I guess you might recognise my diesel toyota ute in the foreground of my avatar image. Its a single turbo straight six 4.2 litre (1HD motor). It goes well with plenty of torque for pulling bores and dragging machinery around. There is so much fresh air down here that there is no such thing as a 'diesel particulate filter' thank god.

I look at the specs of the euro diesels with common rail direct injection, a myriad of sensors integrated by powerful ecus and achieving wonderful power and economy and for a moment, I'm envious. Then I realise that if I couldn't repair my vehicle in the field when I'm 100km from the nearest sealed road, then I'd really be in the 'shit'. Modern vehicles are just too complicated I reckon. Done over 400,000km so far and I'm too scared to upgrade...