18 wheeler, I disagree. I think that is a very good comparison.
Find a car that has a petrol burning engine capable of producing 300hp maximum. (doesn't matter how many cylinders or engine capacity)
Drive as fast as you need to make that engine use 70-80% continuously of the 300HP. After one hour, see how much fuel you have used. I'm sure you will find that no less than 50 litres have been burned....comparable to our 300hp "dinosaur" aircraft engine.
I wonder if this car engine would still be performing well after 1700 hours of such driving, even with 100 hourly service intervals