Many of us love the comfort and style of an American ride. Their fuel consumption, on the other hand, is unpleasant to say the least. Replacing the petrol-guzzling V8 with a Diesel engine sounds like the right way to go. But which would be the engine of choice? Is it worth to surrender the automatic for a manual transmission that accompanies most of the Diesel engines on the market?
Old-school inline-sixes like Nissan's TD42 and Toyota's 1HZ/1HD might seem the best for those who look for more smoothness than a 4-cylinder would be able to provide, plus they were also available with automatic transmissions. Somebody could claim that even the Isuzu 4JA1 has been available with automatic transmission for the Crosswind, but really, that engine would barely move an Astro van that is not a full-size at all.
If one would be willing to shift gears on their own in a Silverado, Tahoe or Suburban, looking at engines from trucks with a 7-ton GVWR or greater is the way to go as it would be likely to retain a repectable tow rating. Anything from Isuzu NPR to Mitsubishi Canter, Nissan AtlasCabstar and certain versions of the Toyota Dyna/Hino Dutro/Hino 300 and Nissan/UD Condor. As used truck imports are still allowed, if one not willing to get rid of the comfort provided by the automatic transmission can be lucky enough to get it out of a JDM truck.
Shifting gears manually doesn't bother me at all, so my engine recommendation would be Isuzu 4HF1 or 4HG1.
2 comments:
I got a 3rd generation C20 repowered with the 4-litre engine out of a wrecked Toyota Coaster.
Since Toyota started to replace the 14B with the 5L-E in South Africa for the lower-end version of the Dyna, I would eventually give it a try in a Chevy bakkie.
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