[TusharK]

Maruti Suzuki introduced its all-new DDiS 225 diesel engine in 2019, only to be discontinued a year later. When the BS6 emission norms rolled out in 2020, India’s largest carmaker announced that it would phase out its diesel engines and offer a petrol-only line-up going forward.



This announcement came as a surprise, as it had only been a year since Maruti had started offering the DDiS 225 engine in the Ciaz and Ertiga. It seems it wasn’t the BS6 regulations that killed off this engine, but a design flaw.



According to a media report, the design of the DDiS 225 engine made it impossible to upgrade it to BS6 standards. Besides a dual-mass flywheel, the cylinder head featured an integrated exhaust manifold. This configuration resulted in the overcooling of the exhaust gasses. By the time the exhaust reached the Diesel Particulate Filter (DPF), it turned into a liquid form.



This, accompanied by the soot couldn’t pass through the DPF filter. Also, the regeneration process would reach 1,300 degrees C, damaging the DPF and Diesel Oxidation Catalyst (DOC).

Maruti did consider switching back to a more conventional bolt-on exhaust manifold. However, diesel cars had gotten even more expensive by then due to the stricter emission norms.

Source: Autocar India

Link to Team-BHP News

[Sensible_Speed]

Originally Posted by TusharK

Maruti did consider switching back to a more conventional bolt-on exhaust manifold. However, diesel cars had gotten even more expensive by then due to the stricter emission norms.

So, Maruti couldn't justify the re-engineering costs for that engine despite diesel still playing for approximately 20% of overall car sales? That seems a bit shortsighted to just let go of that big a market, especially by the market leader no less. Can they source a diesel engine from Toyota in the future? That would be an interesting prospect.

[PreludeSH]

I don't think it was a design flaw. It was a design choice and not keeping future changes needed for BS6. Any other company would have re-designed it but Maruti didn't want to invest on it. Anyway, what have they really invested in terms of engineering ?

[youknowitbetter]

I have a question on this. Can Suzuki offer this engine in others markets and more so in less developed ones?

The reason for my query is that while R&D costs may not have been recouped in India, is it possible Suzuki has recovered or profited from sales elsewhere, which may still justify the viability of developing this engine.

I have also written to Autocar India asking the same, but doubt that I may get a response from them.

[AKSarkar1]

I am actually quite happy to see this post because I used to have repeated problems with my Maruti Ciaz which had the 1.5L Diesel engine. The engine was quite refined and the power was also quite good but there were repeated issues with the engine, mainly the check engine light coming on and off. In a rather isolated incident, one day the car engine just decided to give up and when taken to Maruti we never really got an answer to what the problem was but they got the car up and running quickly.

Luckily for me this car was my official vehicle provided by the government and I had a chance to switch this vehicle with the older gen Ciaz with the more trustworthy 1.3L Diesel that was in the department garage, albeit that was an older used model. To be quite frank, I never really noticed that much of a difference in between the 2 engines and preferred the 1.3 as it NEVER gave me a single problem in the ~50,000 kms that we put on it.

[Jeroen]

Originally Posted by AKSarkar1

. The engine was quite refined and the power was also quite good but there were repeated issues with the engine, mainly the check engine light coming on and off..

Just a thought:

Check engine light is not necessarily related to the engine. One thing though, if the check engine light comes on there is going to one or multiple error codes.

Without the codes it is pure speculation whether this was an engine problem or something completely different. (E.g. a fuel cap not sealing proper,y will give you a check engine light!)

Jeroen

[Cresterk]

Originally Posted by Sensible_Speed

So, Maruti couldn't justify the re-engineering costs for that engine despite diesel still playing for approximately 20% of overall car sales? That seems a bit shortsighted to just let go of that big a market, especially by the market leader no less. Can they source a diesel engine from Toyota in the future? That would be an interesting prospect.

But why even bother spending crores re-engineering it when diesels are facing draconian 10 year bans in NCR. Also it’s way easier to just reduce metal weight in petrol cars leading to even bigger profit margins from reduced material costs. Maruti’s core customers clearly don’t care about reduced performance.

[Stolidus500]

Originally Posted by Cresterk

But why even bother spending crores re-engineering it when diesels are facing draconian 10 year bans in NCR.

Diesel cars are not only sold in NCR. It was a short-sighted decision period. In my area, people are either buying preowned cars or going for bigger cars due to Marutis being petrol only.

[shortbread]

Originally Posted by Sensible_Speed

So, Maruti couldn't justify the re-engineering costs for that engine despite diesel still playing for approximately 20% of overall car sales? That seems a bit shortsighted to just let go of that big a market, especially by the market leader no less. Can they source a diesel engine from Toyota in the future? That would be an interesting prospect.

They tried, for 2 years almost. Plenty of camouflaged diesels spotted and posted on various online media. Ultimately they failed and gave up. Suzuki's expertise is quite narrow, small cars powered by 4cyl petrol powertrain mated to manual boxes. Anything outside their comfort zone, they need help.

The biggest benefactor of marutis failure was Toyota's Innova. The 3 row diesel MUV space has now been monopolised by the Japanese giant.

[Brumby]

Originally Posted by TusharK

According to a media report, the design of the DDiS 225 engine made it impossible to upgrade it to BS6 standards. Besides a dual-mass flywheel, the cylinder head featured an integrated exhaust manifold. This configuration resulted in the overcooling of the exhaust gasses. By the time the exhaust reached the Diesel Particulate Filter (DPF), it turned into a liquid form.

Makes me think how one can turn nitrogen, nitrogen-oxide, carbon-dioxide, sulphur-oxides and other exhaust gases to liquid by just cooling with water at about 90 deg C and air at ambient temperature (mostly greater than 20 deg C)

If the above is true, then Suzuki must help the industry, because high power consuming re-liquefaction plants are required to liquify nitrogen.

Sulphuric acid corrosion due to condensation in the exhaust manifold is a known defect due to very low exhaust temperatures, but the complete exhaust gas turning into liquid is hard to digest. Sulphuric acid corrosion happens in engines using high sulphur fuel, however the cars complying BSIV regulations must have been using diesel with less than 0.1% sulphur, so even formation of sulphuric acid will be in minuscule quantity.

Probably there must be other factors.

Cheers

[FiestaST]

This somewhat gives me a closure. I always wondered why Maruti painstakingly develops an engine (a good one at that) only to discontinue a year later. Now the other thing I want closure to is the missing of MH370

[sandeepmohan]

Didn't know Maruti Suzuki had this engine in their portfolio.

Considering they had access to the well received Fiat 1.3l and 1.6l blocks, for which I am sure this engine has its basis, somewhere, they should have worked with Fiat to further develop the platform. They have far more experience building diesel engines and continue to design and build them. Missed or lost opportunity I'd say. TATA has clearly milked the max out of the Fiat derived engines that they continue to use.

[Cresterk]

Originally Posted by Stolidus500

Diesel cars are not only sold in NCR. It was a short-sighted decision period. In my area, people are either buying preowned cars or going for bigger cars due to Marutis being petrol only.

NCR does take up quite a lot of market share. The way entry level mass market cars work is by making them as cheap as possible and ensuring it’s bought by as many people as possible.

[DicKy]

Originally Posted by Sensible_Speed

Can they source a diesel engine from Toyota in the future? That would be an interesting prospect.

Nope. Toyota doesn't have any small diesels in their portfolio anymore. The smallest diesel engine they have right now is the 2.4l GD in the Innova Crysta.

Toyota saw the writing on the wall in the 2000s itself and the ND engine (the one we got here in the Etios and Corolla) and AD engines(would have been sweet and made the Corolla/Camry raging successes in India if it was launched) were the last small engines they developed. In the 2010s they used small BMW diesel engines before going full on hybrid post Dieselgate.

[Rohit_Quad]

I don't buy this for a second. The main reasons in the article don't make any sense to me. I think there was a bigger screw up on Maruthi's part (mostly profit margins) and I feel they are using these exhaust manifold BS as a cover up for not upgrading the engine to BS6.