Technical Aspects of Downsizing:
Downsizing refers to the vehicles engine displacement,
since “the engine displacement is the volume swept by all the pistons inside the
cylinders of an internal combustion engine in a single movement from top dead
centre to bottom dead centre”[2], it determines the amount of fuel which can
enter the cylinder. The bigger the engine displacement, the more fuel is being
injected into the combustion chambers. To minimize the engine displacement
there are two possibilities. One is to reduce the amount of cylinders in an
engine e.g. from a six cylinder engine to a four cylinder engine. The other one
is to decrease the size of the cylinders for less volume. The swept volume of
engines always indicated the engines performance, but a reduction in swept
volume doesn’t have to result in a loss of power and performance of an engine.
The decreased volume can be compensated with supercharging. The most common
type of supercharging for downsizing purposes is a turbocharger, which takes
the engine’s own exhaust gases and compresses them. This results in an
increased density of air entering the combustion engine to create more power.