Hi there,
when it comes to little diesel engines, the
benefits arent always as great. The air cooled
units are noisy, hard on starters, and generally
short lived if they have an aluminium block.
I wouldn't touch one without cast steel or
nodular iron block, water cooling spreads the
heat load from the extreme high compression
area down the bore and rigid head to crank
support is vital. Thin cast aluminium just doesn't
cut it, even with iron liners. Kubota make a few
mowers with three cylinder engines and they are
superb. I've seen lightweight aluminium diesels
fail catastrophically in under a thousand hours,
one on a logsplitter cracked the block in
100 hours. I'd stick with petrol under 20 hp,
and proper diesel over 20.