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Comment by tim333 | Hacker News Reader

In europe inline-fours are more popular. Cheaper and less fuel.

Even in the US, I4 engines are by far the most popular. Most consumer cars are built for fuel economy with the one notable exception being the suburban tacticool pickup truck, which are often modded to burn MORE fuel.

It does not hurt that you can easily get 200+ horsepower from the factory with one, either. My car is a series hybrid with an Atkinson-cycle I4 but it still bursts to 200hp because it's a hybrid.

I have a Mazda CX-9 with an I4 and, my anecdote, it sucks on gas. About 14 mpg in non-highway short hop driving. That might be fine as part of larger group but it always feels embarrassingly low.

Europe has stupid displacement taxes so they'll make some high strung 0.9L turbo 3/4cyl with all the technology that gets .01mpg better MPG than a ~2L engine while taking twice as much $$ in service to make it to any given milage.

IDK why they don't just tax the actual fuel used like the rest of the world (not that they don't do that).

I'm not sure if displacement taxes still exist, but direct car taxes are fairly low in any case (like 200€ per year or so for an average car in Germany?). Most of the tax is paid through the fuel. The actual reason for downsizing (small turbo engines) is that they consume less fuel under light load, which is where car engines spend most of their time. It's not great for longevity though. Car engines had become more and more reliable over time apart from a few teething troubles of occasional new technologies, now some people say it's trending down due to downsizing.

In my country its based on emissions, 1.6l 4 cyl 140g/km co2 is ~150e, 3 litre V6 300g/km ~500e.

The inline four has largely converged around a 2.0L displacement with an equal bore and stroke. IIRC, it's fairly optimal from a performance and thermodynamic efficiency standpoint.

Americans like their cars enormous and heavy.

Like electric vehicles?

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