Not The End Of Diesel Engines For Maruti Suzuki — 1.5-Litre Diesel Engine To Take Over

Maruti Suzuki will phase out its 1.3-litre diesel engine but will retain its 1.5-litre diesel engine from April 2020. We had recently reported that Maruti Suzuki would phase out its diesel engines from April 2020 when BS-VI emissions norms kick in. Now though, there is a new development.

According to a report by Team-BHP, Maruti Suzuki will discontinue its 1.3-litre engine but will continue using its 1.5-litre diesel engines. This simply means that all small cars from Maruti Suzuki will be available only in petrol or CNG variants while bigger and more premium cars will be powered by the bigger 1.5-litre engine.

In essence, you might not be able to buy a Maruti Suzuki Swift or Ritz with a diesel engine, but you certainly can buy the Maruti Suzuki Ertiga, Rtiza, S-Cross, etc with the new 1.5-litre diesel engine. The 1.3-litre DDiS diesel engine used till now is currently one of the most popular engines in India as it has been sold by the millions.

It is an engine that is produced by Maruti Suzuki under license from Fiat and this has been happening for several years now. The four-cylinder turbo-diesel survived the change from BS-III to BS-IV, but the upcoming BS-VI norms seems like a long-shot for it. Trying to push the engine to prep it for BS-VI emissions norms would be an expensive affair.

With an increasing demand for petrol and electric cars, Maruti Suzuki does not consider it worth to be investing more money in the old 1.3-litre engine, hence the decision of phasing it out.

According to the same report, Maruti Suzuki has already started cutting down on the production of the engine and it would eventually be phased out completely just in time for BS-VI to be implemented.

Maruti Suzuki will be looking to replace the 1.3 with the 1.5 in the Ertiga, Ciaz, S-Cross and maybe even the Vitara Brezza. The 1.5-litre, 4-cylinder, turbo-diesel DDiS 225 engine was designed with BS-VI emissions in mind. Specifications of the engine have not been confirmed yet.

Thoughts On Maruti Suzuki To Ditch 1.3L Diesel Engine For 1.5L Diesel Engine

The future certainly belongs to electric mobility and all automotive manufacturers are making an attempt to get there. However, the journey to electrification will happen in phases and steps, and the discontinuation of diesel-powered models is one of the first steps.

However, the demand for diesel cars is still pretty high and Maruti Suzuki would not like to lose out on revenue just because it didn't have a diesel engine in its line-up. Maruti Suzuki will lose out on a lot of customers if it discontinues diesel engines while its competitors have BS-VI ready diesel engines.