Tear-downs: paving the way for CGI growth

How will OEMs respond to Ford’s 2015 F-150 pick-up truck with its intensive use of aluminium and a gasoline engine with a CGI block?

Chrysler uses benchmarking to lift truck output

Chrysler’s Warren Truck Assembly Plant has used benchmarking to boost throughput of  pick- up vehicles at the plant.

With sales of the Ram 1500 on a 52-month sales streak, Chrysler Group’s Warren Truck Assembly Plant, has used benchmarking and other techniques to increase production.

Ram 1500 gives The General a headache

General Motors’ product planners may be scratching their heads at the way the US market has moved in the direction of the Ram 1500 pick-up truck.

According to the latest US figures for March 2014, sales of the Ram 1500 tipped 42,532 units – a rise of 25.7 per cent over March 2013 – just beating sales of the Chevrolet Silverado at 42,247 units, a rise of only 6.8 per cent over March 2013.

GM to revive 4.5-litre CGI diesel?

General Motors could be about to revive its shuttered 4.5-litre V8 diesel engine according to US sources.

Prompted by the upcoming launch of the latest Ram 1500 with a VM Motori 3-litre diesel and the Nissan Titan powered a brand new Cummins 5-litre ISX5 diesel engine, both with compacted graphite iron (CGI) vee cylinder blocks, and the latest Ford 2015 F-150 pick-up truck with a new 2.7-litre EcoBoost gasoline engine (also with a CGI vee block), GM is considering adding a small-displacement diesel engine to its Chevrolet Silverado and GMC Sierra 1500 pick-ups to boost fuel economy.

Will Ford respond before Ram wins 3 times?

How will Ford Motor Company respond to the mounting accolades being heaped upon Chrysler’s Ram 1500 pick-up truck in the US?

One has to think the Dearborn, Michigan based automaker will not take too long before it making an important announcement. Most likely this will come in 2014.

Ford has made plain in the past that it will vigorously defend its position as Number One pick-up truck builder in North America – a position it has held for 37 straight years.

GM disappoints with its 2015 SUVs

Anyone expecting General Motors (GM) to slot in its ‘stillborn’ 4.5-litre V8 turbodiesel into the 2015 Chevrolet Tahoe, GMC Yukon and Cadillac Escalade full-size sports utility vehicles (SUVs) is disappointed.

Instead, The General took the low road and announced these vehicles would carry the well-tried 5.3-litre and 6.2-litre EcoTec3 V8 engines and six-speed transmissions. This is the same line-up the company introduced in the 2014 Chevrolet Silverado and GMC Sierra.

But this may not be the end of the story. For surely GM cannot afford to write off all the engineering expertise it poured over a number of years into the compact V8 diesel it shelved just prior to its 2009 bankruptcy and reorganization.