In Europe in particular, there was the diesel craze of the 2000s. Few cars in the 1990s had diesel engines. The average family car was something like a Ford Mondeo with a 1.8 NA petrol engine.

By around 2005, almost any "premium" mid-sized car like a Mercedes E-class or a BMW 5 series had a turbocharged 6-cylinder diesel engine around 3 litres with common rail injection. These engines have much heavier blocks and need a lot of additional systems for emission control.