There was a time when the words ‘diesel’ and ‘performance’ were seemingly at odds with one another. Those days are quickly becoming a thing of the past as diesel tuning progresses at an alarming rate year after year.
As a result diesel motors are starting to appear as a performance alternative to gas motors in all sorts of different applications.
Depending on where you source the motors these swaps can range from straight forward and low/modest budget (Cummins 4bt) to expensive and complicated (common rail Cummins), but when you consider that at their core diesel motors are quite simple I imagine even more vehicles will be ‘rolling coal’ in the years to come.
Bob Ward found the 7.3 International diesel motor for his truck from a Ford E series van, he then strapped a large Holset to it for some more powerIf you have not read the feature on this truck it’s up hereThis truck has since undergone a bit of an overhaul since these photos, but the swap remainsIt looks a little utilitarian here, but has since been cleaned up quite a bit as seen below
What in tarnation, Is that a Cummins in a Power Wagon?Why yes, yes it is. This cool truck was spotted at Berlin Klassik in 2014, and if I recall correctly was built in Ottawa OntarioWelderup made diesel swaps incredibly popular with this photo of their diesel rodThis ’28 Dodge has a 12V Cummins in it, the motors been worked over to put out 1270 ft.-lbs of torque and 693 rwhpThis Cummins powered C10 is known as the ‘Diezl Rat’
It’s a pretty gnarly looking truck, impossible to miss and I post it oftenI don’t have a photo of the motor in this, unfortunately, but it’s actually a chassis swap
The underpinnings of the truck are Dodge, and the motor is a Cummins, obviouslyNearing the end of the local swaps with this 4bt swapped Miata – Photo: Engineswapdepot.comPackaging is one of the hardest parts of diesel swaps, as you can tell with how well this motor ‘fits’ – Photo: Engineswapdepot.com
Not to be outdone by the Miata, Arugs Auto put 6.0L Power Stroke Diesel V8 into a skyline with two BorgWarner turbos hanging off it. Argus is hoping the car will eventually put down 650 hp to the wheels and 1200 foot pounds of torque – Photo: engineswapdepot.com
The 240 below is one of the first 4bt imports I came across. It might be the first, but I don’t have records to prove or disprove that
Switch things up and keep it classy with a Cummins powered BentleyNo engine bay shots of this one sadly
Here’s another diesel swapped B machine, this one with a motor 3.0 VW TDI motor
This semi truck themed Nova is from a previous WTF Friday post
For those who might like their Diesel (Durmax in this case) cars to be a little bit more traditional looking, Mike Racke built this back in 2009 – Photo: Truck TrendPacific Performance Engineering is a big name in diesel performance and they had a hand in this gorgeous twin turbo engine baySEMA is just around the corner, and this 1950 Cadillac was the topic of much discussion last year – Photo: Lowrider MagazineThat’s a 5.9L cummins under the hood. – Photo: Lowrider Magazine
Got a favorite diesel swap of your own that I missed? Let me know so I can pull together a part II of this post!
It’s cool to see so many different diesels, in so many different vehicles.