Buying a HiAce 4WD to fit out? Choose the engine on range, not price

In this guide

• Which HiAce engines are you choosing between?
• How far will each engine go between fills?
• Can you get petrol and diesel across the outback?
• How much can a HiAce tow, and does the engine change it?
• What should you check before buying a 4WD HiAce?
• So which HiAce engine should you buy?

Diesel is the right base for most HiAce 4WD camper builds, and range is why. The federal Green Vehicle Guide rates the 2.8-litre turbo-diesel at 7.4L/100km and the 3.5-litre petrol at 12.4L/100km. On one tank, that gap is worth hundreds of kilometres.

Which HiAce engines are you choosing between?

You are choosing between the 2.8-litre four-cylinder turbo-diesel, the engine Toyota codes 1GD-FTV, and a petrol engine whose size depends on how old the van is. On paper that choice narrows fast: all six 2025 HiAce variants listed on the Australian Government’s Green Vehicle Guide run the 2.8-litre turbo-diesel, and no petrol variant appears for that model year.

For a four-wheel drive camper build you are almost certainly shopping used or imported, so both engines are still live options. Every figure below comes from the Green Vehicle Guide, which publishes lab-tested combined consumption for vans sold new here. Those are numbers for an empty van, not a loaded camper with a roof rack, so read them as a ranking of the engines rather than a prediction of your trip.

The 2.8-litre turbo-diesel

The diesel is the efficient one by a wide margin. The Green Vehicle Guide rates the 2025 HiAce LWB diesel manual at 7.4 litres per 100km combined, the LWB automatic at 7.8 litres per 100km, and the thirstiest listed variant, the SLWB automatic, at 8.1 litres per 100km. The LWB automatic is rated at 207 grams of CO2 per kilometre.

It also delivers its pull low in the rev range, which is what a loaded van needs when it is crawling out of a sandy creek crossing in low range or holding a steady speed on corrugations. A modern turbo-diesel also carries a diesel particulate filter, a trap that collects soot and burns it off during sustained highway running. That detail comes back later, and it is the single strongest argument against diesel for a van that mostly does short local trips.

The petrol HiAce

The petrol HiAce the Green Vehicle Guide actually publishes figures for is the 3.5-litre six, and it drinks. The 2019 listing puts the petrol automatic at 12.0 litres per 100km combined and the petrol manual at 12.4 litres per 100km, against 7.5 litres per 100km for the 2.8-litre diesel manual of the same year. CO2 runs 275 grams per kilometre for the petrol automatic and 214 grams for the diesel automatic.

If the van in front of you runs the older 2.7-litre petrol four, the 2TR-FE, there is no combined figure for it in the Green Vehicle Guide listings used here. You cannot plan a trip around a published number that does not exist, so get the seller to reset the trip computer, drive a loaded highway leg, and treat what it returns as the number that counts.

How far will each engine go between fills?

About 946km for the diesel and about 565km for the petrol, from the same tank. Toyota Australia’s HiAce specification sheet lists a 70-litre fuel tank on every model, so the range difference is purely a consumption difference. Divide 70 litres by the 7.4 litres per 100km the Green Vehicle Guide gives the 2025 diesel manual and you get roughly 946km. Do the same with the 12.4 litres per 100km petrol manual and you get about 565km.

That is a gap of roughly 380km, which across the centre is the difference between one fuel stop and two. Put another way, the 3.5-litre petrol HiAce uses about 65 per cent more fuel per 100km than the 2.8-litre diesel, according to the Green Vehicle Guide’s own 2019 comparison, so at the same price per litre it costs about 65 per cent more to fuel.

The table below turns those Green Vehicle Guide combined figures into litres burned per 1000km and range on Toyota’s 70-litre tank. Range assumes you run the tank dry, which you never should, so take a working reserve off every row.

Engine and gearbox	Combined fuel use	Fuel per 1000km	Range on a 70L tank
3.5 petrol, six-speed manual (2019)	12.4L/100km	124L	About 565km
3.5 petrol, six-speed automatic (2019)	12.0L/100km	120L	About 583km
2.8 turbo-diesel, six-speed manual (2019)	7.5L/100km	75L	About 933km
2.8 turbo-diesel, six-speed manual, LWB (2025)	7.4L/100km	74L	About 946km
2.8 turbo-diesel, six-speed automatic, LWB (2025)	7.8L/100km	78L	About 897km
2.8 turbo-diesel, automatic, SLWB (2025)	8.1L/100km	81L	About 864km

A fit-out moves all of it. Weight, a roof rack, full water tanks, a lift and bigger tyres all push consumption up, and a four-wheel drive conversion adds driveline losses the lab test never sees. The ranking holds. The absolute numbers will not.

Can you get petrol and diesel across the outback?

Both fuels are sold well beyond the capital cities. The Australian Institute of Petroleum collects pump prices from 174 metropolitan and regional locations around the country and publishes separate weekly reports for petrol and for diesel, which is a fair indicator of how widely each is traded and tracked outside the cities.

What changes out there is price, not availability. The Australian Institute of Petroleum reports that country fuel prices are generally higher than capital city prices, because regional markets have different economic and competitive characteristics, and that regional prices tend to be more stable than city prices. Check the current petrol and diesel gap in those weekly reports before you leave, because it moves.

The real remote-travel problem is not which pump the roadhouse has. It is how far apart the roadhouses are, and whether the one you were counting on is open when you get there. That is a range question, and range is where the diesel wins. If you go petrol and plan long unserviced stretches, budget for jerry cans and the weight they add to a van that is already carrying a fit-out.

How much can a HiAce tow, and does the engine change it?

The engine does not change it. Toyota Australia rates the HiAce LWB manual at 1900kg braked and every other HiAce model at 1500kg braked, with 400kg unbraked across the range. Those ratings belong to the vehicle, not to the fuel it burns.

If you are looking at an automatic, or at any body length other than the LWB manual, the Toyota Australia specification sheet puts your ceiling at 1500kg braked. That covers a camper trailer, a box trailer or a small boat. It does not cover a full-size off-road caravan, so a HiAce build works best as the accommodation rather than the tow vehicle.

Where the two engines do part company is how hard each works to hold a load at highway speed. A turbo-diesel makes its peak torque low in the rev range, so it pulls without hunting through gears. A petrol engine has to spin harder for the same work, and that shows up in the fuel bill. A petrol HiAce towing near its limit will drink well past the 12.4 litres per 100km the Green Vehicle Guide lists for an unladen van.

If you are fitting the van out rather than towing, the figure that binds you is payload, not tow rating. Weigh the finished build before you load it for a trip.

What should you check before buying a 4WD HiAce?

Check five things: which engine it actually has, what it really uses, how the diesel particulate filter has been treated, the service history, and the weights. Each one is cheaper to find out now than after you have spent a fit-out budget on the van.

Servicing cost is the one comparison this guide will not put a dollar figure on. Neither the Green Vehicle Guide nor Toyota’s specification sheet publishes one, and workshop rates vary too much between towns to be worth guessing at. Ring two workshops on your intended route, ask what each charges for a HiAce service on the engine you are considering, and ask whether they handle diesel injector and filter work.

Step 1: Confirm which engine you have

Read the build plate and the import or compliance paperwork, because petrol and diesel HiAce vans span two generations and more than one engine, and a listing description is not proof of either.

Step 2: Get a real consumption reading

Reset the trip computer, drive a loaded highway leg, and plan around that figure rather than the lab number, especially on a van that already carries a conversion.

Step 3: Take a diesel on a long highway run

Sustained highway driving is what lets the diesel particulate filter burn off accumulated soot, so a diesel van that has only ever done short suburban trips is the one most likely to have a blocked filter waiting for you.

Step 4: Read the service history

Ask for stamped records and receipts rather than a verbal summary, and pay particular attention to oil change intervals on a turbo-diesel, where a stretched interval is harder on the engine than it looks on paper.

Step 5: Weigh the van and check the plate

Work out how much payload is left for your fit-out, and check that any trailer you plan to pull sits under the van’s rating, which Toyota Australia sets at 1500kg braked on all but the LWB manual.

So which HiAce engine should you buy?

Buy the diesel if the van is going bush, and only look at petrol if it stays close to home. The gap between 7.4 litres per 100km and 12.4 litres per 100km on the same 70-litre tank decides it, and it decides it before you have added a single dollar of fit-out.

2.8-litre turbo-diesel, best for long remote touring, towing near the braked limit Toyota Australia sets at 1500kg on most models, and any route where fuel stops sit hundreds of kilometres apart.

Not for a van that only does short suburban runs, where the diesel particulate filter rarely gets the sustained heat it needs to clean itself.

Petrol HiAce, best for shorter trips closer to home, weekends on sealed roads, and city-based vans that see mostly stop-start use.

Not for outback touring, where the range and the fuel bill both work against you at once.

If the build is aimed at the Tanami, the Gibb River Road or a lap of the country, start with the 2.8-litre turbo-diesel and put your inspection effort into the filter and the service history. If the van will live in a city and see the coast a few weekends a year, the petrol’s consumption matters far less than the diesel particulate filter it will never get hot enough to clear, and that is the one case where the thirstier engine is the easier van to own.