Problem: When I finally get cars I get immediately frustrated that I can't use them because I have no fuel. Fuel is too difficult to obtain at the point I can build cars for the first time.

Why is that so? Because both fuel recipes are not really an option at that point of time. Light oil isn't yet available (needs Chemical Tech Cards > Advanced Oil Processing) and the other recipe needs way too many steps (Hydrogen through Electrolysis plant is a HUGE overkill, and the atmospheric condenser isn't available yet, and solid fuel is needed too.) Don't forget that all these steps come after I finally managed to get engines, which isn't easy in the first place.

Gameplaywise, I would actually like to have cars before trains so that I can explore the surroundings to evaluate where to place tracks.

So what to do? Here are some ideas.

• Either make Fuel really easy to get, or don't make cars require it. I suggest letting cars run on Solid Fuel, that is easy to obtain from petroleum. (And solid fuel hasn't any use, does it?)
• To give Fuel a reason, maybe make it a requirement for Rocket Fuel.
• Remove the Hydrogen + Solid Fuel = Fuel recipe, it is too difficult before Advanced Oil processing, and not needed anymore once we have Light Oil. But maybe it was meant to get rid of excessive Oil + Hydrogen? Then put it later in the research tree (maybe to Bio Fuel), so that it won't confuse in the beginning.
• I still would like cars to be easier to get than trains, but making trains require fuel sounds really annoying. I'm not sure how to do this, I guess you will probably keep it this way (cars more difficult than trains), but maybe someone has a good idea.

(I just see there's a new version. My comments are based on 0.9.9)

"Hydrogen through Electrolysis plant is a HUGE overkill" " it is too difficult before Advanced Oil processing" ??? use water electrolisis and just burn the clorine in a bluid burner no ? well it's require a little setup but it's very small and is enough for (42) personal car. https://imgur.com/gZg8xc1 (I forget the sand)

Precisely the sand. So you need stone too, next to your oil processing. That's a huge overkill just to get your cars running which you expect to run the moment you build them. (And later you disassemble this all and go to the easy Light Oil recipe.)

Why not use wood or coal to power your car?

In Krastorio cars can't burn coal or wood. They can only run on fuel (or better). I don't think that's a bad idea in general, but it unfortunately messes up proper progression.

If it's messes up your progression, then I'm even afraid to imagine what will happen next.

eh.. first time around i thought it was annoying too, but 2nd time I quickly started using solid fuel to feed furnaces meaning I had some of it flowing into my glass making. from there it's trivial to start making a little bit of fuel. you really only need a tiny amount. even if you had to hand cary a bit of stone, it wouldn't be that big a deal.

The problem remains that the mod author has created a circular dependency on oil: You need to use the car to explore to find oil which is needed to use the car.

Because all fuel recipes require oil you can either cheat, or explore, fight and build oil pipelines on foot which isn't fun.

Maybe it wasn't a coincidence that neither the vanilla car nor vanilla military science require oil...

I agree that it was a lousy feeling to have a car deployed for several hours before I could actually fuel it. Spent a lot of time building rail tracks on foot and by the end of it the car wasn't even particularly useful.

Starting arena is suppose to contain oil or it's because I installed RSO ?

RSO is what puts oil in the starting area. however without RSO, one can look at the preview and at least see where they need to go to get their initial oil.

in 2 games of krastorio 2 never had to go far for oil. mineral water seems to be rarer.