Choosing Gasoline or Diesel Powered?
I realize that this is a long thread but if you are pondering the Gasoline versus a Diesel based on power consideration or are wondering about adding an after market performance enhancing kit to a Gas...
Forum Discussion
Some good information here although you put too much emphasis on the torque of an engine. It's been said before, but I'll say it again, its the hp that gets things up a mountain. You can have 10,000 ft-lbs of torque but, without rpm, you won't move. Once you do have both rpm and torque, you have hp.
That being said, a diesel with similar (and maybe even poorer) hp/weight ratio will likely climb a mountain better. That's due to 2 reasons:
1. The diesel is turbocharged and loses much less of its hp as it climbs over 3000 ft compared to a non-turbo gas engine.
2. A diesel's peak hp usually falls between 2000-2400 rpm----an rpm that owners are comfortable to run their engines at (especially when the noise is in the back). A gas engine's peak hp usually occurs over 4000 rpm---which gets noisy in a front engine MH (especially when the fan kicks in). As a result, many gas MH drivers don't keep their engines in their peak hp range while a diesel driver likely will----leading to the diesel (and it's turbo) climbing the mountain faster due to greater actual HORSEPOWER being delivered to the drivetrain.
That being said, a diesel with similar (and maybe even poorer) hp/weight ratio will likely climb a mountain better. That's due to 2 reasons:
1. The diesel is turbocharged and loses much less of its hp as it climbs over 3000 ft compared to a non-turbo gas engine.
2. A diesel's peak hp usually falls between 2000-2400 rpm----an rpm that owners are comfortable to run their engines at (especially when the noise is in the back). A gas engine's peak hp usually occurs over 4000 rpm---which gets noisy in a front engine MH (especially when the fan kicks in). As a result, many gas MH drivers don't keep their engines in their peak hp range while a diesel driver likely will----leading to the diesel (and it's turbo) climbing the mountain faster due to greater actual HORSEPOWER being delivered to the drivetrain.
