Achieving very high fuel economy and good performance with engine downsizing - the Ecobasic concept car

摘要

The Direct Injection Diesel Engines are becoming very attractive for the European passenger cars market thanks to their low specific fuel consumption and the improvements achieved in the last years in terms of performances, noise and emissions. To further reduce the fuel consumption of low segment passenger cars an important contribution could be given by the engine downsizing. The four-cylinder architecture, the most suitable to guarantee good comfort specially on small cars, can be maintained thanks to the Common Rail Fuel Injection technology which makes feasible the design of very low unit displacement Diesel engines. This paper gives an outlook on the approach to the downsizing followed by Fiat Research Centre and describes the work carried out on a 1.2 e. TDI Diesel Engine optimised for the application on Ecobasic, the FIAT "3-litre" concept car.