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Comment by SoftTalker | Hacker News Reader

Utterly destroyed their reputation? Um, no. These trucks hold their value unlike almost any other vehicle. A 20 year old Dodge RAM with a Cummins will still sell for $20-$30k if it's halfway nice.

The first thing most owners of a Dodge RAM with a Cummins do is install performance modifications. They will flash a custom tune in the engine control system, change the fuel injection, intake and turbocharger, etc. and set it up so that it can "roll coal" they don't care one iota about emissions.

The Dodge RAM was the last full-size truck made with a manual transmission. I have been watching Craigslist and FB marketplace for one of these with a Cummins to come up in factory stock condition. They are rare. They've almost all been modified.

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>The first thing most owners of a Dodge RAM with a Cummins do is install performance modifications. They will flash a custom tune in the engine control system, change the fuel injection, intake and turbocharger, etc

Not even 5% … but sure, we can go with “most” if you want.

Super Duty's will likely hold its value better. GMs too. Especially now after this news. It's odd to say that the result of an action hasn't happened when you haven't given it time. Perhaps If we wait on year, then look at resale numbers this news would have effected them. That would tell us the truth. Looking at the data now tells us nothing about the impact of this event, because it just happened.

Yes, a Ram diesel will hold its value better than a car, but it's the bottom out of the big 3 diesel truck makers. The "old guys" always say with the Rams that the truck falls apart around the engine. The engine lasts, but the rest of the truck has all been replaced by then.

Exactly! If they regulate this, then what other shenanigans might end up regulated and how will they afford their 3rd bugout bunker?

You can still buy land cruisers with manual transmissions and more power than you need. American "trucks" are absurd. Such oversized engine blocks and cabs with the same size tray as a normal ute.

Honestly don't get the point of them. Need >4.5 ton gvm...get a MR or a HR truck and do it properly.

Can't wait to see some of the industrial plant equipment cummins gear get replaced. Used to work on a rig with a cummins that ate roughly 1200L of fuel every 24 hours. Gross innefficient beast of a thing literally just to turn a hydraulic pump. Diesel gear sucks to work on.

Gimme electric motors and some hydrogen fuel cells already.

Agreed. From my perspective, these companies are ignoring the law to give people what they want. How does that destroy their reputation with the public?

After all the ways the government rules have made my purchases worse, I'm inclined trust these companies more, not less.

Watch a documentary about LA smog in the 70s.

Watch some documentary footage on children with lead poisoning from leaded gas.

Report back your findings.

How, exactly, are modern diesel trucks emitting leaded gas fumes, or unburned VOCs?

I was replying to a commenter who said that the "governments" addition of these regulations as made things worse.

I was highlighting ways in which these regulations have made our lives better.

Answering your question, I agree. If we were to defeat those things that make modern diesels better as the parent commenter is suggesting, it would make the air worse.

So you concede those types of emmisions pollution were harmful, but seem to be suggesting that cheating modern emissions standards wouldn't be? That two forms of pollution were bad but we should default to assuming other forms are harmless?

Emissions control engineering has a 90-10 rule to it; and the costs and benefits ought to be weighed appropriately.

The vast majority of owners fucking with the emissions equipment on their modern diesels are not doing so to conspicuously assault other motorists/cyclists/pedestrians with soot; they are doing it because in pursuit of that last 10% of emissions cleanup, regulators have burdened the operators of diesel trucks with hundreds of pounds of multi-thousand-dollar components that are delicate, MUST be maintained, reduce engine power by 25% and fuel efficiency by 50%.

If you just tow a boat, or a camper, that's annoying. If you use the truck for an actual business...that's HUGE expense.

Bear in mind, the typical diesel delete isn't something you notice if the person is driving normally in a modern truck. Electronic engine management and electronic common-rail injection are in new trucks, and they're night and day vs. mechanical injection on old diesels.

"Reduce fuel efficiency by 50%"? Did that really happen? I have driven a number of diesel cars over the last 20 years and the power-to-displacement ratio and fuel economy have improved somewhat over that period.

A new diesel pickup, with the EGR/SCR/particulate filter removed or bypassed, will routinely go from 9-10mpg to 18-19mpg.

I have seen this with the current 6.7 Ford Scorpion-series Powerstroke V8 in an F-350.

Interesting, thanks. I've always found the manufacturers' figures to be optimistic, but the real figures do seem to have improved over time. Perhaps not the case with trucks.

It’s the same. The gains made possible by new technologies for extracting more output from a given quantity of fuel are balanced by the regressions caused by new technologies to ameliorate emissions.

With the emissions-controls reduced to what was legally required in 2003, a new-ish Mercedes E-class diesel is efficient enough to drive from Framingham MA to Beloit WI on a single tank of fuel, at highway speeds.

It seems like every diesel in the world was “defeating” the rules.

But we don’t have terrible air quality (except for when fires burn forests that greenies said we needed to protect, and made worse in the end). So I’m not sure what I’m supposed to be researching.

You get the climate apocalypse you deserve

"I am happy that the company made their product slightly more profitable for them by making peoples' health worse. Screw the government!"

Let’s swap drugs in here and see how many people are in favor of ignoring government rules to give people what they want in spite of the health problems they cause.

Individual rights, level of government intrusion, ability to enforce the law, what kind of "right" is deprived for what kind of benefit, all make a big difference.

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