So how come it seems there are a lot of diesel trucks in the US, but not many diesel cars?

Diesel trucks were always popular in the US. Emission and fuel economy regulations generally meant the auto makers only offered large block ones in the heavy duty class trucks.

For decades the only car choices for diesel were a VW or a Mercedes. That only changed recently, but now diesel has a higher price per gallon than gasoline, even premium, in most regions.

In the US, diesel trucks are ideal for those who RV, or tow other large, heavy items, as under load a diesel is FAR more fuel efficient than a gasser.

Ram's new 3.0 Diesel in the 1500 series is supposed to get 25mpg or better.

Traditionally, the value of the diesel was that it would last several hundred thousand miles with just routine maintenance. The 96 Ford diesel I own has 250K miles and is still running strong.

A modern 3.0 litre diesel should get better than that, the German diesels of that size get over double that, although they are in cars, not trucks. My friends 2006 Merc Sprinter already has 500,000 miles on it, he's clocked up millions of miles in various diesel commercial vans.

The diesels they put in the heavy duty trucks for the US market are mostly V8s with 5 liters being small. Thus why this thread exists.

I would love to get more diesels in cars. I've been looking at buying a diesel car to commute in, but since I have a truck and a motorcycle, I feel like having a car on top of that is overkill. When I had my 1990 Mustang GT, it just sat around because the mileage improvement wasn't that much over the truck, and the truck was much nicer!

Draigflag- The 3.0 diesel might get much better than 25mpg in a car, but the size and lack of aerodynamics in a pickup are probably what is hurting it. When I had my old Cummins, it was in a 1998 2WD extended cab shortbed truck. I referred to it as my "commuter," because when I put 3.55 gears in the rear end and put a cold air intake on it, I was getting 25mpg out of that. But there was virtually no emissions on that truck.

The DPFs we use in the US SUCK for fuel economy, and that is probably the big problem with getting more than 25mpg in the new 1500s.

Yea I noticed that, its weird how a 5.0 litre gas engine can only pull as much as a 2.5 diesel engine. I would like to see Audi have some input in US trucks, the V8 TDI's they make get over 40 MPG, and do 0-60 in under 5 seconds. Even with lack of aerodynamics and extra weight, performance and economy should still be good.

The US might now have more stringent requirements when it comes tow ratings for vehicles. I know the car companies don't mind upselling a person that needs to tow from a car to a truck, but the stock LR tires might mean a low official rating on the car anyway.

Purely on weight or torque?

Not sure, i'm not very technical minded. I was just reading through some stats for US trucks, and noticed the big 5.0 Litre engine one's can only tow about 7000 lbs, which is what a 2.5 diesel can tow usually.