New generation engines - Part II

Published in Western Canada Highway News:
For the big engine makers, the approach to meeting the new emission standards was essentially twofold: recirculating exhaust gas to cut emissions of NOx and NMHC, and filtering particulate matter so that less of it gets belched out. In Cummins’ case, it meant combining the newest version of the company’s cooled exhaust gas recirculation (EGR) system – already proven when Cummins met the 2002 regulations – with a particulate filter designed and produced by Cummins division Emission Solutions.
“We have delivered on our promise to have certified compliant engines that perform and deliver on the things that are most important in the trucking industry, which are performance, fuel economy and reliability,” Cummins spokesperson Louis Wenzler said this year. “And as we step back and listen to customers and fleet owners that we talk to on a regular basis, our interpretation would be as they grade our scorecard that (they believe) Cummins has delivered on its promise. The product is working.”
Wenzler said Cummins was pleased to see that the engines “worked as designed” right from the start, though “minor adjustments in the software” were made after the first units hit the market. He emphasized the word minor. “Have we made design changes that drive hardware changes and assembly changes? The answer to that is ‘No.’ The fundamental product as released is stable, is remaining with no changes. Have we made minor software changes? Yeah.”
Caterpillar Inc. responded to the emission-reduction challenge with refinements to its trademarked ACERT technology. To the basics of ACERT – air management, precision combustion, etc. – the company added clean gas induction (CGI) to reduce NOx levels, as well as a top-notch diesel particulate filter. CGI is an ACERT process that cools filtered non-combustible gas and and then blends it with more incoming cool, clean air before returning it to the combustion chamber. A company brochure emphasizes that these engines differ from competitors’ products in that they put clean air into the combustion chamber – “not the recycled exhaust gas of cooled-EGR technology.”
A news release from Caterpillar last fall said the new engines “provide the value, performance and fuel economy customers expect.” Lorne Lagimodiere, truck engine account manager for Toromont Cat in Winnipeg, concurred with that assessment early this year. He added that the 2007 engines provide better response, power and fuel economy. And the trucks running on those engines invariably have clean smokestacks as testament to how well PM pollution has been cut.
Truck sales volumes shot up in 2006 “because truckers knew that that the ’07 engines would cost anywhere from $8,000 to $13,000 more,” said International Truck and Engine’s Roy Wiley. “There was a big pre-buy in 2006. For the medium-duty engines the price difference was a lot less – more like $4,000 to $6,000. But for the big-bore engines - well, those engines are quite expensive.”
The Pro-Star Class 8 truck was at the centre of International’s response to the 2007 standards. The MaxxForce 11 and MaxxForce 13 engines in those trucks included proven cooled-EGR systems and advanced aftertreatment systems. A company vice-president pledged in 2006 that the new engines would deliver outstanding performance and reliability along with improved air quality.
"The new engines are being received well in the marketplace," Wiley said months after the launch. He added that the engine systems were subjected to “your normal tweaks that you sometimes have to do, but nothing out of the ordinary.”