Another one. https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/stat...nd-agreement-principle-cummins-settle-alleged
Hard to believe all these other manufacturers have not managed to learn from VW's mistakes.
Diesel tech is only getting harder. Cummins is going to be releasing its first ever gasoline engine in 2024 as I recall, the B6.7 Octane, plus of course they are big into the battery business now. I think they see where this all is headed and this penalty might only push them there faster.
I see more and more medium-duty trucks now built on Ford chassis, rather than the Freightliners and Internationals and Hinos that have dominated the MD market ....... with the Fords mostly having a chrome "V8" badge on the doors indicating the gasoline 7.3L motor. Actually as you pass them on the highway you don't even need the badge, just looking underneath and seeing the simple catalyst and muffler hanging down there alone rather than the big diesel aftertreatment package tells it all. Great business move for Ford to release a serious HD gasoline engine to meet demand for an alternative, reading the writing on the wall for diesels and especially for fleet consumers who are tired of complex diesel emission controls. Compared to the downtime and maintenance cost of a modern diesel, I'm right there with them.... A simple, port-injected pushrod V8 built on diesel architecture that'll run a couple hundred thousand miles with almost zero attention as long as you keep the gas tank full (at $0.75/gal less than diesel), and then can be rebuilt or replaced for probably less than the cost of a new DPF/SCR unit for a Cummins, let alone all the other maintenance along the way? Even as a diehard diesel guy it's hard to see how the gasser doesn't blow the diesel out of the water in everything except perhaps performance, even if it gets 5 mpg where a diesel could get 10.
Then there's the much reduced weight of a compact, naturally-aspirated gas V8 and its simple emission controls, that means more available payload in a commercial vehicle or legal towing capacity in a pickup truck.... Plus of course the massive difference in initial cost, which is a 5-figure amount last time I checked.... and wouldn't surprise me if in 10 years the gassers even have better resale value too versus a used diesel with unknown potential big $$ needs. Worst that could happen with the used gasser is you have to throw a fairly inexpensive fresh engine in it, and then you're set for another couple hundred k.....
Companies like Penske and Ryder that always ran diesels in the past are making the shift from what I see in their fleets out on the road. Seen a lot of new municipal trucks, dump trucks, flatbeds, service trucks etc running the V8 as well. Guess the math is easy enough on the lifecycle total cost that everyone is seeing it after 15 years of aftertreatment-equipped diesels. Payday for Ford, as that gasser has to be relatively inexpensive to build (and to test and certify), and they have the market to themselves other than a few smaller light duty tilt cab Isuzus with GM V8s and whatever Cummins eventually releases. I am guessing that Cummins will probably be direct-injected turbocharged gasser with a GPF derived from the diesel, meaning much heavier, more expensive, and less efficient than the Ford V8, negating a lot of the benefit of the gas alternative. Though the preliminary specs do suggest the Cummins will offer ratings of over 300hp/600lb-ft meaning it could be an option in heavier weight classes than Ford's engine could be suitable for, so maybe it is less of a direct competitor and will serve more to just expand the range of applications for gas power in HD vehicles. https://mart.cummins.com/imagelibrary/data/assetfiles/0072230.pdf
Strange to watch it all happen, as 40 years ago the big shift was under way in the opposite direction where consumer 1-ton pickups and medium duty chassis, box trucks, motorhomes, etc that had always had gas-sucking carbureted big blocks were phased out by the first range of serious MD diesels. Cummins 5.9/8.3, International 6.9/7.3, and DT466 and its derivatives took over due to the fact that they made sense in every way -- simplicity, reliability, cost. That equation probably held in favor of the diesels until 2004 at least, maybe/arguably until 2007. Now those three factors are going to push back the other way, and I would bet any manufacturer that can get into the gasoline HD market with a good product in the next couple years will have a lot of room to run. I suspect most commercial buyers in this light HD weight class have been buying the post-07 diesels since they were introduced mostly because diesels were just what they were used to and because there was not a viable gas alternative for most of that time -- not because the diesels made any kind of economic logic. Now that the alternative is out there and folks are starting to take a hard look at the numbers.....
It'll be interesting to see where it all sits in another 10 years if the trend continues. Back to big-block gassers in everything? I am not gonna bet against it.....
Hard to believe all these other manufacturers have not managed to learn from VW's mistakes.
Diesel tech is only getting harder. Cummins is going to be releasing its first ever gasoline engine in 2024 as I recall, the B6.7 Octane, plus of course they are big into the battery business now. I think they see where this all is headed and this penalty might only push them there faster.
I see more and more medium-duty trucks now built on Ford chassis, rather than the Freightliners and Internationals and Hinos that have dominated the MD market ....... with the Fords mostly having a chrome "V8" badge on the doors indicating the gasoline 7.3L motor. Actually as you pass them on the highway you don't even need the badge, just looking underneath and seeing the simple catalyst and muffler hanging down there alone rather than the big diesel aftertreatment package tells it all. Great business move for Ford to release a serious HD gasoline engine to meet demand for an alternative, reading the writing on the wall for diesels and especially for fleet consumers who are tired of complex diesel emission controls. Compared to the downtime and maintenance cost of a modern diesel, I'm right there with them.... A simple, port-injected pushrod V8 built on diesel architecture that'll run a couple hundred thousand miles with almost zero attention as long as you keep the gas tank full (at $0.75/gal less than diesel), and then can be rebuilt or replaced for probably less than the cost of a new DPF/SCR unit for a Cummins, let alone all the other maintenance along the way? Even as a diehard diesel guy it's hard to see how the gasser doesn't blow the diesel out of the water in everything except perhaps performance, even if it gets 5 mpg where a diesel could get 10.
Then there's the much reduced weight of a compact, naturally-aspirated gas V8 and its simple emission controls, that means more available payload in a commercial vehicle or legal towing capacity in a pickup truck.... Plus of course the massive difference in initial cost, which is a 5-figure amount last time I checked.... and wouldn't surprise me if in 10 years the gassers even have better resale value too versus a used diesel with unknown potential big $$ needs. Worst that could happen with the used gasser is you have to throw a fairly inexpensive fresh engine in it, and then you're set for another couple hundred k.....
Companies like Penske and Ryder that always ran diesels in the past are making the shift from what I see in their fleets out on the road. Seen a lot of new municipal trucks, dump trucks, flatbeds, service trucks etc running the V8 as well. Guess the math is easy enough on the lifecycle total cost that everyone is seeing it after 15 years of aftertreatment-equipped diesels. Payday for Ford, as that gasser has to be relatively inexpensive to build (and to test and certify), and they have the market to themselves other than a few smaller light duty tilt cab Isuzus with GM V8s and whatever Cummins eventually releases. I am guessing that Cummins will probably be direct-injected turbocharged gasser with a GPF derived from the diesel, meaning much heavier, more expensive, and less efficient than the Ford V8, negating a lot of the benefit of the gas alternative. Though the preliminary specs do suggest the Cummins will offer ratings of over 300hp/600lb-ft meaning it could be an option in heavier weight classes than Ford's engine could be suitable for, so maybe it is less of a direct competitor and will serve more to just expand the range of applications for gas power in HD vehicles. https://mart.cummins.com/imagelibrary/data/assetfiles/0072230.pdf
Strange to watch it all happen, as 40 years ago the big shift was under way in the opposite direction where consumer 1-ton pickups and medium duty chassis, box trucks, motorhomes, etc that had always had gas-sucking carbureted big blocks were phased out by the first range of serious MD diesels. Cummins 5.9/8.3, International 6.9/7.3, and DT466 and its derivatives took over due to the fact that they made sense in every way -- simplicity, reliability, cost. That equation probably held in favor of the diesels until 2004 at least, maybe/arguably until 2007. Now those three factors are going to push back the other way, and I would bet any manufacturer that can get into the gasoline HD market with a good product in the next couple years will have a lot of room to run. I suspect most commercial buyers in this light HD weight class have been buying the post-07 diesels since they were introduced mostly because diesels were just what they were used to and because there was not a viable gas alternative for most of that time -- not because the diesels made any kind of economic logic. Now that the alternative is out there and folks are starting to take a hard look at the numbers.....
It'll be interesting to see where it all sits in another 10 years if the trend continues. Back to big-block gassers in everything? I am not gonna bet against it.....
Last edited: