[yogeshnaik]

Originally Posted by vroom01

A question out of curiosity: Does the TDCI has the property of requiring maintenance or repair if it is not being subjected to adequate running or is kept idle for say- a month or two? Will this engine require frequent maintenance if it is run for only 10 kms a day? Is it good for a long term ownership (10 yrs) without adequate running?

Keeping idle for a month or a two will drain the battery and can reduce your battery life. Electronics, such as engine immobilizer, keyless entry consume some mA of current from the battery throughout.

Running 10Km/day or taking out at weekends should not be an issue. Your engine will be lubricated well and the oil in the engine will retain its viscosity. Keeping idle for a longer duration will impact engine oil. Another reason is, physical properties of Diesel when compared to Petrol are also different. Although the manufacturers claim that the modern Diesel engines are now nearly equal to petrol engines, there is still a huge gap between the two. Also Diesel is thicker than Petrol, keeping for a longer time the properties also change.

Coming back to the TDCi engine, diesel engines do have more maintenance. If a user uses it according to the Ford's manual, it should give you > 1 Lakhs Km of trouble free service. Parameters are service intervals, oil & oil filter changes, engine de-carbonization etc.

If the running is less and considering fuel costs, statistically petrol engine is preferred. If you like to have a diesel engine for your satisfaction like torque and some power etc., keeping diesel vehicle for 10 years will not be a problem. You may overhaul the engine above 1 Lakh Km and that too depends on personal usage. I have seen diesel engines that have run > 2 Lakh Km.

[rohanjf]

Originally Posted by sgiitk

Then there were multiple (up to 5) injections (obviously at very high pressure) to get a smooth combustion throughout the stroke.

To add to this, most of the common rail direct injection systems in existence today, use up to 5 injections per cycle. This includes Ford's TDCi and Fiat's MultiJet.

However, 1. 3 Multijet II is even better. It uses eight injections per cycle!

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multijet#1.3

If we consider TDCi vs Multijet, I guess we can keep on discussing without reaching a conclusion. However, I feel Multijet II is far advanced. Unfortunately, Ford has not really upgraded the TDCi yet.