Clearing the Air on Emissions

Emissions Expertise

Confronting the Emissions Redesign Challenge:

Three Ways to Reduce Time, Costs & Frustration

Every new stage or tier of emissions standards requires you to redesign your products to accommodate a new engine. It can be a time-consuming, expensive ordeal made more challenging if your engineering team is small or burdened with other tasks. That’s the bad news. The good news? You don't have to go it alone. Support from your engine supplier can reduce development costs, time to market and overall frustration. At Caterpillar, we tailor our support to your needs — choose the level of consultation that’s right for your team.

Even if you’re confident in your in-house engineering team’s ability to handle a redesign, a second set of eyes never hurts. The industrial engine application team at your local Cat^® dealer is on hand to provide whatever type of support you need. They can work with your engineers to compare different options, share detailed specs and provide a 3D model of the selected engine integrated into your product design.

In addition, your dealer can help you quickly turn a standard engine into one custom-designed for your product. Say the bracket holding the air filter doesn’t fit your design. To support your service requirements, your dealer can either configure a different option to come straight from the factory or provide an aftermarket solution. Working with your dealer also gives you access to factory-installed aftertreatment systems, radiators, air filters and more. These plug-and-play packages eliminate the need for your team to design, source, test and warranty individual components or systems — a huge time- and money-saver.

If your team could use more support, consider attending a Technical Integration Workshop (TIW). We’ve been hosting these one-on-one sessions for OEMs of all sizes for several years. Usually held at a Cat factory, a TIW is an intense, two-to-four-day session that brings together your engineers, your dealer’s application team and, if needed, Caterpillar design engineers. Your dealer often invites suppliers and experts from your industry as well to explain the solutions others in the marketplace are adopting.

As a group, you’ll walk through potential engine options, select the best solution and modify the design as needed. That involves more than just making sure the engine “fits.” You’ll also explore options to optimize performance and efficiency — everything from heat rejection and work modes to cooling pack design and thermal management. You’ll conduct a virtual installation of the engine into your product and walk away with a 3D model you can use to finalize the design. TIWs help speed up the concept and development portion of the redesign process, so you can focus your time and effort on getting your new product to market instead.

If your team is too busy with other work to take on a redesign, or you just don’t have the internal resources, there is another option. Send us your product and we’ll send it back fitted with an engine that’s ready to work. Our Customer Machine Engineering Team can handle all (or a portion) of the design, installation and testing, checking in with you at regular intervals to review progress. We take responsibility for ensuring our engine integrates seamlessly into your product — and meets your schedule and budget goals.

While no one looks forward to a redesign brought on by changing emissions regulations, it does present an opportunity to reevaluate your current engine supplier. Is quality high? Is integration simple? Does after-sale support meet expectations? Are total lifecycle costs going down? Perhaps most important, does the engine do more than address power and torque requirements — does it help your customers be more productive?

If the answer to any of these questions is “no,” it’s time to explore your alternatives.