I'd like to see what one of your DPFs looks like.

Mine? I do not own any, I own (and always owned) gasoline, I don't want to have such troubles with my car... :-D

To be honest I don't blame you. They can be a money pit big time.

To be honest I don't blame you. They can be a money pit big time.

Why the word "blame"? I didn't felt like "blamed" at all...

I came to closer contacts with DPF's, as my friend does frequently car maintenance (to earn some extra bonus for the family) an I frequently help him with with this regeneration (and sometimes with other stuff). There I learned all the extra troubles with passenger car diesels, so it convinced me it is not worth to save a bit on the fuel - I spent a lot of money for a new car to have reliable vehicle, so I didn't want to sacrifice that...

Quote from: slipperypete on August 14, 2012, 05:42:47 PM

To be honest I don't blame you. They can be a money pit big time.

Why the word "blame"? I didn't felt like "blamed" at all...

I came to closer contacts with DPF's, as my friend does frequently car maintenance (to earn some extra bonus for the family) an I frequently help him with with this regeneration (and sometimes with other stuff). There I learned all the extra troubles with passenger car diesels, so it convinced me it is not worth to save a bit on the fuel - I spent a lot of money for a new car to have reliable vehicle, so I didn't want to sacrifice that...

"I don't blame you " is an expression similar to "I understand "

"I don't blame you " is an expression similar to "I understand "

OK, thank you to teach me something extra, I didn't know that. I have still a lot to learn about the English...
Well, that's the main reason, why I'm active here... :-D

Quote from: slipperypete on August 15, 2012, 05:17:00 AM

"I don't blame you " is an expression similar to "I understand "

OK, thank you to teach me something extra, I didn't know that. I have still a lot to learn about the English...
Well, that's the main reason, why I'm active here... :-D

That is entirely fine. English is a complicated language.

There are a lot of advantages to diesel engines over petrol/gasoline engines.  As you have mentioned, take care of the particulate emissions and there is really no disadvantage to them at all.  My mother has a 2010 Volkswagen Jetta TDI and it is powerful, clean and fuel efficient.  It has the "regen" type DPF on it.  The exhaust on it is much cleaner than the equivalent gas/pertol engine car.  It also gets nearly twice the fuel economy.  Most of the diesel emission issue of the past has been solved with "Ultra Low Sulfur Diesel" (ULSD) which has less than 15 ppm sulfur.  I have noticed a quite a reduction in smoke on my personal truck (1996 Dodge with 5.9 Cummins) since the introduction of ULSD.  I also run a blend of 50% waste cooking oil and 50% diesel fuel, as I have been doing for at least four years/over 100,000 miles of driving.
Fuel efficiency is the number one advantage.
Diesel engines are more robust than gas/petrol engines.
Diesels have low end torque, which makes them superior for pulling or anything with low speed/high torque needs.
Diesel fuel does not have explosive vapor, making it much safer to store, transport and dispense than gasoline/petrol.
Even with all engines getting more complex, diesels still have one less complexity in that they are compression ignited and require only fuel+compression to run, not fuel+compression+spark, as gas/petrol requires.
I have LOTS of diesel powered equipment and would not trade any of them for gas/petrol.  They include:
2005 Jeep Liberty CRD (2.8L VM engine)
2003 Dodge 3500 (5.9L Cummins engine)
1996 Dodge 3500 (5.9L Cummins engine)
Kubota M9000 tractor (90 horsepower Kubota turbo/intercooled 4 cyl engine)
Arctic Cat TRV ATV (686 cc Lombardini 2 cyl ohc engine)
Miller welder/generator (722cc Kubota 3 cyl engine)
Kubota TG1860 riding mower (722cc Kubota 3 cyl engine)
Champion 30 gallon portable air compressor (Yanmar L100 air cooled engine)
Pressure washer with L70 Yanmar air cooled engine
Firewood splitter with L70 Yanmar air cooled engine
2" water pump with L70 Yanmar air cooled engine
(2) 3500 watt Robin portable generators with DY27 Robin air cooled engines
Future project engines include: Yanmar V-Twin vertical shaft liquid cooled, Yanmar L75 air cooled, Yanmar L40 air cooled, Acme air cooled, Kubota 600 cc liquid cooled, Kubota 2.2 liter liquid cooled 4 cyl, 5.9 6 cylinder Cummins, removed from an old water pump unit.
I want to build a little runabout pickup and a Jeep Wrangler, both diesel powered, in the future.
Can you see how I got my user name? 

Diesels become emission-wise on par with gasoline engines (where gasolines could be even 20 years old) only after the introduction of the DPF.
They offer a bit higher thermal efficiency, but they are way more demanding for the forces the components should handle. On top of that the higher compression ratios ask for tighter tolerances for the components. The high pressure fuel system is another precision machinery diesels do need. All that make the engine highly susceptible to the lubrication oil quality and any impurities in the fuel (filtered vegetable oil does not cause as large problems, as it have suficient lubrication qualities), try to mix 10% of gasoline into the diesel fuel - your injection pump would be dead within minutes.
On larger engines (150kW and above - for heavier vehicles) all the tolerances grow proportionally with the engine size, so (beside the forces involved) they become more tolerant to e.g. wear, so the long life.

Gasolines does require the ignition system, what has been a pain to design, but otherwise they do not have to push the components so far to their limits. So when something get mixed into the fuel, it does not cause any big problems, unless it lower too much the octane rating or when the flash point become too high (too low remaining percentage of the original gas).

The lower fuel consumption of diesels in terms of litres per 100km (or miles per gallon) come mainly from the higher combustion heat of the heavier kerosene (main component of the diesel fuel) compare to light gas.
And on large engines it come from the fact, than due to the limited flame speed (what have to spread from the spark ignition on gasolines), the gasoline cylinders are limited to about 500cc (about the optimum), so larger engines have to utilize many cylinders, so do not benefit from the "large scale economy", as the diesels do (there is from the nature no such limitation, so it is no problem to use many times larger cylinders, what mainly benefit from the lower heat losses, lower friction and larger tolerances).