The mother of all L-6 engines.
roducing up to 385 horsepower and 900 pound-feet of clean diesel torque
Automotive ping!..............
Slant six, the engine that couldn’t be killed.
When did it disappear? I had a straight 6 in my ‘03 Trailblazer. Dang fine engine, that.
Jaguar was considering going back to an in-line 6. Not sure if that’s still the plan.
Sorry, but in spite of Mercedes niche market use, the I6 is still dead, Jim.
Datsun 280Z!
The mother of all L-6 engines.
roducing up to 385 horsepower and 900 pound-feet of clean diesel torque
Forever 153624
I loved the old Dodge 225.
That animation has the inline cylinders firing in pairs, as though it were a V. Did the old inline sixes fire like that? I never actually checked it out. I assumed that the cylinders each fired sequentially; but not in inline order. My ‘63 Chebby 3/4T 6 cyl. pick-em-up was a real workhorse.
Oooooh! Am I ever embarrassed! That animation is NOT firing in pairs. I hope I just had TEMPORARY insanity.
Wish I still had my straight 6 ‘51 Chevy.
I had two Plymouth 225 slant 6 engines...put around 250,000 miles on them and the engines still ran good. The rest of the car died. Transmissions were good too. 1965 and 1967 Valiant and Belvedere. Single barrel carburetors...good gas mileage. Super easy to work on. Frequently putting ball joints on the front suspensions for those cars.
“Powerful V8s took over the American auto industry from the 1950s to the 1970s as cars grew monumentally large and gas was cheap,....”
Here’s an example: Premium gas for my ‘69 GTO was $0.379 when it was new in 11/68. Now a gallon of premium is about $2.80. Adjusted for inflation, that 1968 gallon of premium gas cost $2.70 in today’s dollars (hard to believe, I know, but it is true: https://www.bls.gov/data/inflation_calculator.htm). Note, however, that my GTO never got over 15 mpg, whereas today’s rough equivalent - a Camaro with a “big” (by today’s standards) V-8 probably gets about 22.5 mpg. Thus, the price-adjusted cost of gas per mile is about 1/3 LESS right now than in the pre-OPEC “glory days” of the late ‘60s.
These are the good old days - especially with how performance cars accelerate and handle.
Smooth, torquey, reliable, long lasting, and plenty of power as long as the power to weight ratio was reasonable.
They sound pretty good too. The BMW Z4 has them (among many other models) and bone stock they sound mean. Makes it a low cost of ownership too. I had a straight 6 in a 1970 Camaro back in the day. Kept running and running and running.
It is a straight six with 120° crank throws. The heads and valve train have evolved but BMW has been producing a straight six of the same basic design for automobiles continuously since 1933.
IMHO, the two best automotive engines available today are the Dodge Ram/Cummins Diesel I-6 and the Subaru Boxster H-4. I own one of each so I’m a little prejudiced... I do not have any experience with the Subaru Boxster H-6 but I suspect that is a good engine too.
I read an article in Popular Mechanics years ago that discussed engine designs and which were the smoothest. I-3, H-4, I-6, V-8, V-12, V-16, etc. were all inherently smooth. I-4 was awful and required a counterweight on the crank to prevent the engine from vibrating itself apart. Put two I-4’s side-by-side to make a V-8 and that balanced it out. V-6 is a poor design that requires counterweights as well. Two V-6’s make a V-12 which is balanced but would make a huge engine.
My wife and I owned a 1972 Dodge Demon with the 225 Slant 6 and Holley one barrel.
Bought it new in October of 1971, drove it every day as a family car and sold it to a collector in 2006. My wife then got the second car of her life at age 53.
Original engine with 186k miles. Trannie was rebuilt a couple of times (funny story about the second rebuild).
Hell of a durable engine. Body leaked something fierce - horrible body integrity. Luckily from 1979 on we were able to keep it garaged.
My 1986 BMW with a 3.5L M30 in-line-6 engine, still runs smooth....after nearly 400,000 miles.....