Remember diesel? These nine used classic cars we found for sale certainly do

We must start with Volkswagen, because its name is now indelibly linked to diesel. For some reason. Anyway, this car is one of the unfortunate victims of the 21st century’s biggest automotive hoo-ha. A truly revolutionary little device, it was spun from VW boss Ferdinand Piëch’s lofty target for a ‘1.0-litre car’ – one capable of travelling 100km on a single litre of fuel. An initial concept in 2002 paved way for a production car by 2013 that – on-paper – beat his target, the production XL1’s diesel-electric hybrid powertrain achieving 0.9l/100km – or 313mpg.

You won’t quite make that in real life, but you’ll get close, and despite ‘meh’ performance (68bhp means 12.7sec), its driving experience feels mini-McLaren thanks to its feelsome steering, carbon tub and butterfly doors. Performance versions with bike engines were touted, but killed by Dieselgate. Boo.

Just 250 were made, around a tenth of which still dwell in the UK. The rarity ought to justify the £80k price…

Plenty of carmakers tenuously call upon motorsport activities to shift a few units out of showrooms. Fiat Seicento Michael Schumacher, anyone? But this one had more nous to it. A lot more. By the end of the Noughties, Audi was freshly reinforcing its mantelpiece to hold a wealth of Le Mans trophies, most of them won with diesel. So why not motivate the sensible Q7 SUV with something vaguely similar? Comprising six litres and possessing nearly 500bhp, the twin-turbo V12 shoehorned into its snout was unlike anything we’d seen before in a family shuttle. Or indeed since.

The end product weighed 2.6 tonnes long before we harangued EVs for such crimes and it lost money like them too, priced from a whisker under £100,000 in basic trim – or nearly £150k with desirable options packs. Which makes this 29,000-mile example a bargain at £55k, no? It is kind of a racecar, after all.

From an SUV with a Le Mans engine (sort of), to an SUV with a Bugatti engine (sort of). Owners of a post-2018 X5 M50d can tell all who’ll reluctantly listen that their diesel workhorse has quad turbos, “just like a Veyron, innit?” Can’t lie, though, we’d be impressed too. Its 394bhp and lofty 561lb ft fire its bulk to 60mph with hot hatch vim, all soundtracked by a pretty decent noise for a diesel, too.

Most of them are finished in menacing grey or black and appear to have swerved onto the forecourt via a questionable parts catalogue – thankfully we’ve found a plain ol’ white one with normal wheels for ultimate undercover performance.

Oh, you want your performance diesel SUV to carry a bit more decorum, do you? The crew from Crewe have the answer, albeit with a little help from Audi. The SQ7 is a bit of a star, and it was only too happy to lend the bones of its powertrain to Bentley for the Brit firm’s first – and as yet only – oil-burner. Whatever you think of its design, it’s a lush and luxurious long-distance hero – and owners adore them, keeping second-hand prices reasonably high.

And back to earth we go. At the other end of the vast VW empire is sensible ol’ Skoda, though the Octavia vRS has – over four generations – generally bombilated around the more exciting end of its range. Heck, it even took a Bonneville speed record. The Mk3 is probably the best looking and offers a lovely mix of handling prowess and interior tech. Little surprise, when it’s basically a cousin of the glorious Mk7 Golf GTI.

It came with a dizzying amount of choice – front- or four-wheel drive, manual or automatic transmission, hatch or estate body and petrol or diesel power, with a handful of special editions thrown in for good measure. Prices and mileages vary wildly in the classifieds, but there really ought to be a vRS for any budget. This fetching Race Blue hatch is a diesel DSG and thus likely a delightful way to cover humongous miles.

You may be aware Jaguar is in the process of a Doctor Who-esque regeneration. You may also be aware it has upset some people. The end product is something we’ll see tantalisingly soon, but our first taster suggests some proper, traditional XJ traits. Which yes, is a very good thing. But if its inevitably stocky price tag precludes you from diving headfirst into Jag’s bold new future, how about a slice of its recent past?

The previous XJ rattled traditionalists upon launch too, its space-age, Callum-penned styling a deliberate leap forward that also left a few folks behind scratching their chins and spewing forth online. We adored it – the interior especially. And while the supercharged V8s are lovely, the one you really want is the smooth and torquey 3.0-litre diesel. Blue on tan and demanding less than seven grand, with a chunky warranty to help ease some of your inevitable fear: buy it before we do!

Hands on hearts time: this is the one we’d all buy with our own, actual money. The Alpina D3 Biturbo had enough appeal to make you lightheaded when new, and this one has been maintained ‘regardless of cost’ in the intervening years yet is priced like an entry-level Corsa.

The classic decals and multispoke wheels are present and correct and its 3.0-litre twin-turbo straight-six is good for 345bhp and 516lb ft. Contemporary Ferraris possessed a lot less torque than that, and they couldn’t haul around a muddy labrador while claiming 40-odd miles per gallon. ‘Diesel perfection’ may sound like the faintest of praise, but boy does this car get close…

Or would you like your early 21st century limo to be even more left of field? Like the XL1 further up the page, the Phaeton is the product of another Piëch daydream, the ‘Veyron of comfort’ to put it succinctly.  The TL;DR version is that the Phaeton hit the bullseye from an engineering perspective while failing cataclysmically when it came to vagaries like ‘actually selling’ or ‘making VW money’.

Which yes, plays wonderfully into the hands of the scruffy used car buyer with modest cash. If the stars align you’ll find an example with the almighty V10 TDI in the classifieds (and not a scary ‘spares and repairs’ car), all five litres and 300-odd horsepower of it. It was a slice of wanton Noughties excess in the vein of the Q7 a few scrolls up. In reality, you’ll find a handful of 3.0-litre V6s for pifflingly little cash: this one has a year’s MOT and an equipment list that would look rich now, all for the price of some contrast dashboard stitching on the Porsche 911 configurator.

Alright, so this is actual diesel perfection. Audi won 13 of its 17 starts at the 24 Hours of Le Mans, eight of those with diesel power, and this is a car from near the end of that success-rich World Endurance Championship era. An era which drew to a close thanks to – yes – Dieselgate.

As the name suggests, it’s a four-wheel-drive hybrid, so on paper it’s a sensible and zetigeisty buy. How easy it’ll be to park – or indeed get running in the morning without a fleet of race techs and 2015-era laptops – is another question, but its 750bhp+ and 210mph top speed aren’t to be sniffed at. And the history books attest it’s very good over long distances.

POA – but you’ll have spent over a million before you’ve even employed a support team.