Diesel engines and city/short trip driving

[Toby]

Looking at buying a Ford Galaxy and wondering if its inappropriate to get a diesel engine as we only generally drive short distances in the city and annual mileage would only be about 3,0000 miles.

Would only using the car for short journeys damage the engine and potentially cause it to breakdown more often?

Also, does getting an automatic transmission influence this in any way?

Thanks

 

[Caveat]

It is inappropriate IMO.

Couple of reasons: as intimated, short trips/low mileage isn't good for a diesel engine. Something about a particulate filter clogging up? I'm not exactly sure. You may not have any trouble at all, but diesels are designed with longer journeys & mileage in mind - that's the point of them.

The other thing is, at only 3K a year, it is unlikely that the added cost of buying a diesel would outweigh the fuel saving benefit - you could get a petrol equivalent of your vehicle for less money, with less mileage in the first place and have less of a concern about the short low mileage trips too.

When you say automatic do you mean diesel auto or petrol auto?

Edit: just noticed your other thread. Don't know much about diesels myself but yes, this filter clogging thing seems to be a common enough story.