Honda Cars India has announced that the company sold over 1,00,000 cars in India featuring the new 1.5-litre i-DTEC diesel engine under the hood. First introduced on the Amaze compact sedan in India in April 2013, the diesel engine has moved on to power a number of vehicles in Honda’s stable including the fourth-generation City sedan as well as the all-new Mobilio MPV launched earlier this year. The company also stated that the diesel variants of the Amaze, City and Mobilio have clocked a total of 90 crore kms cumulatively as per service data.
Exclusively designed for India, the i-DTEC motor incorporates the automaker’s Earth Dreams technology that helps offer better fuel efficiency. Honda also says that the automaker has used several friction reducing technologies on the new engine to reduce friction in a diesel unit to match that of a petrol unit, in order to achieve higher fuel efficiency. Moreover, with an all aluminium cylinder head, the i-DTEC mill is also the lightest engine in its class, offering similar torque configuration.
Courtesy of the technological advances, the 1.5-litre i-DTEC engine has turned out to be very fuel efficient. Delivering an ARAI certified 26 km/l in the new City, the sedan is the most fuel efficient vehicle in the country with the new diesel motor. The oil burner also returns a healthy 25.8 km/l on the Amaze and 24.5 km/l on the Mobilio offering the same power output. The 1.5-litre i-DTEC motor produces 100 PS of power and 200 Nm of torque, paired to a 5-speed manual transmission (6-speed unit on the City).
The 1.5-litre i-DTEC changed the fortunes for Honda India who had been struggling to gain momentum in the market without a diesel motor, until last year. The company most recently achieved the milestone of selling over 1 lakh units of the Amaze in the country and we expect a similar announcement to come soon for the new City as well, due to the overwhelming demand for the C-segment sedan. The 1.5-litre i-DTEC mill will further be added to the new generation Honda Jazz hatchback, scheduled to launch in March 2015.
