My comment was to show the relative parity between gasoline, and fuel oil prices, although Diesel is still higher by a bit. There are exemptions from road use taxes included in the price for some types of equipment, and some vehicles, such as farm, and off road/ construction vehicles, as well as refrigeration plants on transport trailers, and containers. The U.S. tax system places a fair amount of taxes on motor fuels, particularly when that fuel is used to generate business revenue. Taxation imposed to make the price artificially high in order to discourage use would be considered by most Americans as “Socialist” as well as a few other colorful,and descriptive metaphors. Diesel has always been a bit more expensive than gas, back in 1980, a gallon of gas in my town was 46 cents, and Diesel was 66 cents. And American made Diesel cars were just starting to appear on the roads (the disastrous attempt by General Motors to turn a gas engine into a diesel )
In the UK petrol is around 5p per litre more (£1.37 for diesel opposed to £1.42 for petrol at my local supermarket) now until diesel became popular in the late 90’s diesel was actually more expensive by about 5p a litre.
The cost savings are you get more mileage out of diesel engine despite it being a much heavier lump of metal than the corresponding petrol engine of the same capacity in the same car.
Diesels tend to have a lower road tax license fund in the UK as well due to less emissions (my 1600 diesel costs less than half what my sons 1300 petrol car costs - £100 compared to £225 a year - his is 3 year older than mine though), the emissions are tested each year as well to ensure they are still within the proscribed limits (road tax is based on Euro testing of cars for emissions).
In Belgium, until 15 years ago there was an extra “diesel” road tax, which they discarded eventually and nowadays diesel engines are getting cheaper to put on the road exactly like they do in the UK.
Stunning no?
More than 70% of the cars driving around are diesels. Many people drive a “company car” as part of the salary.
Only 15 years ago there were more petrols driving around. Much less leasing. More people “owned” a car than they leased. The fewer mileage you had, the more you choose the petrol way, since it had no diesel tax, the car was cheaper to purchase and fuel cost was low. More recent, fuel was getting a more important cost, diesels got cleaner and even more fuel efficient. And last but not least: gov. gave CO2 - bonusses.
It is constantly moving around: in 2012 was the first year again that saw more new petrols sold than new diesels. Fiscal CO2- bonus was gone 
hey we stopped the “Tiger tank is mother of all tanks” foolishness
But not quite as amusing as the rest of us getting to watch you have an argument with a banned ex-member 
Ah but only a temp ban - he will return lol
Nope, further evidence came to light and he was perma-banned about 20 minutes afterwards.
I wonder whether he will continue his Tiger propaganda
Ah I missed that bit
Not here, lol. It’s about $3.75 for gas and $4.09 for diesel…
I went by my local gas station today, the price for regular is $3.19 Gal. price of Diesel is $3.75 Gal. When I went through Chicago the other day it was about $4.07 Gal. Regular.
That’s a lot of difference no? 27,6% more ???
There’s a fair amount of disparity in gas pricing in America. Major oil companies claim it has to do with the cost of distribution and that inevitably cities near major ports or refineries will inevitably have cheaper fuel prices. Some of it has to do with taxes, but I think a lot of it has to do with a bit of price fixing…
That happens in my home county which has the highest cost for fuel (and electricity) as there is no refinery/generating station nearby, oddly water is also one the the highest in the UK despite my house being only 10 miles from the reservoir.
Any other information you’d like to add about this image?
Well, I’m struck with the fact that the British (of all allies) made tests of the Panther vs their brand new Centurion mid 1945. Concluding that their new tank was not at all blazing the Panther aside.
First of all it uses the Panther as reference. Not that it was nonsense of them to do so at the time. The Panther however, was as phased out as a the Tiger was eventually.
The Centurion on the other hand (whcih brings it to my second point of interest) must be one of “the” tanks of all time, being one of the most famous with a very long service record. The pinnacle of the new birth of British pride.
It makes me wonder: was the Panther a potential start of a tank family, able to compete in the cold war age?
Gasoline prices in East Tennessee are generally lower than in the northern States,(no idea why though) Chicago is always more expensive than most anywhere in the area, they must include cost of bribery in their tax structure. (and perhaps the costs of keeping many of their state officials in prison):mrgreen:
Had the Panther been properly designed, and developed, it would have been a far better Tank than it turned out to be, with a very overburdened driveline due to excessive weight (nearly ten tons over what it was originally designed to be. ) and the poorly designed final drive that used a double spur gear arrangement that required drivers to be trained in how not to push it too hard lest it breakdown completely. It was too expensive, and time consuming to build in any useful numbers, as has been pointed out a thousand times already. The thing that would render its design obsolete was the introduction of super velocity kinetic penetrator munitions, Sabot, Arrowhead, etc. as well as High Explosive anti-Tank (HEAT ) munitions that made face hardened hot rolled armor a worthless liability. In truth, had a NATO MBT of the 60’s-70’s come across a few Panthers, they would be toast within 15 seconds from distances far beyond their own ability to engage. The homogeneous cast armor of both NATO, and the Warsaw Pact Tanks while perhaps not as resistant to a kinetic shot from the Panther had the quality of allowing the round to pass through without a great deal of secondary fragmentation, or spalling. A problem that plagued vehicles made with hot rolled face hardened armor. This was a particular problem with use of the HESH, or HEP munitions which while primarily used against artillery, and bunkers, was very good at defeating armor by causing awful amounts of spalling in the interior surfaces of rolled armor. The Israeli’s and their Centurions used HESH ammo to great effect against the soviet supplied armor of Egypt, and Syria.(and they had cast armor)
The Panther would not have faired very well at all had it been deployed as it was in the Cold War days even if it had more modern ammunition available. (And we haven’t even gotten to its antiquated driveline yet.) It would have been better to create an entirely new design employing more modern features than to update what was essentially a dead end.
For the Cold War, Germany built the Leopard, which more closely resembled the Centurion than the Panther . The Leo. was certainly a good, and well built Tank, but was still more costly than its NATO counterparts.
Don’t forget the Panther’s thin side armor making it vulnerable even to the American 75mm mounted on most Sherman tanks until the final months of the war. One thing I would contest though is that the Panther wasn’t much more expensive than a Panzer Mk IV to build, IIRC…
I don’t think the Isreali’s bothered to much using Shermans up to the Yom Kipur War. By that time the leo 1 got several upgrades and they were designing the Leo 2 (with massive perforated steel armour blocks). In theory even the Centurion would have been replaced in the fifties. And yes, the Soviet designs were not that spectacular strong at a certain period, but even they were mostly older designs (+10 years before).
I don’t think the Panther (besides its drive train) would have been that useless post-war. The later Panther were rolled plate, yet non hardened face any more, because even the Germans started regarding it as useless. The centurion was given different guns, upgraded and redesigned in armour, engine and even wheels and suspension for the same reasons as there are given to the panther. If all that would not have happened, the Centurion would not be the famous tank it is. The Panther was examined by British AND French. Both did see qualities. And why wouldn’t the West Germans with Panthers would have been NATO?
Exactly, Pz IV production line was mostly unaltered, while the Panther was streamlined under Speer’s ministry along the way of design. The construction principle alone of the Panther (selfbearing welded hullplates) made it cheaper in concept. The fact it costed less more than it used more in materials vs the Pz IV explains a lot. I’ve read (but can’t remember, perhaps here) that a Tiger costed 2.5x as much as a PzIV and 2x as much as a Panther, making the Panther only 25% more expensive as a IV. The reliability of the IV is point of interest though.