LONDON -- Jaguar Land Rover has taken a big step in reducing its dependence on engines from Ford Motor, its former owner, by launching its own new four-cylinder gasoline unit.
The 2.0-liter turbocharged engine is part of the Ingenium family of all-aluminum powerplants and will be built in the UK and in a new powetrain facility in China.
The engine will replace Ford’s 2.0-liter turbo built in Valencia, Spain, which JLR uses in many of its Jaguar and Land Rover models. The engine is particularly popular in China, where local taxation penalizes cars with engines above 2.0-liters in size.
Currently the four-cylinder gasoline engine accounts for around half of the engines that Ford builds for JLR and about 25 percent of the total engines JLR uses, a JLR source told Automotive News Europe. That equates to around 130,000 engines a year.
Ford will continue to build a V-6 diesel, V-6 supercharged gasoline and V-8 supercharged gasoline engines for JLR. However, JLR is expected to replace the V-6 engines with its own six-cylinder versions of the modular Ingenium family.
Ford’s engine contract with JLR runs to 2020, by which time JLR has said it wants to be largely self-sufficient in engines. Ford sold JLR to India’s Tata Motors in 2008.
JLR has already replaced Ford’s 2.2-liter diesel engine with its own Ingenium 2.0-liter four-cylinder diesel.
The new four-cylinder gasoline will be initially available in three outputs, including 250hp and 300hp versions, JLR said. It said the fuel economy will be improved by up to 15 percent on the equivalent power Ford engine.
JLR said it saved money and increased flexibility by designing a similar engine block for both the diesel and gasoline four-cylinder. That allows both to be built on the same casting line.
Production of the engine will start this year in JLR’s engine plant in Wolverhampton, central England, which opened in 2015. China production will start early next year in a new facility built alongside JLR’s factory it jointly operates with Chery Automotive in Changshu, north of Shanghai.
More information about which models the four-cylinder gasoline will be fitted to will be announced at the Paris auto show at the end of the month. The engine is likely to be offered with the new Land Rover Discovery large SUV, which is due to be unveiled at the show.
