Less Is More For Ford's New V-6 Engine [Federal Regs Kill the V-8]

Big pickups would use four-cylinder engines, luxury sedans would come with V-6s instead of V-8s. The venerable V-8 engine would be found only on big commercial trucks.

Ford Motor Co.'s vice president of global product design sees engine downsizing as the clearest way to meet new federal fuel economy standards. The trick will be doing it without slashing power.

"We know our customers want better fuel economy," Kuzak said. "We know how to deliver that near-term."

Starting with the launch of the 2009 Lincoln MKS sedan later this year, Ford will begin a multiyear push to cut the size of its engines.

The MKS will replace the Lincoln Town Car as the flagship of Ford's luxury lineup. Unlike the V8-powered Town Car, the MKS will use a six-cylinder engine.

To make up for its size, the new engine swipes two technologies from the hot-rod world — turbo-charging and direct fuel injection.

The result is a V-6 that provides 13 percent more horsepower than the Town Car's V-8 and increases fuel economy.

Work on the MKS' engine has already begun at Ford's plant in Lima, Ohio. The MKS uses a modified version of the 3.5-liter V-6 built there. Later this year, 3.5-liter work will start up at Ford's Brook Park, Ohio, campus.

Despite big power numbers, convincing buyers that a six-cylinder engine can do the work of a V-8 will be a tough sell.

"After decades of selling power, and power being defined as having more cylinders or bigger displacement, you have to completely redefine" engine marketing, said Brett Smith, assistant director of the manufacturing, engineering and technology group at the Center for Automotive Research in Ann Arbor, Mich.

Car buyers may say they want more fuel-efficient vehicles, but Smith said brawny consistently outsells thrifty.

That's why whenever an automaker releases a redesigned car or truck, it tends to be more powerful than the one it replaces.

The 2007 Toyota Camry? Even the 158-horsepower four-cylinder model is 26.4 percent beefier than it was in 1996. The V-6 gained 42.6 percent on its climb to 268 horses.

In 2004, General Motors released the Chevrolet Colorado and GMC Canyon small trucks, powered by either a four-cylinder or a five-cylinder engine.

Smith said Ford dealers responded by telling potential buyers that the Colorado was a cylinder short, even though its power numbers were higher than the V- 6 available on Ford's Ranger.

It's a marketing strategy that can't survive new federal mandates of 35 mile-per-gallon fuel efficiency by 2020.

"Everyone's in this together. One company isn't going to be able to sell a bunch of V-8s in a segment where others are selling V-6s. It just won't be possible with these new rules," Smith said.

He added that Ford's chosen technologies, turbo-charging and direct injection, could make small engines powerful enough to allow the company to cut sizes.

Turbo-charging is the practice of forcing more air into an engine cylinder, boosting the power briefly when needed.

Direct injection means injecting fuel directly into those engine cylinders instead of in a port or manifold. The fuel used burns more completely, creating more power with lower emissions. But it's a complex system that requires lots of computer controls.

Combined, the technologies can add thousands to the price of an engine, a cost that Ford's Kuzak said can be reclaimed in less than three years from lower gasoline bills.

There are a handful of cars on the road today that use both technologies, but they tend to be specialty, hot-rod models.

Mazda uses the system in its Speed6. It gets 270 horsepower, 27 percent more than the V-6 Mazda 6 sedan and it costs nearly $7,000 more.

General Motors uses turbo-direct-injection in hot-rod versions of the Saturn Sky and Pontiac Solstice two-door roadsters.

The Saturn Sky Redline uses a 2-liter, four-cylinder engine that gets 50 percent more power than the standard version of the car with a 2.4-liter engine. And it gets 28 miles per gallon on the highway, up from 25 miles on the base Sky.

"These technologies are still marketed as performance add-ons," Smith said. "It's not looked on as a fuel-economy enhancement."

He added that all major automakers are looking at turbo-direct-injection to aid fuel economy, but none has yet mastered it.

Even Ford, the biggest proponent of the technology, plans only 500,000 units by 2012 or about 100,000 engines per year — about 5 percent of its vehicle output.

Kuzak said after 2012, nearly all of Ford's new vehicles will use either that technology or diesel engines.

"I cannot say that we have all of our plans (to get to 35 miles per gallon) buttoned up to 2020. We have our plans through 2012," Kuzak said.

(Robert Schoenberger is a reporter for The Plain Dealer of Cleveland. He can be contacted at rschoenb(at)plaind.com.)

“I’d like some proof of your assertion. None of the three dealers I called have ever heard of it happening on the VG30-series engine.

On the VG30, it’s not cheap engine design but a desire for a quieter, more refined sounding engine, which was something the Japanese had to do to get market share in the US. Horsepower has nothing to do with it. Higher horsepower engines these days use chains, especially blower cars.”

The VG-30I engine in my first Pathfinder had the belt tensioner seize, shredding the belt and trashing the engine. A tensioner that had been replaced less that 30K miles before it seized.

We’ve had 2 Pathfinders with that engine family. The first being an ‘87 VG-30I with a throttle body, the last being a ‘93 VG-30E with port injection.

I consider both of them to be POS’s Underpowered, inefficient, and with marginal timing system and head gasket reliability. And both with the high maintenance costs that are required by the short timing belt change interval. IOW, complete crap.

Very strange, since most people who own the Pathfinders would disagree with you.

Your belt tensioner (and presumably the entire belt drive system) - who did you have replace it? What parts were used?

Underpowered, sure. Not by the standards of the day, but now certainly. Inefficient? Not so sure. The gas mileage isn’t great but some modern SUVs in the same size and power class don’t do any better.

Short timing belt change interval? It’s 60K or 105K, depending on year. That’s not short. Short is the idiot at GM who produced a V6 that needed timing belt changes every 30K.

Headgasket issues? I’ve never heard of VG30s having headgasket problems. Lifter issues and exhaust manifold bolt problems, yes, but they just don’t have headgasket issues. The early ones even had fire problems due to Hitachi screwing up the fuel hose they supplied, but still.... What makes you say that?

The timing belt work on our ‘87 was always done at the local Nissan dealer. The tensioner that seized was one they had installed.

You did remind me of some other problems I had with those engines -

On the ‘87 -

Multiple fuel injector failures.
A fuel pressure regulator failure.
An ignition control module failure.
The EGR canister rusted out.
Warped exhaust manifold + broken studs on both engine banks, one side had the same repair work done twice.
2 starter failures.
A fan clutch failure.
The engine always ran warm too thanks to the factory fitted undersized radiator.
An alternator failure.
It also had a handful of pitted lifters when I tore it down after the belt incident but what did that matter. All 12 valves were bent and who knows if it managed to crack any of the piston skirts. I didn’t bother to tear it down further to look.

We did have it quite a while, but when things fail for a second or third time and on multiple vehicles, you get the feeling you’re seeing design flaws, not normal wear.

The ‘93 was better but IMO only because we didn’t drive it as long thanks to the rear frame section rusting out. Unlike the front portion of the frame, the rear section wasn’t finished well enough to prevent major rust. I guess the folks at Nissan couldn’t be bothered with that. Maybe it was built on a Friday eh?

Problems with the ‘93 -

Broken exhaust manifold studs and warped manifolds.
A starter failure.
An alternator failure.
A fan clutch failure.
And a slightly leaking head gasket that turned up during a routine oil analysis.

The local import shop and the dealer told me it was common, as were all the other problems I’d seen.

I think you can see why I’m less than impressed with the reliability...

Then that should have been the Nissan dealer’s fault - that tensioner was improperly installed. (They’re actually designed so that they can’t seize, not without loud squealing noises for several hours of use ahead of time - I took one apart once and discovered that it is a roller bearing inside a plain bearing inside a sleeve that lets the pulley rotate.) I bet they took the shortcut and *didn’t* replace the tensioner stud and nut like they’re supposed to. That can be marked up to the idiot they had servicing it.

Yeah, the TBI wasn’t very good on the early VG30s. And yes, all the Pathfinders tend to rust out in the rear floor and in the frame over the rear axle. The problem with the latter isn’t that the rear isn’t finished, it’s that there’s a water and mud (and, most importantly SALT) trap back there. They left holes in the frame for you to wash it out (and there’s instructions to that effect in the owner’s manual) but nobody ever does it so they rot out.

The exhaust manifolds warping is caused both by their idiot supplier who gave them the wrong studs and by the fact that the studs’ design isn’t quite good enough (on the early VG30s). The studs crack, which de-tensions the manifold and lets it warp. This is fixed by installing the studs from the VG30DETT-powered 300ZX (Nissan’s factory/recommended fix) - and if the vehicle had less than 100,000 miles on it when the problem was discovered, Nissan would fix it for free. Actually, still will, no matter the age of the truck.

The starter failures are due to the location of the starter and people not being careful while changing oil. If you are sloppy when changing the filter, oil runs down and gets past the shields intended to block heat and crud from getting into the starter. Too much oil in the starter and it overheats and dies.

Alternator failure - this happens a lot. It is a real weak point on the truck. The main reason it dies is because it’s undersized for the demands that most people are making on it - it’s only 70A. The good news is that you can get replacements cheap that are 110A or more. And Nissan has since improved the design and offers it at a subsidized price.

Undersized radiator? That’s not a typical complaint. I run my 90 in Dallas with the AC on in the height of summer and have no overheating issues. The 87 (which *was* the first year) did have a lot of issues that were fixed with the 88. Of course, the fix kits are supposed to be free, and your dealer is supposed to tell you about them. I’d chalk up the ignition module failure to that (never seen a Nissan do that) as well.

The leaking headgasket is NOT normal, not at ALL. I’ve got over a million miles on VG30s, done oil analysis on them for years, never had one go wrong that way.

Neither is your repeated fan clutch failures - except as a matter of mileage, maybe. They tend to go out around 120K. How many miles were on them?

Did you buy these new or used? It sounds like you got them used and pre-abused.

I had a 93 that had timing belt issues (previous idiot owner had less mechanical skills than he thought he had and he tried to change the timing belt) that did OK for a while. I currently have a 90 SE as a daily driver and a 92 as a mudder truck (in conjunction with someone else, it’s a toy) and neither have most of the problems you describe. For example, both of my current trucks are Texas or Southern trucks and they’ve never seen salt. My 90 has 231,000 miles and doesn’t have any significant rust on the frame or floorboards.

I’m not saying that these things are perfect but they were and are a heck of a lot better than the competition was. But you don’t have to take my word for it. Go to http://npora.ipbhost.com/ and cruise through the forums there - it’s the world’s largest Pathfinder-specific forum, and pretty much every common problem these trucks have has been exposed there. Much of what you list isn’t even there.

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

	The 2009 Lincoln MKS a new fuel-efficient 3.7-liter V-6 engine. (Photo courtesy of Ford)