Just saw this on the news...

http://www.smh.com.au/national/gillards-cash-for-clunkers-scheme-20100724-10p...

Don't think it will affect the VW scene too much, but I do worry that they keep trying to squeeze us out.

Craig

Hmm.... can score bombs in peoples back yards for $50...

then make 2G's out of it when buying a new car. HA! Score lol.

haha you think I will buy a new car for 2k bonus? They would have to pay me at least 100k to buy something new. Then I would scrap it and keep the dough and go buy couple of vws

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Originally posted by vlad01 haha you think I will buy a new car for 2k bonus? They would have to pay me at least 100k to buy something new. Then I would scrap it and keep the dough and go buy couple of vws

You could buy a Proton savvy , with $2000 for a trade...

and put it on Your mastercard.... lol

LEE

or when We get those Indian or chinese small cars...
We may even get change... lol...

Sounds like another labour vote grab, on the run new policy. All she is doing is grabbing money from other environmental projects to pay for this one. For instance she is taking money away from solar, where we should really be leading the world, but labour just keeps directing money away from this to more short term, band aid fixes. Maybe she should get Peter Garret to oversee it just for good measure. And besides, how much closer to a new car is $2k going to get you? And let's watch the prices on the approved cars suddnely go up after Jan 1 if Gillard and her chronies get back in. It will bejust like the first home owner grant.

yeah that would be right. The cars will go up exactly 2k

And whats even more ironic is that the new cars most likely produce more CO2 to make than old cars did including all the CO2 of their life time use put together

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Originally posted by vlad01 yeah that would be right. The cars will go up exactly 2k And whats even more ironic is that the new cars most likely produce more CO2 to make than old cars did including all the CO2 of their life time use put together

Hi

Two of the cars are Hybrids, one of them is the Camry that the government, that's us put 35 million into.

Do they realise what the life cycle, as in birth to death footprint is of a Hybrid vehicle, its worse than many SUVs, better of with a small diesel 4 or a LPG Falcodore.

Do you know what happens when a Hyrid car runs out of petrol, it stops

This policy will make the basket weavers happy at least.

Excuse my 1st political rant this campaign.

Steve

haha thats awesome. I wanted to put a holden v6 into my younger brothers EB ford coz its engine was fuched as all 6cyl fords do and the engines are an absolute fortune???!!! but the holden v6 is cheap and reliable as day and night.
I can't even sell my 191k v6 for under 200 buks wtf?

But that idea, I think I will pass as the ford chassis rails are too narrow.

Going by this logic. I want a drag car for work. Simplely made and it get me to work faster. Pollutes less than a (smug ) hybrid.

The Folden looks alright.... I saw a new monaro with a BA Falcon front end on it & a nissan V8 at a car show in Brisbane recently...... now that was ugly....

Hi

Oh forgot to mention, when the 12 volt battery in the Prius dies, the car wont go anywhere. Stuck a few these at work.

Steve

1500S, your problem there with the Fords is that they're dying of old age. As we all know, during that period Ford was only interested in building taxis, which do 1,000,000km in 5 years and are then scrapped. The Falcons will happily do a million km non-stop, I know a taxi driver who had one up to 1.3 million km, but once they get past 10 years old they're into retirement age!

1303Steve, there are several modern cars which are violently affected by having their 12V supply interrupted. The Honda Jazz automatic and CVT transmissions require constant battery power to keep their transmission memory, and if the battery dies or is disconnected without a backup, they have to be towed to a dealer for re-programming. They will drive without being re-programmed, but the shifts are horrible and they destroy the transmission very quickly.

Back on topic though, the whole idea of the cash for clunkers policy is a political and economic one, not environmental. These sorts of schemes have been run in the US, UK and Europe for a while now, and the evidence shows that they do not make environmental sense. Thankfully, the fact that you must have owned the car for a minimum of 2 years to trade it in (it's in the article) will prevent this from killing many decent usable cars.

So, essentially, the target market of people who can actually use this policy are people whose current car is over 15 years old and valued at considerably less than $2000, who want to buy a brand new car. How many people like this are there? Surely if you're currently driving a $1000 car, then you won't have the required $15,000 to buy a new car, even after the $2000 trade-in. Why wouldn't you go and buy a used car for $5000 instead? Or keep your old car if you've had it for over 2 years and it's still going.

yep new cars go up by 2k without a doubt

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Originally posted by 1500S Quote: Originally posted by vlad01 haha thats awesome. I wanted to put a holden v6 into my younger brothers EB ford coz its engine was fuched as all 6cyl fords do and the engines are an absolute fortune???!!! but the holden v6 is cheap and reliable as day and night. I can't even sell my 191k v6 for under 200 buks wtf? But that idea, I think I will pass as the ford chassis rails are too narrow. You're right about the Ford 6 cyls being unreliable costly things. I had to get rid of my last one (EF) with only 420,000 km on the clock! Bloody fuel pump gave up and the LPG tank needed to be re certified. The previous EA was worse as at 390,000 km it blew a head gasket. No more Fords for me after that lot. DH

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Originally posted by Camo Quote: So, essentially, the target market of people who can actually use this policy are people whose current car is over 15 years old and valued at considerably less than $2000, who want to buy a brand new car. How many people like this are there? Surely if you're currently driving a $1000 car, then you won't have the required $15,000 to buy a new car, even after the $2000 trade-in. Why wouldn't you go and buy a used car for $5000 instead? Or keep your old car if you've had it for over 2 years and it's still going. Well said and this should be the logical thought pattern, but there are idiots out there that just see $2000 for nothing and jump at it. Just like the idiot pollies that are offering this NO BRAINS Kev

There's a guy in my car club with a ford powered torana. I personally have had no engine problems in either of my falcons. And just as well cos the bloody bonnet release cable breaks off in your hand after 12 months. And the brakes work brilliantly, for 15 minutes after they have been rebuilt, and the central lock remotes break, and the rear end clunks, and the steering rack coming loose, and you have to grow a second wrist joint and cut your hand to peices to change a headlight bulb and ... it sits on 120 km on the freeway as smooth and quite as you'd like. Love/Hate it.

The problem I have with the clunker plan is that it has no detail as is the political way these days, either party. So...

1. if your car is a 94 model and its worth a little more than 2K I reckon you'll be screwed. I cant see you getting a dealer to trade it. You're going to lose money.

2. Its going to be like the Harvey Norman effect. It will entice some people to go out and buy a car they cant afford on credit. These are the people who should be protected from themselves.

3. It will be the end of many classic cars, not just VW's but other makes as well.

4. What effect will it have on insurance write off values?

5. And the big one: Julia says she will recycle my car responsibly. So I go and trade in my 1997 Mitsubishi Lancer (it will take 3 years to get the scheme in place OR there will be a loophole allowing it). I get my $2000 off on a hybrid Camry. Lets pretend it was a Mother Mary style miracle and it landed at the showroom completely carbon neutral. We exchange keys and I drive away still using more fuel than a 97 1500cc lancer. Err no I dont becasue new cars use less and pollute less. Its a VERY frugal Camry this one. The car I leave behind somehow has to make it back to this responsible recycling centre. Lets say they use wind power so carbon neutral. The people working there will all use hand tools without hoists and lighting to pull it all apart so carbon neutral. But here is where it all falls apart. The car is probably 10-15% metal. The rest of it is plastic, rubber, cloth, polystyrene, glass. We could shred this rubber and make stuff out of it... but there is already an over supply of rubber, so its landfill. I doubt very much weather my dash will make it back into a PET drink bottle so its landfill. Who knows what the bumpers will end up as. How are you going to recycle my carpet, headliner, seats, door trims? Pretty sure you cant recycle automotive glass. But lets just for a moment fantasise that this could be done. Now we're going to load up all the differnt bits n bobs onto seperate trucks and cart them all over the country to the re-processing centres. Using solar powered trucks of course. But how are you going to do it for a profit? If you cant profit from it, no company will do it. Of course it cant happen, not even if all the previous ridiculous fantasies were in place. All cars will get crushed in their entirtiy, same as they are now. They'll come down in little cubes to port kembla and get thrown into the blast furnace. All the plastic/paint/rubber/oil fumes will float up into the atmosphere and rain down on the country side.

And this is where the eco bit happens. Plants will draw up all that acid rain and become big carbon stores, and all the slag from the blast furnace will be crushed and turned into road base. And there you have your eco fairytale. See Virginia, there really IS a santa claus

Exactly the plan shows no thought or technical merit. It's either a filthy vote grab or labour party advisors are sorely misinformed. Either way, do you want these people running our country?

This whole cash for clunkers deal is really getting to me, to insist on using a "enviromental cars" like battery/petrol hybrids is completly rubish in this country.

We have some of the biggest LPG fields in the world on our coast, but what do we do,,,,, sell it to the japs for 2 cents a litre.

If goverment is really wanting to reduce our gas emission's it should be pushing us to convert our existing cars to gas and increasing the cash back from $2000 as well as other incentives (like reducting rego's for gas converted cars)

At leat some of the new diesel cars are even more efficent than the hybrids. 2 years ago I drove a Kia CC 1.6 diesel (A lot better the the Kia rubish they sell here?) all around the UK, even sitting on 80MPH at times it used only about 4 litres per hundred ks!!

GOVERMENT OR ANY PARTY THAT WILL LISTEN!
Push LPG conversons or small under 1.6 Diesels, Hybrids are only good for inner city use but even then most small diesels will be even better.
Huge LPG stores are on our doorstep but we keep importing petrol and diesel?? Why

According to Paul Kent's article in today's Telegraph, the 'green' cars that the Labor Govt has chosen are - Toyota Camry Hybrid, Holden Cruze, Ford Falcon EcoBoost, Toyota Corolla, Mazda3, Mitsubishi Lancer and Hyundai Getz.

So only the Camry Hybrid and the Falcon are made here, the rest are fully imported. So how come no one in Canberra has heard of the Volkswagen Polo, or the Volkswagen Golf? Both of them better cars than any on the list.

Maybe it's a good thing that VWs are not on the greenie list. The first thing the dealers will do is jack up the prices of these eco-cars to cover the $2 grand rebate, making new VWs even better value by comparison.

Kia CC ?? Ffft. You should have driven the very best ultra-eco car, the VW Polo BlueMotion. 1.2-litre TDI 3-cylinder 12-valve turbo diesel, 55 kW / 195 Nm. 0-100 in 12 seconds, 172 km/h top speed. But only 91 g CO2 per km, and just 3.1 L/100km on extra-urban cycle (4.2 urban, 3.1 average).

http://www.volkswagen.co.uk/new/polo-v/which-model/compare/overview?p=7 

Better than Kia, Prius, Fiesta, Mini etc etc. But VWGA won't bring it to Australia - pity.

(Kia CC ?? Ffft. You should have driven the very best ultra-eco car, the VW Polo BlueMotion. 1.2-litre TDI 3-cylinder 12-valve turbo diesel, 55 kW / 195 Nm. 0-100 in 12 seconds, 172 km/h top speed. But only 91 g CO2 per km, and just 3.1 L/100km on extra-urban cycle (4.2 urban, 3.1 average).)


Ok bit off topic but I have to answer this
The Kia CC,,, , The story behind it was the wife and I rocked up the the counter at Europcar Edinburgh. They did not have any small cars available but gave us the Kia CC for the cheap rate, the CC is 2 levels up from the bottom, we really were expecting the worst but it was a good drive really!!
I read a story receintly that the CC is designed for Europe only and too expensive for Australia. See we just get the cr_p cheap models.

We also drove a Nissan Micra in the UK, it was a top line model manual model, with big mags, reverse sensors and a few other extras and it was actually fun to drive, Nissan only import the gutless auto base model here.
But being a Nissan the wiper switch died and left us with only top speed wipers, not great for old wet Scotland!

We will be soon in the market for a small wagon, the 2 on our shortlist is the Forister and VW Golf, both diesel

im not exactly into politics as such but i do follow it.I was going to vote for Julia but now that decision
is seriously being doubted. im 18,first vote of my life,and i would like to vote for someone who matches my beliefs
in this country.This scheme is simply ridiculous.The government continues to say"we want more people in trades"
They wonder why people will not stay in an apprenticeship.Firstly i am on 7dollars an hour,as a panel beater.The average house price
in my area is $300,000 and rent per week is $250.How the HELL! can i afford to get rid of my trusty beetle for a measly 2k.Give me 30k for a vw gti,
100,000K first home buyers grant and at least 12bucks an hour apprenticeship wages.I would be happy.I know alot of mates who simply went to the mines
simply due to the fact of money.Apprenticeships are very good opportunities,which is not only good for the person but the whole country.They are being lost due to wages..
That is a really good article,thanks for showing it.

Anyway sorry for winging,dont do it often.
~Jas~

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I know alot of mates who simply went to the mines simply due to the fact of money.Apprenticeships are very good opportunities,which is not only good for the person but the whole country.They are being lost due to wages.. That is a really good article,thanks for showing it. Anyway sorry for winging,dont do it often. ~Jas~

Aha, I didn't think anyone would drive a Kia by first choice! I would have thought a company named 'Europcar' would rent European cars - shows how much I know.

I found this article on Gillard's nonsensical plan by motoring writer John Cadogan - great stuff.

http://www.caradvice.com.au/75746/cleaner-car-rebate-scheme/