GM to Introduce New Tier 2 Bin 5 4.5-Liter Diesel for Light-Duty Trucks
15 June 2007
General Motors will introduce a new 4.5L V-8 Duramax turbo-diesel that improves engine fuel efficiency by 25% compared to gasoline engines, and reduces CO2 emissions by 13% and cuts particulates and NOx emissions by at least 90% compared to comparable diesels today. The engine will be rated in excess of 310 hp (231 kW) and 520 lb-ft (705 Nm) of torque.
This will be GM’s first engine to use a selective catalytic reduction NOx aftertreatment system with a diesel particulate filter to help achieve the Tier 2 Bin 5 and California LEV 2 emissions standards. The engine will be applied in pickup trucks of less than 8,600 lbs (3,900 kg) GVW and the HUMMER H2 after 2009.
This new GM light duty diesel is expected to become a favorite among customers who require excellent towing ability and fuel efficiency. It will meet the stringent 2010 emissions standards, and it will be compliant in all 50 states, making it one of the cleanest diesel vehicles ever produced.
—Tom Stephens, group vice president, GM Global Powertrain and Quality
The new dual-overhead cam, four-valve V-8 diesel engine will fit within the same space of a small-block V-8 gasoline engine. This compact size is made possible by using integral cylinder head exhaust manifolds, integral cam cover intake manifolds and a narrow block.
Technical highlights of the engine include aluminum cylinder heads with integrated manifolding; a variable-vane turbocharger with intercooling; a Compacted Graphite Iron (CGI) block for a stronger and lighter engine base (compared to lower-strength aluminum or heavier grey cast iron); and fracture-split main bearing caps and connecting rods for a precise fit. An electronically controlled, ultra-high-pressure, common-rail fuel system is used, which has the ability to inject fuel five times per combustion event to control noise and emissions.
GM currently offers 17 diesel engine variants in 45 vehicle lines around the world. GM sells more than one million diesel engines annually, with products that offer a range of choices from the 1.3L four-cylinder diesel engine sold in the Opel Agila and Corsa, up to the 6.6L V-8 Duramax diesel sold in full-size vans, heavy duty pickups and medium duty trucks in the US.
GM first introduced the Duramax diesel 6.6L V-8 in the US in the 2001 model year.
GM will produce the new engine at its plant in Tonawanda, NY and is investing will invest $100 million in the plant for that purpose.
Now this is what I have been waiting for. The agency I work for uses over a thousand pickup trucks and we have to keep both diesel and gasoline fuel tanks at the moment. Not that I am high enough up the food chain to make those kind of purchasing decisions but I can allways hope.
Posted by: kermit | 15 June 2007 at 02:36 PM
Good, this is a big diesel I can go for. Clean, sized right for the job (you obviously don't need a 6 + liter diesel for a light duty truck), and more fuel efficient than most of today's offerings.
Posted by: Patrick | 15 June 2007 at 02:55 PM
Awesome. Now all they need to do is offer it across all trims, not just for the expensive ones like Jeep is doing with the Cherokee CRD (only offering it in a Limited, which starts at $38,000).
Posted by: John Ard | 15 June 2007 at 03:58 PM
It's about time! Plus let's not forget the compatibility with biodiesel and e-diesel.
I'd like to see this industrywide. If both domestic and import automakers were smart, they'd switch over light trucks (pickups, SUVs, vans) to diesel instead of gasoline.
Posted by: Mark R. W. Jr. | 15 June 2007 at 04:20 PM
Just wondering--does this engine meet one of those new regulations that the car companies fought and claimed would cause a rift in the time-space continuum?
It seems there's quite a disconnect between what the managers at those companies think can be done economically and what their own engineers can actually deliver.
Posted by: Lou Grinzo | 15 June 2007 at 05:49 PM
Mark R. W. Jr. - I couldn't agree more. I'm slowly getting ready to buy a new vehicle - and would love to buy an American diesel along the lines mentioned in the article.
Posted by: ejj | 15 June 2007 at 05:53 PM
So whats the reason for this new push to Diesels, earlier Honda & Nissan announced some models.
Is it because gasolene is getting expensive to produce.
Posted by: Max Reid | 15 June 2007 at 05:59 PM
I see a great future for micro-hybrid clean diesel for trucks/SUVs--anything that has a towing requirement. You can't tow a boat with a Prius (lots of boats being towed right now where I live).
Posted by: Nick | 15 June 2007 at 06:39 PM
I know it's been discussed on this site before, but when one considers the total environmental impact of a vehicle, from manufacture through it's entire operational life, a diesel Hummer outperforms a Prius.
And that Hummer holds nearly twice as many people as the Prius. Which begs the question: Why don't we rate vehicles on the basis of passenger-miles per gallon?
Posted by: terry | 15 June 2007 at 08:15 PM
"I know it's been discussed on this site before, but when one considers the total environmental impact of a vehicle, from manufacture through it's entire operational life, a diesel Hummer outperforms a Prius."
Get real. That's been totally debunked. Figures lie and liars figure, and in this case they are using ridiculously low figures lifespan figures for the hybrid vs. ridiculously high lifespan figures for the Hummer, along with other faulty assumptions.
"And that Hummer holds nearly twice as many people as the Prius."
Well, the Prius is rated for 5 passengers and the H2 for 5, but lets say 4 and 5 in the real world. 4 is closer to 5 than to 8 the last time I looked at a number line. Have you ever looked at one?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Number_line
Posted by: PeakVT | 15 June 2007 at 08:54 PM
Great news! A 4.5 liter V8 T2B5 is a welcome addition. Can a Tonawanda-built 2.2 4cylinder or 2.7 5cyl be far behind?
BTW my "obselete" 03 Saab 2.2 TiD still kickin'it. 34-46mpg is a wonderful thing. Go GM.
Posted by: [email protected] | 15 June 2007 at 09:20 PM
GM still not getting it. It's 50mpg not 300 horsepower that people want.
Posted by: Randy | 15 June 2007 at 09:47 PM
Uh, Randy, maybe it's not GM. Maybe it's you. In case you don't remember, the (GM) '94 Geo Metro XFi got 53mpg city/58 mpg highway. Hardly anyone bought them.
Posted by: terry | 15 June 2007 at 10:44 PM
I asked Land Rover if I could buy a vehicle with a diesel engine last time I purchased a vehicle, and they said "No". Perhaps they will take a cue from GM. I drove a diesel Range Rover Sport last month when I was in Russia on business, and I thought it was fantastic.
PeakVT: debunked by whom? I'll bet that for every "peer reviewed" study you can cite debunking it, someone else can find one that debunks your debunking. Like you said, "figures lie and liars figure." Which would you rather have: a soccer mom in a Hummer that drives 10 miles round trip twice a week to drop the kids at soccer practice, or someone in a Prius (like my neighbor) that commutes 70 miles a day to work? If they both drove the same amount of miles, obviously you would think that the Hummer is worse, but in this case.....?
Meh. Religious fanatics always find a way to make 1+1=4 (or 5?).
BTW, Hummers are b*tt-ugly, but I heard something once about beauty being in the eye....
Posted by: mike | 16 June 2007 at 01:30 AM
Mike:
It got debunked right here on this site, and about 10 regular posters piled on, pointing out how the study blatantly spun the data, with no justification.
Find the study, and look at how many miles they expect each vehicle to be on the road, and how many miles per year. IIRC, the differences between the "estimates" for the Hummer and Prius were laughable, and the so-called study offered no justification for the enormous differences, all of which conveniently made the Hummer look more environmentally attractive.
And the study was not peer reviewed nor published in a respective journal. It was a sham.
Posted by: stomv | 16 June 2007 at 05:42 AM
The really important news here is that GM has followed MB's lead and opted for SCR technology to meet Tier2 Bin5. GM Powertrain is a global division employing some 80,000 people. The diesel expertise gained in the otherwise ill-fated JV with Fiat and its VM Motori subsidiary has already been put to good use by GM Europe, and is now coming to the US.
The fact that GM America's last foray into diesel engine design in the 1980s (Oldsmobile Aurora) is not at all pertinent to the engine being presented here.
This press release is possible only because MB and others recently managed to persuade EPA and CARB that SCR was the only realistic option for medium-to-large displacements and, that concerns about AdBlue availability and device defeats have been addressed.
So forget the specifics of this particular engine for a moment: SCR + DPF means modern turbodiesels will capture high market share in the large RWD sedan, SUV and pick-up truck segments by 2015.
For smaller FWD cars, NOx store catalysts are cheaper than SCR but still very expensive. Gasoline-only and micro/mild hybrids will likely continue to dominate in the lower segments of the US market, where diesel fuel is priced (reasonably enough) roughly on par with gasoline on an energy content basis.
Posted by: Rafael Seidl | 16 June 2007 at 06:11 AM
Message to GM:
Bless your hearts for doing this! If you make them well, people will buy them faster than you can make them!
Posted by: Schmeltz | 16 June 2007 at 06:15 AM
4.5L is a nice start, but what about medium size trucks? It would be nice to see something in the 3.0L range that Toyota offers on their Hilux, which will soon be introduced over here.
Posted by: dsl987 | 16 June 2007 at 06:17 AM
Hummer-H2 consuming lesser energy than Prius is based on the assumption that Prius life is 109,000 miles and H2 life is 300,000.
Thats flat wrong as a Canadian cab driver has driven his Prius-1 for 200,000 miles. Toyota examined that vehicle and found everything intact.
With 2 powerplants (engine & motor), actually Prius could go more miles than Hummer-H2.
People have found the truth and thats why Hummer-H2 sales is down by 75 % in the last 4 years, while Prius have skyrocketed some 400-500 %.
European automakers are selling Diesels as small as 1.3 liter range, I dont know why GM is pushing for 4.5 liter. Atleast they have realised that gasolene is going to be more expensive in the future.
If someone wants a vehicle to tow a boat, then buy a truck.
Posted by: Max Reid | 16 June 2007 at 08:01 AM
"Which would you rather have: a soccer mom in a Hummer that drives 10 miles round trip twice a week to drop the kids at soccer practice, or someone in a Prius (like my neighbor) that commutes 70 miles a day to work? If they both drove the same amount of miles, obviously you would think that the Hummer is worse, but in this case.....?"
Nice straw man.
Besides, the Prius costs about half as much as an H2, meaning it embodies much less energy from the get-go. Obviously both should drive a Prius.
Posted by: PeakVT | 16 June 2007 at 09:01 AM
@dsl987 -
building a reliable 4-banger turbodiesel isn't the issue, there are plenty of those plying the streets of Europe. The problem is that EPA/CARB emissions standards are so strict that the technology required to meet them would price such a small diesel out of the market.
Example: MY2007 Colorado Work Truck, 2.9L I4 gasoline, 2WD, 5-speed manual officially gets 20/26 MPG. Figure 15,000 miles annually and $3.50 average for gas over the next 8 years. Total lifetime fuel cost $18260.
Now figure a clean diesel option offering similar performance would cost $3000 more but get 25/33 MPG of *gasoil*. Figure same mileage, same length of ownership, but an average of $3.80 per gallon of diesel. Total lifetime fuel cost $15724, i.e. about the difference in initial purchase cost. However, you'd also have spend more on AdBlue, VLF, insurance and maintenance.
Unless the MPG improvement were substantially more than 25% higher, you would qualify for a tax credit and/or you could write off the asset as a business expense, such a small diesel might not be the better choice. The externalities of the US market don't favor diesels the way those of the European market do.
Posted by: Rafael Seidl | 16 June 2007 at 09:44 AM
"Nice straw man.
Besides, the Prius costs about half as much as an H2, meaning it embodies much less energy from the get-go. Obviously both should drive a Prius."
Uh-Oh, someone put their Intro to Logic 101 hat on......
Obviously, both should drive whatever they want to drive. If soccer mom wants to drive a Kenworth cab-over to soccer practice, more power to her.
Posted by: mike | 16 June 2007 at 11:03 AM
Rafael,
Well said. But as far as I know neither CARB nor EPA have officially recognized SCR as an approved and suitable technology alhtough the EPA did establish guidelines for anti-defeating measures that might allow the use sometime in the undefined future.
In Other Words, the bureaucrats have NOT yet gotten off their duffs. It is getting awfully close to the 2008 model year without any definative regulatory approval. Has thier delay moved the sdvent to the 2009 model year, thanks ENTIRELY to the bureaucrats?
This sppears to be a "clean sheet" design giving GM at least four State of the Art engines; this mid-size clean deisel, and also the 'HighFeature' advanced 3.6 liter V6 gasoline engine, and a fine two liter Ecotec four to accompany its advanced larger 'Northwind' V8.
I am unaware of GM's standing in the nominal 1 liter class, as these are not present in the US marketplace. But it would appear that GM need not compete with inferior engines or transmissions for much, if any longer.
Posted by: Stan Peterson | 16 June 2007 at 11:39 AM
"If soccer mom wants to drive a Kenworth cab-over to soccer practice, more power to her."
Right, because there are no externalities to driving gas guzzlers. None whatsoever. Never has been, never will be.
I have a Logic 101 hat around here somewhere you can try out.
Posted by: PeakVT | 16 June 2007 at 01:24 PM
Nobody said anything about externalities. I know they exist, but they are not as important to everyone as they are to you. You would see her making a bad decision, I would see her exercising free will (as illogical as her choice may be).
Here is a basic fact: society not only approves of the use of gas guzzlers, they reward it. See section 179 of the Internal Revenue Code if you doubt me. I take advantage of it, soccer mom takes advantage of it, and your taxes subsidize our choices (if you live in the United States).
Externalities in the form of higher taxes? Well, quite frankly, we don't pay them, you do. Soccer mom and myself have an income structure that allows us to write that stuff off. Externalities in the form of damage to the environment? Don't worry about it, the same taxes you pay will fund cleanup.
I have a logic 101 hat of my own. I wore it when I figured out how to use the law and tax codes to buy and drive what I want without paying for it.
Posted by: mike | 16 June 2007 at 04:51 PM