50% improvement in fuel economy on top of the more usable low end torque = fun~!! ....here's my build thread with pics and videos.... http://forums.tdiclub.com/showthread.php?t=293577 ....btw a fully dressed ALH weighs in somewhere around 375lbs which is not far off from the stock 3rz .... imho a 4bt is more suited to a full size truck or older cruiser etc. but I'm aware that a few yota's have been successfully converted using this mill, my personal opinion is it's too heavy and too noisy and many states don't allow an "industrial" engine to be swapped into a passenger vehicle .....

 

I like it but for the price might as well wait until they finally add it as an option

 

I was looking as a lark at what a diesel would cost unburried this one LOL

 

Right? I'd rather spend 22k on an complete '08 Dodge with a Cummins.