Take A Closer Look At The 2019 Silverado’s New 2.7L Four-Cylinder Engine
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General Motors will take the 2019 Chevrolet Silverado into new territory with the introduction of a new 2.7-liter turbocharged four-cylinder engine.
Chevrolet announced the new powerplant alongside the rest of the 2019 Silverado’s engine availability on Friday but also provided additional technical details on the engine. So, let’s dive into some of them.
The basics: 310 horsepower and 348 pound-feet of torque, with peak torque arriving from 1,500 rpm to 4,000 rpm. Chevy said the engine will help the 2019 Silverado sprint from 0-60 mph in under seven seconds and the mill weighs 380 pounds less than the 4.3-liter V6 engine it replaces. The V6 engine will stick around, but only in lower-spec models. Both the block and head are made from aluminum to reduce mass.
According to the brand, the 2.7-liter turbo-four engine features an “innovative double overhead cam” valvetrain that enables active fuel management (a first for a four-cylinder engine at GM), high- and low-lift valve profiles and continuously variable valve timing.
Active fuel management works with an electro-mechanical variable camshaft to provide three different cam profiles: high-valve lift for full power, low valve lift for balance of power and efficiency, and two-cylinder operation during light loads.
Other highlights of the new engine include:
- Dual-volute turbocharger housing for improved low-speed torque
- Active thermal management to improve engine performance in hot and cold temperatures
- An integrated exhaust manifold for a reduction in turbo lag
- Stop/start technology
- An electric water pump
Chevrolet said the engine was built from the ground up as a truck engine, first and foremost. That meant loads of torque available from down low in the powerband. To achieve this, engineers implemented a long piston stroke of 4.01 inches for better combustion and a higher compression ratio.
To ensure things run smoothly with high cylinder pressures that come with turbocharging, the crankshaft and connecting rods are made of forged steel and the pistons are made of a tough aluminum alloy with a cast iron ring groove insert. Engineers also subjected the engine to the same set of rigorous tests that V8 engines endure.
The engine will enter production at GM’s Spring Hill, Tennessee, facility this fall and launch in the fourth quarter of this year. EPA fuel economy estimates, payload and towing ratings will all come closer to the engine’s launch.
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Sounds like this engine’s pistons will be primarily cast aluminum with cast iron where GM’s cast aluminum pistons typically fail.
Is this a cost savings measure over the expense of forged aluminum pistons? I feel like this could be a repeat of the LTG Ecotec engine debut all over again.
Ford has been using cast pistons in their Ecoboost engine line since the beginning. The only time GM had cast aluminum pistons fail was due to LSPI, which will destroy an engine regardless of whether the piston is cast or forged.
Its a Saturn engine technically …….
I am wondering are they making the 310 HP on regular gas? Is it listed as Premium Recommended? What is the compression and boost?
My Eco was 9.5 compression. I was at 23 PSI and was making 300 HP. Have they found a way to do this on regular fuel or do they recommend the premium to make max power and you can use regular to make 270 HP?
They only expect 10% of the trucks to use this engine so they are being conservative on expectations.
I would expect this will find its way into the Colorado and Canyon.
Compression ratio is 10 to 1. Maximum boost is 22 PSI. It requires 87 octane. 6100 RPM fuel cut off.
LOOKS LIKE DODGE IS OUR LAST HOPE!
This engines seems like it would make a fun GM performance crate engine someday….
The first thing that popped in my head was swapping this into an older xtreme s10 for a daily driver.
This the engine I want if I go to a new Cadillac XT4. The low HP (<240 hp) engine they are starting out with is a deal killer for me.
Yep deal killer for me also. This engine would help. Any improvement over what they are offering, PLEASE.
348 lb-ft @ 4,000 rpm = 265 hp. That’s more power (at a lower engine speed) than any Gen I or Gen II (Vortec) 350, and close to the last 454, IIRC, at about 270 hp.
This engine will be the future of full size trucks! People on this site had better get use to it. People who say start/stop feature, cylinder deactivation, VVT, are anoyoning and hate the new technology are the reason for this direction.
If you keep pushing back on technology that keeps v8 engines a option then this is your future! This is why I love all of the new gas saving technology, it allows for engines like the LT1, LT4, LT5
With driving our 2.0 with a turbo Envision and the great power that turbo gives,
I can’t wait to test drive that 2.7 turbo truck.
Should be awesome. Really looking forward to all the numbers on it.
Also putting it in the Canyon and Colorado would be great. Would have to beat the heck out out of the V-6 in my 2016 Canyon. Doggy dang thing. That Turbo is just the greatest thing
since peanut butter. The response of that turbo alone would beat the socks off that
V-6 in that Canyon.
it all sounds good + can be if the bean counters don’t cheap out on “global” parts. anything totally new will will have bugs in the real world + GM’s track record is less than stellar lately, can you say beta tester!! it will take 3 to 5 years for this engine to be proven + i will “stay tuned”!!!
Its got an electric water pump and electric VVT. Its gunna have one hell of a big battery.
Alternator!
GM finally released their first non-OHV engine for pickup trucks after 22 years. Ford already did way back in 1997 with Triton V8 SOHC. What took GM so long?
My guess is that they did not have the right group of developers to make that happen until now.
GM have great engineers, the one’s who hold GM back are the business dorks who run the company. Until recently they just didn’t want to invest the necessary funds to develop modern engines.
I believe the saying at GM HQ goes: “Never enough time to do it right, always enough time to do it twice.”
Ford has had fancy pants DOHC 4V multi turbocharged engines for all those years and just now got ONE of them to surpass the torque (by 10 whole ft lbs!) of that silly old dinosaur pushrod engine…what took them so long? In another decade or two they may get in the same horsepower neighborhood, then maybe they can focus on matching the fuel economy of a Chevy small block V8. But they’ll never match the simplicity or durability with an engine that has >2× the moving parts.
In a decade or two well have electric trucks that do 0-60 in under 5 seconds
Electricity, batteries, and electric motors are not magic! Technological progress is making them better, but so are ICE technologies making ICE vehicles more efficient.
I’d be all for a pickup that is propelled by an electric motor due to their reliability, simplicity and efficiency, but the challenges are amplified applying these technologies to a high utility vehicle like a pickup where much more battery fuel and weight will be required. Moreover, engineers are not even to the point of making products work for most Americans, and that’s before considering these products are over hyped versus reality.
1. MPG-e is exaggerated by OEMs and those exaggerations are supported and allowed by the EPA. Many gas and diesel cars get a somewhat truthful rating when driven in a reasonable manner in a typical environment. The gov’t doesn’t allow them to exaggerate and when they’re caught or err, they correct their published data or pay. E-cars and e-everything gets a pass on truthfulness.
Fuel range is exaggerated by OEMs and those exaggerations are supported and allowed by the EPA.
True battery life is hidden from consumers or lies told to us about how long they’ll last with an acceptable range.
Battery replacement costs are hidden from consumers.
The media, the EPA, and electric-or-bust proponents minimize information regarding infrastructure requirement costs for refueling at home.
Electricity as a fuel currently costs about double that of gasoline or diesel on an equal energy basis. Consumers are not warned about this important factor by those such as the auto media and EPA that are supposed to be consumer advocates. Therefore, if you drive an electric vehicle that gets 70 mpg-e real world and rated by the EPA at 108, that will cost in the world we have to live in by about as much for fuel as a gas car at 35 and a diesel at 40.
Battery range shrinks over time. Think about cell phones, which are usually charged and discharged daily just like a typical electric car usage. How long does it take to notice reduced range with a cell phone and an e-cars charges and discharges at an even faster rate. So even if a battery last ten years, how much fuel does it store after only five years.
I’m not against electric cars or pickups as a technology, but they’ll have to work together so that all fueling is universal and not dependent upon brand or model, and they must start giving us realistic data.
Google 1932 Ford roadster, you will see a whole bunch of GM OHV small block V8’s looking at you Walter!
Not true the Vortec 2.8L and 3.5L I4 and I5 engines were DOHC
Yes and for the next 20 years, Ford’s engines have been an absolute disaster and a reliability nightmare. Rattling cam phasers, stretched timing chains, broken timing chain guides, leaking timing chain tensioners, broken timing chain sprockets, etc. Sure the 2-valve SOHC V8’s didn’t have as many issues but they were also gutless and offered zero advantages for the trucks.
Funny, rumors are circulating that Ford is now developing a large pushrod V8 for their F-250/350 trucks.
“Funny, rumors are circulating that Ford is now developing a large pushrod V8 for their F-250/350 trucks.”
The last OHV pushrod engine Ford produced was in year 2008, a 3.0L V6 Vulcan and 4.2L V6 Essex. I seriously doubt it will ever come back again because the current new V8s are all based on Modular SOHC or DOHC design since 1991. I don’t think Ford will build a new V8 engine from scratch again due to its limited future now.
Ford also build a lot of new vehicles today with TWIN-TURBO, while GM continues to go naturally-aspirated (no turbo). You know who wins on reliability still.
This seems strangely similar to the LK5 found in the 1st generation Canyon/Colorado/I-Series but with some major updates. I wonder if they’re potentially related.
The 2.7L Turbo L3B is an all-new design that’s not related to the LK5.
In this case (with major technological improvements), it would cost more to re-engineer an old engine like the LK5 than it would to create an all-new design like the L3B.
Stop/start. UGH!!!
I would like that engine in my Colorado.
One still has to wonder why didn’t they go with a twin-turbo setup, an electric turbocharger for quick response at low engine rpm and then a secondary larger supercharger for higher engine speeds for a combine seamless integration; but being that this new 2.7L DOHC-4v 4-cyl turbo is being used in a large vehicle, we probably shouldn’t be surprised to see it as the new base engine or optional engine in vehicles like Buick Enclave as this generates the same horsepower as the LGX 3.6L V6 and could possibly generate better fuel mileage numbers.
I would like it in a 1988 S-10 size pick-up.
Can’t wait to race of these boosted 2.il 4 bangers with my 2.7l v6 baby boost. But then I can’t seem to get 5.3l trucks to race me since they must have been embarest by the 2.7eco already so I doubt I will get any takers from GM 2.7 owners either.
Might as well use your truck as a race car, we already know that paper thin, crack-prone aluminum bed pretty much makes it worthless as a real truck. Same goes for the plastic IWE-based 4WD setup they use. Great for reducing driveline losses but their 4WD is one of the weakest and most unreliable setups used in a half-ton today.
Where does this stop?….4 cylinder and we still need cylinder deactivation? Just make a two cylinder and get it over with and we can push with our left foot!
380 lbs less than a 4.3l equipped K2. Apples to oranges, how much does the mill weigh?
https://media.gm.com/media/us/en/chevrolet/vehicles.detail.html/content/Pages/news/us/en/2018/may/0518–silverado-turbo.html