Diesel cars are renowned for their durability, but that doesn't mean they don't require maintenance.
Prices for used diesel cars in the West are falling. This is due to the fact that for a long time the sales volume of new diesel cars was very high and therefore there are a lot of them on the used car market now. New diesel cars are much more expensive than their equivalent petrol counterparts. In addition, the time has passed when the diesel range we are accustomed to today was limited to just one model. Today, manufacturers are able to supply the market with diesels that meet the highest requirements.
It is a pity, if there are any, that diesel fuel costs the same as petrol or even more. But even in this case you will be at an advantage, since diesel cars, as a rule, have a longer service life, but only if you have a high annual mileage. No savings are achieved only with low annual mileage. You save on spark plugs, although it is clear that when using spark plugs with a replacement frequency of 60 thousand km, the savings on them will be small. At the same time, you will lose on more frequent oil and filter changes.
What is attractive about diesel?
Modern diesel cars are attractive because of their ability to develop high traction force at low revs, which is especially good for drivers who do not like to change gears too often. Most manufacturers offer turbocharged diesels to give the owner the opportunity to experience the full charm of a high-class car.
If you are thinking about switching to diesel, but do not know how to take care of it yourself, then we will say right away that maintaining a diesel in good condition is no more difficult than a gasoline engine, despite their differences. We offer you a short guide to buying, operating and maintaining a diesel.
The mechanisms of a petrol and diesel engine are not much different. Both engines operate on a four-stroke cycle of fuel combustion, but they do this in completely different ways.
While gasoline engines ignite the air-fuel mixture with spark plugs, diesel fuel is ignited by very high compression.
While a gasoline engine sucks in air and gasoline on the first stroke, a diesel engine sucks in only air, which is compressed to such an extent that its temperature rises to 800°C. The hot air ignites the diesel fuel, which is injected into the combustion chamber of the cylinder shortly before the piston reaches the BMT on the compression stroke. Since the compression ratio of diesel engines is twice as high as that of gasoline engines, the fuel must be injected under very high pressure so that it flies into the combustion chamber and the fuel stream retains the shape given to it. Due to the increased requirements for injection, the high-pressure fuel pump of a diesel engine is a particularly high-precision manufactured unit.
On older diesel models, high-pressure inline multi-plunger fuel pumps were usually used. Now most modern diesel engines use more sophisticated rotary pumps with a constant fuel supply, as they work better at high engine speeds. Modern diesel engines use electronic fuel metering control systems to achieve a combustion process that is close to ideal. Many diesels are even equipped with neutralizers for cleaning exhaust gases.
There are two types of diesel engines, and the difference between them is in how they burn fuel. Some use direct fuel injection. The name itself refers to the direct injection of fuel into the combustion chamber. Although this injection method is very efficient, its disadvantages include high noise and unevenness. For this reason, direct injection has been preserved only in diesel engines used in trucks. However, in diesel engines of improved design, these disadvantages have been largely eliminated, and most car manufacturers offer highly efficient diesel engines with direct injection.
In other diesel engines that do not use direct fuel injection, a small additional chamber is created in front of the combustion chamber, into which the fuel is injected. This chamber is located on the opposite side from the injector installation location and the direction of movement of the fuel injected by it. This design technique allows increasing engine speed, but this comes at the cost of some loss of power.
Why is diesel noisy?
The familiar roar of a diesel engine is caused by the combustion of fuel and the subsequent sharp drop in high pressure in the combustion chamber. The specific roar of a diesel engine is most clearly heard after starting during the warm-up of the engine at idle speed.
The diesel engine does not have an ignition system, but it does have a system for pre-heating the combustion chambers of the cylinders using spark plugs. In addition, the times of prolonged cranking of the engine with the starter and tedious waiting for the indicator lamp of the end of pre-heating to go out are long gone. Many manufacturers are already producing quick-start diesel engines, which take no more than a couple of seconds to start in winter. Some cars even have a "starter handle" that can directly control the high-pressure fuel pump to change the injection moment, speed up warming up and reduce smoke emissions during start-up.
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