Designing Single-Purpose or Multi-Purpose Engines for On-Road and Non-Road Use - A Platform Approach

The paper gives an overview of the partially extremely complex problem when looking into commonalities and differences of the three main application areas of engines and powertrains - automotive, agricultural tractors, and industrial engines, the last being predominantly but not exclusively focused on construction equipment.

The modern “platform” approach has been used in the automotive world to a large extent and the learned experiences may be of interest for the agricultural tractors and/or the construction equipment manufacturers. On the other hand the truck engine engineers and manufacturers will learn more about the special requirements of the tractor and the industrial engines fields, and thus influence concepts and development procedures and also the production of the automotive engines which in many cases serve as the basis for derivate engines. The question will be raised whether there are benefits of the “single-purpose engine” as compared to the “multi-purpose or universal engine”. What will be the cost implications of the two main approaches and how should the production be organized and optimized for the two ways? A major role in this context is on the side of the supplier industry, especially when it comes to emission related components and strongly varying market and operating conditions. Service and maintenance behavior as well as fuel availability in the different areas of the world and in the different applications of the engines are other serious challenges, not only, but especially in the field of construction equipment. In order to find the “right” solution for the various applications, a qualitative method to define platform engines is described by taking into account about sixty engine specification parameters.

Globalization adds a number of new aspects. It is a rather new and bright opportunity and a big challenge with many risks at the same time. Globalization will strongly influence concepts and design details, especially when it comes to the idea of the “world vehicle” or “world engine”.