Did you know that Celerio diesel comes with a host of ‘firsts’? It is world’s smallest diesel engine on a passenger car. It is the first diesel engine by Suzuki and hence, a first indigenous motor on a Maruti Suzuki car. It is obvious that being a two cylinder engine, the company must have faced a lot of technical issues, the prime-most of it being the handling of the NVH and to bring it down to acceptable levels.
In an interview to Autocarpro, C V Raman, Engineering Head of Maruti Suzuki, revealed some interesting bits on the engine and here we present them to you in pointers..
- Maruti Suzuki has been working on this project for the last four and a half years and the overall project costed the company some 900 crores.
- Requirements and benchmarking were done by the Indian team whereas the complete design and engineering was performed by Suzuki in Japan.
- The DDIS 125 engine has 97 percent localization and only 2-3 parts like casting component, chain drive etc are imported.
- The company says that they have tested the engine for 4 lakh to 5 lakh kms and ensured that it runs perfectly on all grades of fuel available in the country.
- The turbocharger has been designed specifically by BorgWarner and it is manufactured in India by Turbo Energy.
- Maruti manufactures the engine at their Gurgaon plant which can manufacture over 100,000 engines per year.
- Plonking an AMT gearbox on this engine, C V Raman says, is possible technically. However, they have not thought about it yet.
Maruti Suzuki has invested a lot of time and energy in diesel engines and it is quite evident that they will want to shed their dependence on Fiat for the sourcing of diesel technology. In case you are not aware, the company is also working on a (1.2L) three cylinder and (1.5L) four cylinder versions of essentially the same platform which will power future Maruti Suzuki cars.
