Diesel as fuel has major connotations for many in the industry and also for car buyers in the country. A great deal of deliberations on the green or not so green aspects of the fuel have been done by many in the past couple of years. And the vested interests preventing diesels in certain geographical areas of the country with skewed reasons justifying their efforts, was pathetic to say the least.

Which brings me to the subject at hand. Are affordable diesels in India technologically on par with their counterparts elsewhere? The simple and straight answer is NO. If the question is whether present day affordable diesels are capable of meeting present day Indian emission norms - Bharat Stage II - then the answer is yes. A Catch 22 situation, if ever there was one.

Before I move further let us tackle what I mean by an affordable diesel. An affordable diesel has to be the one which powers mass market cars which a bulk of the populace can afford, so the cars which fall in that ambit include the Tata Indica, the Fiat Siena, the Ford Ikon and... ah yes, the Maruti Zen D. Again, you may say that it is the only the first and the last named which can come anywhere close to being affordable but I think that the two-tiered approach which I have suggested in terms of models forms the bulk of the passenger car diesel sales in the country.

Which brings me to the prevailing criteria of pricing resorted to by the car makers. Diesel engines require a bit more by way of induction hardware and plumbing but the way most manufacturers sought to cream off the buyer by charging way over and beyond the actual costs just safe in the knowledge that the owner would benefit from the cheaper price of diesel was apparently pathetic.

However Telco set the cat among the pigeons when it unveiled its Indica in both petrol and diesel versions (or should that be the other way around?) three years ago and more than anyone else, it brought diesel economy and running costs in the truly affordable manner to the consumer.

Which now brings me the focus of the subject: are these present day diesels enough or should we see a proliferation of technology to bring them on par with their counterparts in say Europe? The fact remains that we in India only see the diesel as a low cost fuel proposition and not much else. That is doing the diesel a great disservice. With the advances in diesel engine technology the world over, it is high time that our car makers step up on this thought process and plan for the most modern diesels for the Indian car buyers.

The diesel engines one can buy in India have for years been dictated by light commercial vehicle design thought and the move from the direct injection to the indirect injection was a major one. The move from a mechanical type injector system to a rotary type electronic pump heralded another step forward but it failed to address NVH, refinement in power delivery and driveability.

Multi-valve engines like those employed by the E- and C-class Mercedes-Benz models are one way to go while turbocharging is another means employed. But the major change which I personally would like to see happen on small car diesel engines in India is to move to the common rail type of injection system or the even more efficient unit injector technology.

Much has been written on common rail diesel engine technology in this magazine. It is today the rage all over Europe which is the largest market for diesel engined cars in the world. Everyone from Mercedes-Benz to Audi to BMW to Peugeot to Ford and Fiat have embraced it. Bosch and Lucas have been the two most favoured suppliers of the hardware needed for the charged rail injection system with Delphi also joining in the action.

But has anyone stopped and considered a success story which is the Volkswagen Lupo? It is the one production car in the world one can buy today with genuine three-litre capability. This magazine has written about the three-litre car before as well and it is a constant endeavour of many top line car makers to try and make an engine which will go 100km using three litres of fuel. The VW Lupo in its direct injection diesel engined version does this job as intended and one of the reasons behind its phenomenal efficiency is its unit injector system. In fact the high fuel efficiency, strong driveability and unheard of levels of refinement evident in all VW diesels owe their all to the unit injector systems employed.

While sister concern Audi has set the standard in small car passenger car diesel engines in Europe for a long time with its common rail engines, VW has pushed the performance envelope even further by employing the unit injector technology to stunning effect. Of course, there is a slight downside to the unit injector system because the injectors have to be designed into the cylinder head of the engine itself unlike the common rail injection system which can be bolted on as an ancillary unit.

But in terms of packaging the unit injector more than holds its own and this is a prime consideration as cars are getting shorter and more compact in their packaging. Having a smaller engine bay frees up much needed room in the passenger compartment and every small bit helps.

One of the companies in India which can do its cause a whole load of good by embracing unit injector technology is Tata Engineering. Having a good grasp of diesel engine tech has seen this maker of commercial vehicles start off well in passenger car diesels. It will need high tech products if it has to stay independent in the long term and one of the ways to doing that is to embrace good proven technology. I am not inferring that Telco link-up with Volkswagen (though curiously some years ago the two were indeed talking about engines powering Telco's MUV/SUV range in the export market) but it would do its cause immense good by embracing the unit injector system and make it a sweeping one all across its product range. In one fell swoop it will not only attain a technological edge over the others but also standardise this form of fuel injection system to help give the affordable diesel a fighting chance in the years ahead.

Over to you Telco.

Back