Junkyard Find: 1984 Chevrolet Chevette CS Diesel.

JR wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@googlegroups.com:

Chevette Diesels! I remember those! Early-'80s.

I drove one once, and also a Nissan Sentra Diesel from the same era. Both cars were absolutely gutless. Flat-out, pedal on the floor, all they would do was about 75. Go up a rise in the road and the car would slow, go down again and it would speed up. This was with the pedal flat on the floor the whole time. Annoying and monotonous during a long highway trip. Good riddance to them.

Forget about those old diesel of the past. I drove a 4 cylinder turbo diesel in a largish car in Europe and it was the smoothest engine with the flattest torque curve I've ever driven. You could tell it was a diesel from the chatter when outside the car, inside, I wouldn't have a clue.

It was only 2 liters but I had no problems with passing cars at 70 MPH on the freeway. All I had to do was push down slightly on the accelerator and I'd surge ahead. To do this in an American car, you'd floor the accelerator to downshift the transmission and hope the engine's got enough guts to do the job. It also got over 40 MPH. Amazing!

I suspect that this might be the same engine we had in the Vauxhall Insignia that we drove in Wales.

Sure, but they didn't explode like the Oldsmobile diesels did.

--scott

weren't they just converted gas motors?

Ayup, based on the Olds 350 gas V-8.

My late uncle had a Buick with that motor as one of his company cars way back in the day, it was actually pretty nice. If GM had beefed the thing up so that the head gaskets would actually hold, we'd probably look at Diesels a lot differently today, at least here in the US.

The VW Rabbit Diesel was also a converted gas motor, but it didn't have the same reliability issues as the Olds. Unfortunately, it was also spectacularly gutless.

nate

Try driving a Chevrolet C60 with a 130-HP Detroit Diesel 4-53, an automatic transmission, and a 48-mph governor.

I've driven a Chevy/GMC 20 foot moving truck with a 366 gas V-8 before, I think it had a 60 MPH speed limiter, but the only time it could reach that loaded was downhill. Not sure what they were thinking when spec'ing that truck... my foot was literally flat to the floor for hours at a stretch.

nate

I use to drive a Chevy P30 stepvan in the 90's that had a 350 motor. That thing on a good day would reach 55-60mph on flat ground. Not sure if it was the gearing, or a worn out motor.

Trucks I drove in Vietnam were governed down to 45 MPH. There were two levers sticking out under the seat cushion. One for Granmaw gear, the other lever for all wheel drive.