Diesel Cars

You won’t really know what to make of this strange Mk4 Toyota Supra, that’s packing a Cummins diesel tank engine under the hood. Overkill? Well, let’s take a closer look and see what you make of it after you check out the mods on this rig.

It was just back in April of 2021 that Audi launched the A6 E-Tron concept – a car that was originally thought to replace the fuel-drinking A6. As it turned out, the A6 E-Tron won’t replace the regular A6, but it will be the A6’s EV counterpart. About a month after it was released, I sat down to make a case for how the A6 E-Tron could become the electric wagon – or Avant in Audi talk – that 2025 needs. If the latest reports are true, I could have been right, except that Audi might be moving quicker than I anticipated.

Chevrolet debuted the twelfth-gen of the Suburban in December 2019. The SUV came out looking rejuvenated and reinvigorated. Introduced as the 2021 model year Suburban, the SUV was now based on a new platform, featured a new diesel engine option, and came with a range-topping High Country trim. Chevy even capitalized on space optimization, plonked in a new suspension setup, and turned all the screws in the right direction to make this a complete package.

We recently laid our hands on the 2021 Chevy Suburban in the Premier trim with the Duramax diesel engine. Our example was finished in a black exterior shade and looked exquisite, to say the least. It is definitely one of the best full-size SUVs that you can buy today with a five-digit budget.

Land Rover introduced the new Defender two years ago around this time. While it seemed rugged and strong on paper and turned out to be a rather sweet package, a lot of purists didn’t find the old-school charm in it anymore, which wasn’t wrong. But, how does it compare to its predecessors in terms of pure strength? Mat Watson from Carwow decided to find the answer by pitting it against two yesteryear Land Rover Defenders in a tug of war. While one of them featured a diesel mill, the other was an electrified version. Which SUV do you think has the edge?

Russia’s counterpart to the great American Hummer has arrived in the form of the GAZ VPK Strela. The vehicle was showcased at the seventh International Military-technical forum that was held in Russia between 22-28th of August.

OMG! (read: Oh My GretaThunberg) This was bound to happen. At a time when the world is moving towards creating a cleaner and greener environment, Diesel Brothers were breaking rules left and right by tampering with the emission equipment on a trucks without giving a damn about the repercussions. Wait, you know who Diesel Brothers are, right?

For the uninitiated, there’s a reality show on Discovery Channel that goes by the name “Diesel Brothers” wherein a trio of mechanics build and sell diesel trucks. While building them, however, the ‘brothers’ were removing the pollution control equipment from the trucks to bypass emission controls. As it turns out, a lawsuit was filed against them to tune of over two million dollars, and now, they are in deep, deep sh*t.

Mercedes’ lineup of electric crossovers and SUVs continues to take shape with a fresh batch of spy photos of a model that looks a lot like the Mercedes GLB-Class. Except this isn’t the GLB; this is the GLB’s all-electric alter ego, the EQ B. The spy photos were taken in Sweden where the EQ B is undergoing winter testing. Mercedes hasn’t divulged the juicy details of the EQ B, but it is believed that, among other things, it will largely take the form of the GLB, albeit with a few minor tweaks to reflect is all-electric stature. No timetable has been given on when the Mercedes EQ B will launch, but we do know that the all-electric crossover will not hit the U.S. market until 2021.

Update 2/28/2020: The Mercedes EQB has started to take on its official electrified look in our latest batch of spy shots. Is a debut imminent? Find out what we know in our special “Spy Shots” section below!

Well, this is some big news that will interest all the Jeep Wrangler fans out there. JLWranglerForums has received a scoop on the pricing of the diesel engine option. As it turns out, the famed 3.0-liter EcoDiesel engine will be available as optional on the 2020 Jeep Wrangler JL for $6,000.

This includes the price of the eight-speed automatic gearbox as well. But there’s a catch. Although the premise of this engine making its way under the hood of the Wrangler is exciting at the onset, we are utterly disappointed that this engine cannot be mated to a manual transmission. Come on, Jeep. Why can’t you let us have the cake and eat it too this one time?

It’s 2019 and we’re still happily buying and driving gas-powered and diesel-powered cars but the days of the internal combustion engine - at least the one as we know it now, powered by fossil fuels - are numbered with the looming threat of global warming growing seemingly by the minute. As almost every major player in the automotive industry pushes for electrification, we see customers do so too with more and more EVs being bought every year. Moreover, countries all around the world are preparing laws that could see the sale of ICE-powered vehicles outlawed. This may become a reality in the United Kingdom by 2035 and the U.S. could follow suit sooner rather than later although such a dramatic shift won’t happen overnight.

Can you feel it? The wind of change is blowing hard nowadays. Researchers say that, by 2022, owning an EV will be cheaper than the cost of living with a diesel-powered or a gas-powered alternative. By 2040, it’s said that around 50% of the cars on our roads will be electric and you can see how this may happen as the sales of EVs have gone up by an astonishing 92% in the first six months of 2019 to 765,000 units sold across 41 different markets around the globe. It’s still a niche with just 1.7% of the global market being taken up by BEVs but this percentage grows all the time and the process will be accelerated once nations start enforcing partial and then across-the-board bans on fossil fuel-powered vehicle that’ll leave people and business no choice but to switch when the moment comes to buy a new car.

It was 2010 when the rules changed after two Peugeot models were killed off: the 607, which was almost completely based on the 605 model from 1989, and the 407, which seemed like it was roaming between segments in an attempt to get into the wallets of two social strata. It wasn’t like Peugeot roamed around wearing blindfolds, though. This was more of an attempt at creating a global trend founded on personal identity; however, Peugeot couldn’t find its ground when it came to cars whose length was more than 4,5 meters (177 inches).

Mind you, Peugeot wasn’t the only one, as similar strategies were employed by Volvo, Renault, and even Ford. And then they were back with another attempt – one car that would be interesting to those in need of a spacious family car, but also those who were in search for a business saloon or the second best thing at least. As the wheelbase for the 607 was 2.800 mm (110.23 in), and 2.725 mm (107.28 in) for the 407, Peugeot found itself in uncharted territories in 2010 given that its 508 (albeit shorter than the 607), had a wheelbase of 2.817 mm.

So, the two generations of the 508 model found its way to more than 400,000 buyers in Europe alone. Despite steadily declining sales figures, Peugeot wasn’t ready to euthanize the model. Instead, the company decided to cut the administrative costs, and adequately entice its designers and engineers. They came up with a new product and Peugeot revealed it in March 2018 at the Geneva International Auto Show as the new 508.

Don’t you fret, diesel engine fans. Even if EVs are taking the industry by storm, oil burners are here to stay; at least when it comes to pickup trucks. Companies in this segment generally tend to have many diesel engine options and from the looks of it, there’s no stopping yet. On that note, Ram has launched its third-gen EcoDiesel engine in the 2020 Ram 1500 pickup trucks. This engine will be available across the stable in all configurations, but does it get any better than the second-generation EcoDiesel?

Diesels have received an increasingly bad rep over the past decade. They’ve been shunned by some as too dirty to run, a view strengthened by all the climate change advocates throwing their arms in the air announcing our impending mass extinction by global warming. However, there are those (rare) people who still appreciate the good old compression-ignition engine and who will go to great lengths to retrofit a car they like with an oil burner to satisfy themselves.

On my quest to find the craziest diesel swaps that the internet has to offer, I’ve assembled this list of ten examples that are not only cool but also support the idea that a diesel swap is a valid swap... at least in my mind. Keep in mind that some of the swaps on the list are easier to achieve than others as they require an extensive reengineering of the vehicle.

In some cases, the (often bigger) new engine won’t fit where it intended to, and it either gets moved to the middle of the car or serious hacking of the engine bay and firewall need to take place. But once the work on one of these is done, it will not only be super fast (if you use a turbocharged diesel) but also frugal. And, if you tune it well (which you should), it won’t spew out that much sooty black smoke out the back (or the hood, side, or wherever you feel like re-routing the exhaust to).

Mazda has created one of the most beautiful shapes in the compact hatchback segment, its new Mazda3 hatch, a shape that lifts it above any competitor in terms of design. It has a pretty face, nice sides, and a unique rear end that lends it a lot of personality, but at the same time, it also needs to do all the boring, practical stuff well in order to be a serious class contender.

Its interior feels upmarket, and the driving experience is precise and relaxed, especially if the power plant under the hood is Mazda’s latest diesel engine, still available in the 3 and other models the Japanese manufacturer sells in Europe. This latest model doesn’t feel as sharp as its predecessor nor is it the best in class, but it’s far more relaxed and refined than the car it replaces, and it exudes an overall desirable and premium feeling.

The car it replaces was a great all-rounder, although it suffered from excessive tire roar inside at speed (and generally not the best soundproofing), plus its interior didn’t feel as nice as some rivals’, and it also lagged behind in terms of tech. Mazda has addressed all these concerns and more with its new 3, and the result is a much better all-rounder with an even prettier face than before, plus that rear end that will sure to draw a lot of gazes.

Mazda has officially confirmed that it will start selling its first modern diesel in the U.S., and it will come under the hood of its CX-5 crossover. This, all while the manufacturers that have always been very pro-diesel, the Europeans, are now shunning compression-ignition engines and looking for alternatives.

Audi is in the advanced stages of testing an all-electric version of its Q2 crossover, the smallest high riding vehicle it currently sells. The Q2 e-Tron (which is what it will most likely be called) will complete the Q2 lineup that also includes the SQ2 performance model, as well as an extended wheelbase Q2 destined for the Chinese market. The Q2 EV won’t differ much visually from other models in the range, but with a careful look, you will be able to spot that it is the battery powered model. The camouflaged prototype snagged by our spies has no exhaust pipe, for instance, and it’s bound to have additional small exterior giveaways as to what it is. It’s also been suggested that the Q2 e-Tron might use the lengthened platform of the Chinese-market model, but at the moment we really cannot make a definitive judgment on that based solely on this batch of spy shots. Furthermore, the Q2 e-Tron may only be sold in China, although there is a good chance it will reach Europe as well - this would represent the first sale of a long-wheelbase Chinese-market Audi model in Europe.

Update 4/2/2019:Our spy photographers caught the Audi Q2 doing some last minute, cold-weather testing. Check out the latest shots in our spy shots section below.

Audi released the new 2019 Audi SQ5 TDI, and it will showcase the brute at the 2019 Geneva International Motor Show. Yet, before I get into all the “what’s new” jazz, let me give you some perspective here, right in the introduction. The 2015 Ford Mustang GT comes with a V-8 with 435 horsepower and 400 pound-feet of torque and can accelerate to 60 in 4.4 seconds. The 2016 Chevy Camaro SS comes with a V-8 with 455 horsepower and 455 pound-feet of torque and can accelerate to 60 in 4.3 seconds. The 2018 Durango SRT comes with a V-8 with 475 horsepower and 470 pound-feet of torque and can accelerate to 60 in 4.4 seconds. Now, the new Audi SQ5 TDI isn’t as quick. It will accelerate to 60 mph in 5 seconds. So, around half a second slower, but not far off.

So, why the hell am I mentioning American muscle cars here? Well, unlike them, Audi doesn’t run on gasoline, it does not have a V-8, and its engine is around 25-percent smaller in terms of displacement compared to any of the cars listed here. Ladies and gentlemen, I know that comparing a compact SUV with muscle cars and a massive SUV like the Dodge Durango is, basically, blasphemy, but the Audi SQ5 is that insane, amazing, and incredible. In its newest iteration it is, by far, the most amazing diesel-powered performance SUV I know of. Yes, Alpina does have that mad

based XD3 with 388 horsepower, but I consider that to be an aftermarket offering despite the car being produced on the same production line as the regular X3.