Diesel

The annals of automotive history are sprinkled with vehicles that were truly awful all-around. But in some cases, cars that are otherwise decent (if not actually good) have been saddled with wretched engines. Of course, a lot of bad cars owe much of their suck-itude to their powerplants.

The bottom line is there have been some truly terrible automotive engines foisted upon the populous over the years. We’ve decided to take a look back at some of these misfit motors, how they came to be, see what makes them tick (or cough, sputter, gnash, grind, clang…), and measure their historical impact. But most of all, we want this series to serve as a compendium of warnings for future generations of powertrain engineers. Think of them as our idea of public service announcements. Now make the jump to learn about our first (dis)honoree, the Oldsmobile 350 diesel.

By and large, motorcycle design is a pretty orthodox, regimented business. Granted, this is not surprising given that pretty much all you have to work with are two wheels, an engine, a frame in which to house it and handlebars. But once in a while, you do come across a designer who is willing to go off the reservation and push the technical and/or aesthetic envelopes.

Ian McElroy is one of these rogue bike designers (he even named his company RogueMoto), and a couple years ago, he came up with a proposal for a radical-looking superbike powered by a Subaru WRX turbocharged flat-four engine called the Kickboxer. Unfortunately, no investors were forthcoming, so the bike never made it past the computer rendering stage. But McElroy’s gone back and made a couple big changes that will either make you scratch your head or shower him with praise.

In case you haven’t been following international endurance sports car racing for the last decade (Put another way: You’re 98.7% of American motorsports fans.), there’s really just one name that has defined the discipline during that timeframe: Audi. The German nameplate that cleaned house in rallying and sedan racing before making the quantum leap to sports prototypes in 1999 has made success at the 24 Hours of Le Mans and other races around the globe (particularly here in the U.S.) look like a piece of strudel.

The first-year effort was a split program between the open-cockpit R8R and the R8C coupe. The coupe was dropped for the following season and the roadster was redesigned and renamed the R8, and it was with the R8 that the company’s run of dominance began. The R8 was followed in 2006 by the radical R10 TDI, which was powered by a 5.5L V12 turbodiesel. Competition from Peugeot’s 908 HDi FAP – another diesel V12-motivated prototype, except it was a coupe – drove Audi to roll out the more compact R15 TDI (with V10 diesel power) in 2009. But after staging battle after epic battle, both the Audis and Peugeots are being shepherded into early retirement by rule changes aimed at curtailing speeds, costs and fuel consumption. And while we’ve yet to see what ze French will be sending into battle next year, we now know what will be wearing the famed Four Rings on track.

Porsche tuner TechArt is fresh off their win of Sport Auto's Tuner Grand Prix 2009. But this doesn't have Stuttgart's finest mod shop resting on its laurels as they have just announced a new package for the Porsche Cayenne Diesel. Compared to some of TechArt's previous builds, like the 680 hp TechArt Magnum (based on the Cayenne Turbo S), this design is much tamer and will have broader appeal.