I'm thinking back to my early days in the UK. Sitting in the billeting office at RAF Mildenhall reading the base paper, I spotted a Ford ad for the Fiesta claiming 94 mpg. Later as a resident, I was doing business with mfg of Scottish knitwear. One of them had one of these cars and routinely drove to London on business. He said the mileage was true and made the round trip on little more than 1 fillup. Remembering that and being curious, I recently went to the Ford internet site, picked international,Uk and looked through the car selection. The current cars do not get as good mpg but are still much more than US models. Note the UK gal is 20% more but adjusted still better. The build quality, performance and mpg has always been better on European cars of GM, Ford and others.
Also Britain has emmissions standards pretty well shadowing ours here. Along with this is the fact that people can go to Belgium and buy an identical new car cheaper than in Britain. No tarriff duties within EU countries either. I shipped my Ford Ranger back here in '98 for 1500 pounds, currently about $1.85 per pound. That was duty free here on a change of residency, Just something to think about. I don't see any real relief on gas prices any time soon.
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Rexhall T-Rex Aerbus 36' May/2004 build
8.1 Vortec 5 spd Allison
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