The engine industry has never had a year like this.
Ever.
Featuring an unprecedented display of public bickering, posturing and positioning, the 12 months from June 2002 until now have been the most contentious the engine industry has ever seen. While there has never been a tremendous amount of love lost between engine competitors, this last year has taken it to a new level. Friendly competition this is not. The Hatfields and McCoys meet Jerry Springer.
And all this over a bunch of acronyms like EGR, ACERT, AECDs and NCPs. Add words and phrases like tier, pull-ahead standards and pre-buy, and that pretty well sums up the last 12 months in the engine business. The rancor was mostly limited to the on-highway industry but now is likely to expand to an off-highway market near you.
This in an industry where pricing questions are usually answered in perfect corporatespeak: "We price at levels acceptable to our customers and in line with the competition. Specifics, of course, are between ourselves and our customers."
It's been that kind of year. It has been great theater for industry observers, but vexing, frustrating and just plain nasty for those in the trenches.
By now the whys and wherefores of the whole thing are well-known. In 1998, five heavy-duty diesel engine manufacturers (Caterpillar, Cummins, Detroit Diesel, Volvo, Mack) agreed -- as part of a consent decree -- to meet new emission requirements in October 2002, pulled forward from January 2004. The action was in response to the EPA's claim that manufacturers had been using "defeat devices" to get around emission standards.
From there to now. Wow.
As we moved toward the October 1 date last year, the expected on-highway diesel pre-buy really got rolling with some engine manufacturers producing above capacity. "Above" and "capacity" are two words that have not been heard in the industrial engine business for a lot of years.
But then October 1 finally arrived and diesel production dropped as much as 75 percent to 90 percent below September levels. As a result, Rhein Associates for one, is forecasting that the 158,000 heavy duty truck diesel sales level of 2002 can be expected to decline to 140,000 in 2003, or even "125,000 if the initial experience with the post 10/1, diesels is not good," Rhein reported.
So like last year, on-highway news dominated much of the engine business from 6/02 to 6/03.
Which was too bad in a way, because in the nonroad area there was a lot going as well, though somewhat overshadowed by the on-highway fuss.
Like everything else in the engine business today, emissions is the big news off-highway A few of the major" volume off-highway diesel segments, -- 25 to 50 hp and 50 to 100 hp -- both start Tier 2 next year, while the 100 to 175 lip diesel market became Tier 2 regulated this year.
That done, these segments and others now have to turn immediately around and get ready for Tier 3 levels which start in 2006 or later depending on engine output. Tier 3 is being viewed by some as causing the most significant change in diesel technology since the advent of high-speed fuel injection.
Toward this end, Caterpillar, after rolling out its on-highway ACERT emissions technology in March, an nounced its 18.1 L model C18 off-highway diesel with ACERT would be available by mid-2004. Cat is also expected to introduce the complete ACERT off-highway line in 2004, probably at the giant BAUMA construction equipment show next March.
Perkins meanwhile announced it would use the ACERT package with its 1100 series diesels for Tier 3, though no more details have yet been announced. Yanmar moved its TNV diesels into production. The TNV is a platform Yanmar says will carry it through the recently proposed Tier 4 standards.
Kubota built its 20 millionth diesel and launched two new models, the Z602 and D902 with outputs from 13.8 to 20.6 hp, while Deutz launched two new Tier 2 engine lines, the 909 and 910, covering 15 to 56 hp. Lombardini focused on the increasing interest in noise reduction by introducing a new line of encapsulated diesel engine packages.
Meanwhile what EPA calls LSI -- large spark-ignited engines begin the own era of regulation in January. This regulation covers nonroad spark-ignition engines over about 25 hp (19 kW). Engines in this segment have to be certified to CO and THC+[NO.sub.x] standards over their "fill useful life." More stringent standards follow in 2007.
The LSI story is an interesting one. This is a market where the engines are manufactured by a small group, primarily Ford, GM and Nissan. Natural gas fuel systems, from a variety suppliers, are added to these engines, sometimes by distributors for the engine manufacturers, sometimes by the fuel systems supplier, sometimes by an independent third party.
It was a year in which Caterpillar's Jim Parker, during the launch of its on-highway ACERT diesel, told the assembled press and others watching on the Internet: "We intend to sell at a premium compared to our competition. We intend to get a premium. As we said, it's a game-changing technology and we intend to change the commercial game as well
No comments:
Post a Comment