The combustion of a Diesel engine is just like the combustion of a gasoline engine but in a diesel it’s a little bit different. Diesel engines do not have spark plugs to ignite the fuel; it uses
high compression rate to ignite the fuel. The piston compresses the intake air that heats up and at the precise moment fuel is injected directly into the cylinder and combusts. In gasoline engines fuel is mixed with air, compressed by pistons and ignited by sparks from spark plugs.
Diesel fuel and gasoline fuel come from the earth. Diesel fuel is a heavier more oily fuel than gasoline because in the refining process, diesel is refined less. Diesel takes longer to evaporate than gasoline because it has more carbon atoms than gasoline. The boiling point of diesel is actually higher than that of water. Diesel fuel has a higher energy density than gasoline; diesel has 147,000 BTU’s while gasoline has 125,000 BTU’s per gallon. This leads to diesel being more efficient and gets better mileage than gasoline.
In the views of the environment, gasoline is more volatile than diesel. The reasons are that its not what its base consists of, it’s the additives in it. Diesel produces fifteen percent more green house gases than gasoline but diesel gets twenty-forty percent better fuel economy. It may seem that diesel is worse for the environment but when you go to fill up your tank with diesel compared to gasoline the percentage of emissions is offset for diesel.
The only thing that is left is whether which engine is for you. When you’re going out shopping for a new car or truck take this info into consideration when deciding. Hopefully the decision you make will leave you, your wallet, and the world happy in the long run.