AUBURN HILLS, Mich., Oct. 21 /PRNewswire/ —
- New Pentastar is slated to be available across 13 vehicles including trucks and sport utilities by 2013
- Significant cost savings realized with shift from seven engines to one V-6 engine
- 2011 V-6 Challenger boosted 55 horsepower to 305 horsepower with new Pentastar V-6
- Introduced in 2011 Jeep® Grand Cherokee, new V-6 engine will soon be available in new Chrysler Town & Country, 300 and 200, Dodge Charger, Avenger, Durango and Journey
- Designed for a range of specific applications, horsepower and torque are tuned for specific models
- Fuel efficiency improvement will average up to seven percent across the model range.
Improved fuel efficiency, more power and reduced emissions, all hallmarks of the new Pentastar V-6 engine, will soon be available across 13 models from Chrysler LLC.
The Pentastar V-6, the most advanced six cylinder engine ever produced by Chrysler Powertrain group, is slated to be the ‘workhorse’ engine across many models and will eventually replace seven different V-6 engines over the next three years. By 2014, the new V-6 is expected to account for more than a third of the powertrains in the vehicle line-up and substantially contribute to an overall corporate fuel efficiency improvement of more than 25 percent.
“The Pentastar engine is suited to meet the requirements for a full range of vehicle applications in terms of power and fuel efficiency including passenger cars, mini-vans and sport utilities,” explained Bob Lee, vice president of engine engineering for Chrysler Group LLC. “It has been designed for today and many years to come. Already, we are looking forward to adapting future technologies as they become available to the Pentastar V-6 for even more fuel efficiency and performance.”
Compact and lightweight, Pentastar V-6 will be used in front-, rear- and all-wheel-drive models. Already standard on the new Jeep Grand Cherokee, the V-6 will gradually phase out seven V-6 legacy engines ranging from 2.7 – liters, up to 4.0 – liters in the current product portfolio. Overall, the new Pentastar will enable Chrysler Powertrain to reduce major engine components from 189 parts to just 32, greatly simplifying the build process and improving quality. Significant cost savings also are realized with purchasing efficiencies and a reduction in limited, high piece cost parts.
Some parts, including the exhaust manifolds, will completely disappear by virtue of being cast directly into the cylinder head. Today, the engine line-up features 32 different left and right exhaust manifolds. That will drop to zero with the new Pentastar V-6.
Upper and lower intake assembles, which accounted for 21 and 11 different parts numbers (respectively) have been reduced to two upper and lower assemblies. Camshaft variations will drop from 14 to four and just two fuel rails will be required rather than the current 14.
Leading the way will be the 2011 Dodge Challenger that will be exclusively equipped with a higher horsepower version of the 3.6-liter Pentastar V-6. Certified by the Society of Automotive Engineers, the higher horsepower V-6 produces 305 bhp @ 6350 rpm – representing a 55 horsepower increase over the previous 3.5-liter V-6. Torque also is noticeably up with the V-6 rated at 268 lb.ft. @ 4800 rpm.
Fuel economy for the new Dodge Challenger also is increased to 18/26 (City/Highway) from last year’s model.
The increase in power and fuel efficiency is derived from technologies incorporated in the new engine and strategically developing both the intake and exhaust systems to take advantage of the compact engine layout and vehicle packaging.
“From day one, our objective with the new Pentastar V-6 engine always was to develop an engine that was capable of producing more than 300 horsepower,” according to Lee. “What we’ve done is adapt proven technologies to this new V-6 engine to bring even more power to Challenger for 2011”
