Davis County Clipper | 1981-01-14 | Page 60 | The Diesel

Th8 lisD however, or should the EPA clamp down hard with emission emis-sion restrictions, the current trend might well be reversed. In the United States last year. 270.000 diesel cars were sold. Only two years before, the number sold by all makers totaled only 37.000. Thus the crunch. SHOULD A breakthrough in fuel supply or fuel substitutes for gas engines be found. motorists' turn to diesels is un-, un-, tnistakable. BUT THE news isn't all good. Diesels, while they get better mileage (but cost more to buy), are noisy, sooty and sluggish in comparison with gasoline engines. They are. also, sometimes hard to start in cold weather. Thus far. environmental authorities au-thorities haven't cracked down on diesel engine pollution pollu-tion even though diesel engines en-gines often emit large quantities quanti-ties of oxides of nitrogen and particulates or soot. ONE CAN often see heavy black smoke gushing from the vertical stack of trucks. (Usually, engine tuning will eliminate much of this excess pollution). Several months ago. General Gener-al Motors, the largest U.S. producer of diesel cars, finally faced up to what has become a widely-recognized problem among GM diesel engines. IT UNDERTOOK to repair cars already in consumer hands and made improvements improve-ments in diesel engines being built for GM cars. And GM executives ex-ecutives see a bright future for diesels. Foreign makers of diesel cars agree. And the cars do save fuel, and run on a cheaper fuel a big plus in today 's fuel