Ford: Duratec won’t disappoint

DESPITE being smaller in capacity, Ford Australia has promised the imported Duratec V6 that will replace its homegrown 4.0-litre straight six in both Falcon and Territory models in two years “won’t be a backward step”.

As revealed exclusively by GoAuto last July (and announced by Ford a week later), the Blue Oval will cease Geelong production of its trademark inline six rather than invest in the development required for it to meet tougher new Euro IV emissions standards, which are due to apply to all new vehicles from July 1, 2010.

Ford has confirmed only that the current inline six – which has undergone significant upgrades for next month’s redesigned FG Falcon and which GoAuto understands will itself be upgraded yet one more time before its eventual discontinuation after 50 years of Falcon service – will make way for a global Duratec V6 manufactured in the US.

Ford Australia president Bill Osborne, who started his Ford career as the design supervisor of the Duratec 35 and launched it in the Edge SUV in his previous capacity as Ford of Canada president, last month said the “world-class Duratec 35” will deliver fuel consumption gains but “can never duplicate the low-end torque of the I6”.

Now, however, despite similar concerns about the new V6 being voiced privately by some senior Ford engineers, Falcon and Territory vehicle line director Russell Christophers has guaranteed the Duratec engine will at least match the performance and fuel consumption of the inline six.

Left: New Ford Falcon XR6 Turbo.

In 2008 FG Falcon guise the long-running Australian-made straight six produces 195kW at 6000rpm and 391Nm of torque from 3250rpm, and returns 10.5L/100km in five-speed automatic form.

Mr Christophers would not elaborate on exactly which performance figures will be at least maintained by the new V6, which is a modular design that entered production in late 2006, but he confirmed it will be an off-the-shelf engine.

“We’ll take a version of the Duratec that is globally available,” he said.

As previously reported, the Duratec 35 is the first member of Ford’s new “Cyclone” engine family, an all-aluminium 60-degree design that in this case displaces 3.496 litres and features 24 valves operated by double overhead camshafts with variable intake valve timing.

It also powers the US-market Lincoln MKZ, Ford Taurus and Taurus X, Ford Flex and Mercury Stable, but running on standard 87-octane US fuel in the current Ford Edge and Lincoln MKX SUVs the D35 produces 198kW at 6250rpm and 339Nm of torque from 4500rpm. In the MKZ, which is about 150kg lighter than the new Falcon, it returns about 8.7L/100km.

Set to power 20 per cent of Ford’s North American vehicles, our D35 should come from Ford’s Lima, Ohio plant, where production began in July 2006. The D35 was rated among the ten best engines available in the US last year by leading automotive research body Ward’s.

The first Cyclone family member sampled by Australians is the 3.7-litre Duratec 37 found in Ford subsidiary Mazda’s large CX-9 SUV, which offers 204kW at 6250rpm and 366Nm at a busy 4250rpm. The 3.721-litre’s V6’s 225cc capacity increase over the Duratec 35 comes via a 3mm increase in bore diameter, making the D37 even more oversquare than the D35.

While the Duratec 37 is designed to power SUV and truck applications, including the Ford F-150 from 2010, the Duratec 35 is the most obvious candidate to power both the Falcon and Territory in a little over two years.

Indeed, in exciting news for Ford six-cylinder performance fans, Mr Christophers also confirmed “there will be a replacement for the I6 turbo and that engine won’t be a backward step either”.

“We’ll try to do as little as possible to the turbo engine locally. It doesn’t make sense to do it here,” he said, adding that “the next big step for petrol engines is direct (fuel) injection and turbocharging”.

That almost certainly means that, come mid-2010, the XR6 Turbo and G6E Turbo will pack a twin-turbocharged, GDI (gasoline direct injected) version of the Duratec 35 similar to the EcoBoost V6 that will debut in the new Lincoln MKS sedan in the US this year.

The 2008 MKS engine was first seen in the Lincoln MKR concept at the 2007 Detroit motor show, when it featured a D35 GDI “TwinForce” engine (a name that will be replaced by the “more understandable” EcoBoost engine label before production) that delivered no less than 309kW and 540Nm.

That is a significant step up from next month’s new Falcon XR6T, which musters up 270kW and 533Nm, but still falls short of the 310kW and 565Nm outputs that will be on tap from FPV’s upcoming FG-series F6 turbo six.

Which indicates that, like the standard Duratec 35, the twin-turbo EcoBoost V6 has some way to go in the torque department before it matches the finest iteration of Ford’s mighty homegrown turbo six..

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