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Old 02-23-2008, 10:43 PM
Bob Albrecht's Avatar
Bob Albrecht Bob Albrecht is offline
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Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: Kennett Square, PA
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Huge Engines Rarely Used

Quote:
Originally Posted by rs899 View Post
For the last 30 years or so the marketing mantra has been to make them bigger and faster and people have sucked it up.

Years ago (lets say 1972 or so) 100 HP was plenty of power to do the job ( I'm not talking muscle cars) yet one was hard pressed to approach 1 HP per cubic inch displacement. Now everyone expects 200+ HP in everything and its no big deal to find that in an econobox. Why can't manufacturers produce a smaller displacement engine that develops reasonable useful power? I would think one ought to be able to get 100 ponies out of about 1 litre, but no one seems to be interested until now, maybe.

Rick
Most diesels in this country are trucks used for business. I can't imagine why anyone would need/want a 7 liter diesel in a pickup when they live somewhere flat like the Midwest or Florida, especially with $3.30+/gal. Diesel trucks in Europe run around on 2 liter engines and don't seem too slow. Besides, most drivers never really put their foot into it and rarely tow anything or load up the bed.

My wife's 4+L / 270HP Trailblazer is downright scary if you put the pedal to the metal.
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