The diesel passenger car in the U.S. remains a rarity – less than 1% share of the light vehicle market.
On this day 81 years ago, C.L. Cummins left Indianapolis in Packard sedan with a diesel engine conversion. Three days later Cummins arrived in New York City in time for the auto show after traveling about 800 miles at a cost of $1.38.
Fuel prices have risen since then, now ranging between $3 to $4 a gallon. The company Clessie Lyle Cummins founded in 1919 – Cummins Engine Company – to build engines based on Rudolf Diesel’s compression engine (patented 20 years before) has grown to be a Fortune 500 company with more than $18 billion in annual sales.
However, the success has come from truck and marine engines as the diesel passenger car in the U.S. remains a rarity – less than 1% share of the light vehicle market – with virtually all of them from German manufacturers. One notable exception is the Dodge Ram pickup truck with its 6.7-liter, six-cylinder Cummins Turbo Diesel Cummins diesel engine rated at 800 foot pounds of torque. Robert Bosch is predicting that with rising fuel economy standards coupled with ongoing high fuel prices, diesel engines could reach 10% of the light vehicle market by 2015.
