Talking to Autocar Professional on the sidelines of the Symposium of International Automotive Technology (SIAT), organised by ARAI in Pune last month, Dr Guenter Fraidl, senior vice-president, powertrain systems, passenger cars, AVL List GmbH highlighted two growth drivers which are giving a new direction to engine development on a global scale – fuel consumption and costs.

“Today when you have to make a good powertrain, you have to understand where to put money in the most effective way. Our major challenge is that we have to get down the fuel consumption and also keep the costs low. So we are not just looking at any one component and not just locking at the engine, we are looking at the entire vehicle. In the past, it was just downsizing of the engines. The physics today are slightly different. We go to right sizing of the engines without compromising too much (as in the case of downsizing of engines). India to me is one of the most challenging markets with extreme pressure on costs,” said Dr Fraidl.

In the context of enhancing the fuel efficiency of engines, he emphasized on the need to build technologies on the lines of cylinder-on-demand (in line with what Audi’s V8 powertrain with twin turbocharger technology is famous for) for relatively smaller engines, which could be four-cylinder powertrains.

It is known that Audi’s powerful V8 with twin turbochargers is equipped with cylinder-on- demand technology, which deactivates four of its cylinders when operating on part load, thereby enhancing the fuel efficiency of the vehicle by some percentage points.

Stressing this point, Dr Fraidl elaborated that, “We are now working on a very low-cost approach for engine development. A typical example would be the standard for cylinder activation where suppose a cylinder has to be deactivated. Now typically this is done via mechanical function. AVL has found a clever idea where we do it just by fuel cut-off, which can be just a software function. So we are working on how we can use sophisticated software instead of having expensive hardware. Similarly, to build simple, smart engines specifically for India, you have to start from studying the driving behaviour of any typical Indian driver and optimise the engine in that respect. So for example, if they are more capable in the low speed range here, specially optimise that area. That is completely different from the European driving habits. So just by transferring European technology to India won’t work.”

Differentiating between China and India, he said that while in China the pressure (fuel economy, emissions) is from the legislations, in India the pressure (fuel economy) is from the end consumers. He also added that “India is not an ideal market for cylinder-on-demand technology as of now because of the driving habits of people here. However, I believe that in the future, both, the MPI (multiport fuel injection) and GDI (gasoline direct injection) technologies will come to India. The engine technologies will also deploy optimised charging systems.”