Attention: TDR Forum Junkies 
September 10, 2002
Fahfrumpumpen In Their Diesel Cars
By MARK YOST Stanton, Mich.
One million miles. That's what Pete Baranko expects to get out of his 1998 Volkswagen Jetta TDI. "That's not an exaggeration," he says of the 1. 9-liter, 90-horsepower turbo-diesel engine powering his car. "This is a million-mile motor. "
If Mr. Baranko sounds a little fanatical, he is. But he isn't alone. He's part of a small but growing cadre of Volkswagen owners who are ga-ga about their diesel-powered cars, known as TDIs.
About 200 TDI lovers gathered at the Mid Michigan Motorplex over Labor Day weekend for TDI Fest 2002, the third-annual meeting of these diesel devotees. They talked about the cars they love, the technology that drives them, and the incredible fuel mileage it delivers. And when not together, they chat via the Internet at the TDIClub (www.tdiclub.com1).
To make sure he gets his million miles, Mr. Baranko, a 31-year-old airline pilot from Hammond, Ind. , has installed a special meter to read air flow through his intake and spot checks his oil for particulates; if it registers 3%, he changes it. He has installed a Hobbs meter, used on airplanes to keep track of how many hours an engine has run. And he dismisses VW's maintenance recommendations and uses Mobil Corp. 's Delvac 1, a synthetic diesel engine oil used primarily in the trucking industry.
But it's fuel mileage as much as reliability that hooks most TDI owners. According to Volkswagen, a Jetta TDI station wagon with a five-speed manual transmission gets 50 miles per gallon on the highway and 42 mpg in the city. That compares with 31 mpg and 24 mpg, respectively, for the gas-engine model. Other TDI models VW sells in the U. S. include the Beetle, Golf and Jetta sedan.
"Once you've had one, to go back to a car that gets 15 to 20 miles per gallon is depressing," says Sam Johnson, 41, a mass communications professor at St. Cloud (Minn. ) State University and owner of a 2002 Jetta TDI wagon, his third VW diesel. Mr. Johnson first caught the bug -- so to speak -- when he bought a 1978 Rabbit. He traded up to a Jetta in 1983. The wagon is so popular that it has to be specially ordered from VW and requires up to a six-month wait.
This weekend, Mr. Johnson was conducting one of several technical seminars that covered everything from installing high-performance computer chips to software that helps owners decipher warning signals from the car's CPU. He demonstrated how to install the European headlight array that integrates headlamps and fog lights. He also showed me a little air-vent button inside the fuel filler of my 2001 Jetta TDI. If you press it during fueling, you can get an extra 1½ gallons into the tank. "It's great for long trips," he said. "Instead of getting 600 miles on a tank, you can get 700 or 750. "
Those impressive numbers were enough for Erik Egbertson, who works for a software company in Medford, Mass. His 2001 Jetta TDI has 35,000 miles on it and averaged 45 miles per gallon on the trip out to Michigan. Jessica Cerretani, his wife, admitted she was kind of scared when her husband first started talking about getting a diesel. "I was concerned about the impact on the environment," she said. But after doing some research and learning that it's not the demon that Greenpeace makes it out to be, she was hooked. "This group helped in debunking the myths," she said of the TDIClub, sponsor of the Fest.
The club was founded by Fred Voglmaier, a Canadian who lives in Vancouver. He got hooked on diesels in 1996, but could afford only a 1996 gas Golf. But this weekend, he was tooling around in a 2003 Jetta TDI wagon that he'd picked up earlier in the week from a dealer in Toronto. The Web site features articles on maintenance and fuel-mileage tips, as well as forums where owners can brag about top speeds and top fuel mileage.
TDIClub members are easy to spot on the road. They have license plate frames with sayings like "What's a gas station?" and sport T-shirts with slogans like "Fahrfrumpumpen," a takeoff of Volkswagen's popular "Fahrvergnügen" ad campaign. But they're hard to stereotype. Unlike other cults, they're average people from all walks of life who are fanatical about one thing: VW diesels.
If there was one odd bird in the crowd, it was Dave Porterfield, 45, of Chisago City, Minn. And he's strange only because he had a VW diesel and got rid of it. He drove his 1998 Jetta TDI for 100,000 miles before trading it in for one of Toyota Motor Corp. 's Echo hybrid-electric vehicles. But he has since returned to the fold with a 2003 Jetta TDI wagon. "I hated it," he says of the Echo. "I've always been a diesel obsessive-compulsive. And with the VWs, you get the German feel, the German technology. "
Diesels account for only about one-third of 1% of all U. S. car sales, or about 50,000 of the 16 million vehicles sold last year. But the TDIClub's members may not be on the fringe for much longer.
U. S. auto makers are realizing the shortcomings of hybrid-electric cars, like the Toyota Prius and Honda Motor Co. 's Insight, which gets 68 mpg on the highway. Both feel like they're powered by two squirrels on a treadmill. And Rep. John Dingell (D. , Mich. ), the powerful ranking member of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, is preparing legislation that would give tax credits to auto makers and oil refiners who promote the use of diesel technology.
But tax credit or not, this group is hooked. "It's just a good economical way to get around," says Brian Rippey, organizer of this year's TDI Fest.
Mr. Yost last wrote about the 50th anniversary of the Corvette for the Journal.
URL for this article:
http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB1031624872636846795.djm,00.html
Hyperlinks in this Article:
(1) http://www.tdiclub.com/
Updated September 10, 2002 1:17 a. m. EDT
Copyright 2002 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved
For information about subscribing go to http://www.wsj.com
Fahfrumpumpen In Their Diesel Cars
By MARK YOST Stanton, Mich.
One million miles. That's what Pete Baranko expects to get out of his 1998 Volkswagen Jetta TDI. "That's not an exaggeration," he says of the 1. 9-liter, 90-horsepower turbo-diesel engine powering his car. "This is a million-mile motor. "
If Mr. Baranko sounds a little fanatical, he is. But he isn't alone. He's part of a small but growing cadre of Volkswagen owners who are ga-ga about their diesel-powered cars, known as TDIs.
About 200 TDI lovers gathered at the Mid Michigan Motorplex over Labor Day weekend for TDI Fest 2002, the third-annual meeting of these diesel devotees. They talked about the cars they love, the technology that drives them, and the incredible fuel mileage it delivers. And when not together, they chat via the Internet at the TDIClub (www.tdiclub.com1).
To make sure he gets his million miles, Mr. Baranko, a 31-year-old airline pilot from Hammond, Ind. , has installed a special meter to read air flow through his intake and spot checks his oil for particulates; if it registers 3%, he changes it. He has installed a Hobbs meter, used on airplanes to keep track of how many hours an engine has run. And he dismisses VW's maintenance recommendations and uses Mobil Corp. 's Delvac 1, a synthetic diesel engine oil used primarily in the trucking industry.
But it's fuel mileage as much as reliability that hooks most TDI owners. According to Volkswagen, a Jetta TDI station wagon with a five-speed manual transmission gets 50 miles per gallon on the highway and 42 mpg in the city. That compares with 31 mpg and 24 mpg, respectively, for the gas-engine model. Other TDI models VW sells in the U. S. include the Beetle, Golf and Jetta sedan.
"Once you've had one, to go back to a car that gets 15 to 20 miles per gallon is depressing," says Sam Johnson, 41, a mass communications professor at St. Cloud (Minn. ) State University and owner of a 2002 Jetta TDI wagon, his third VW diesel. Mr. Johnson first caught the bug -- so to speak -- when he bought a 1978 Rabbit. He traded up to a Jetta in 1983. The wagon is so popular that it has to be specially ordered from VW and requires up to a six-month wait.
This weekend, Mr. Johnson was conducting one of several technical seminars that covered everything from installing high-performance computer chips to software that helps owners decipher warning signals from the car's CPU. He demonstrated how to install the European headlight array that integrates headlamps and fog lights. He also showed me a little air-vent button inside the fuel filler of my 2001 Jetta TDI. If you press it during fueling, you can get an extra 1½ gallons into the tank. "It's great for long trips," he said. "Instead of getting 600 miles on a tank, you can get 700 or 750. "
Those impressive numbers were enough for Erik Egbertson, who works for a software company in Medford, Mass. His 2001 Jetta TDI has 35,000 miles on it and averaged 45 miles per gallon on the trip out to Michigan. Jessica Cerretani, his wife, admitted she was kind of scared when her husband first started talking about getting a diesel. "I was concerned about the impact on the environment," she said. But after doing some research and learning that it's not the demon that Greenpeace makes it out to be, she was hooked. "This group helped in debunking the myths," she said of the TDIClub, sponsor of the Fest.
The club was founded by Fred Voglmaier, a Canadian who lives in Vancouver. He got hooked on diesels in 1996, but could afford only a 1996 gas Golf. But this weekend, he was tooling around in a 2003 Jetta TDI wagon that he'd picked up earlier in the week from a dealer in Toronto. The Web site features articles on maintenance and fuel-mileage tips, as well as forums where owners can brag about top speeds and top fuel mileage.
TDIClub members are easy to spot on the road. They have license plate frames with sayings like "What's a gas station?" and sport T-shirts with slogans like "Fahrfrumpumpen," a takeoff of Volkswagen's popular "Fahrvergnügen" ad campaign. But they're hard to stereotype. Unlike other cults, they're average people from all walks of life who are fanatical about one thing: VW diesels.
If there was one odd bird in the crowd, it was Dave Porterfield, 45, of Chisago City, Minn. And he's strange only because he had a VW diesel and got rid of it. He drove his 1998 Jetta TDI for 100,000 miles before trading it in for one of Toyota Motor Corp. 's Echo hybrid-electric vehicles. But he has since returned to the fold with a 2003 Jetta TDI wagon. "I hated it," he says of the Echo. "I've always been a diesel obsessive-compulsive. And with the VWs, you get the German feel, the German technology. "
Diesels account for only about one-third of 1% of all U. S. car sales, or about 50,000 of the 16 million vehicles sold last year. But the TDIClub's members may not be on the fringe for much longer.
U. S. auto makers are realizing the shortcomings of hybrid-electric cars, like the Toyota Prius and Honda Motor Co. 's Insight, which gets 68 mpg on the highway. Both feel like they're powered by two squirrels on a treadmill. And Rep. John Dingell (D. , Mich. ), the powerful ranking member of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, is preparing legislation that would give tax credits to auto makers and oil refiners who promote the use of diesel technology.
But tax credit or not, this group is hooked. "It's just a good economical way to get around," says Brian Rippey, organizer of this year's TDI Fest.
Mr. Yost last wrote about the 50th anniversary of the Corvette for the Journal.
URL for this article:
http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB1031624872636846795.djm,00.html
Hyperlinks in this Article:
(1) http://www.tdiclub.com/
Updated September 10, 2002 1:17 a. m. EDT
Copyright 2002 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved
For information about subscribing go to http://www.wsj.com
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