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Tata Motors-owned Jaguar Land Rover said it will begin production at the new engine facility near Wolverhampton, UK in early 2015.
Weighing 80kg less than today's engines the new family of engines called 'Ingenium' designed and engineered in-house by Jaguar Land Rover will power its next generation of models some of which will be aluminium built.
The two British brands are looking to aggressively expand their presence in the compact 'affordable luxury' segment for which the two brands had been working on a new range of small engines.
Thus from the usual 3 litre engines and above the new engines will be under 2 litre, be light weight, more fuel-efficient and low on emission. The new family will be petrol and diesel powered.
Ron Lee, Director, Powertrain Engineering, Jaguar Land Rover said "Being configurable and flexible are the two key strands of Ingenium's DNA because we have future-proofed our new engines from the outset. Ingenium will be able to accept new advances in fuel, turbocharging, emissions, performance and electrification technologies when they are ready and accessible to be deployed".
All Ingenium engines will be equipped with advanced and efficient turbochargers, central direct high-pressure fuel injection, variable valve timing and start-stop technology.
The lightweight blocks share the same bore, stroke, cylinder spacing and 500cc cylinder capacity. This helps give Ingenium the configurability and flexibility around which smaller or larger engines can quickly and efficiently be developed to meet future regulatory and competitive requirements, added a release.
To support the development of this future powertrain technology, including the new Ingenium family, Jaguar Land Rover has invested $40 million to expand and enhance its Powertrain Engineering facility at its Whitley Technical Centre.
