General Motors will invest $200 million in Flint to produce a family of new, small, fuel-efficient engines starting in 2015.
They include four-cylinder engines that will power the next generation of the Chevrolet Cruze compact sedan. The engines probably will be added to vehicles such as the Chevrolet Sonic subcompact and Buick Encore small crossover later.
The company did not say whether any new jobs will be added in Flint as a result of the investment.
GM plans to produce engines in China, Hungary, Mexico and South Korea by 2017, when annual global production should reach 2.5 million. The engine family will range from a 1.0-liter three-cylinder to 1.4- and 1.5-liter turbocharged four-cylinder models. Power will range from 75 horsepower to 165 horsepower. GM calls the engines Ecotec, the name it also uses for its current four-cylinder power plants.
“We’ll use these engines in 64 countries,” Steve Kiefer, GM vice president of global powertrain engineering, said at a briefing today in Pontiac. They will power 27 models by the end of 2016.
One-quarter of all the vehicles GM builds around the world will eventually use engines belonging to this family. A family consists of engines of several sizes and outputs that share engineering and parts. The new family replaces three separate engine families. That reduces the cost and complexity of making engines, said Tom Sutter, chief engineer of GM’s Ecotec engines.
The Opel Adam minicar in Europe will be the first car to get one of the engines when it hits the road with a turbocharged 1.0-liter three-cylinder this summer. GM doesn’t plan to sell the little Adam, which is about the size of a Fiat 500, in the U.S. The 1.4- and 1.5-liter four-cylinder turbos go into production for the next-generation Cruze in China this summer. U.S. production of the new Cruze and its engines begins next year.
Many of the engines will feature direct fuel injection, turbocharging and auto-stop systems to boost fuel efficiency. They will run on regular fuel, unlike some competing high-output small engines that require more expensive premium.
GM compares the engines’ efficiency, power and refinement to Ford, Volkswagen and Audi engines. Five of GM’s brands around the world will use the engines, but the automaker isn’t saying which five.
Source: MEDC
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