The Ford Ecosport will benefit from a new 1.2L turbo-petrol engine from Mahindra’s G-series mStallion petrol engine family with as much as 130bhp and 230Nm of peak torque. It will also be offered on the Mahindra XUV300 soon.
The Ford Ecosport was introduced in India way back in 2012 and is really the car that the sub-compact SUV space going in India. It’s been 8 years since then but Ford has been regular updating the car through its life cycle. In spite of much newer and strong competition, the Ecosport has still held its ground and continues to be one Ford’s best selling models in India along with the Endeavor. There’s another round of updates coming about for the Ford Ecosport and this time, its a change of the heart itself – a new turbo petrol engine.
Ford and Mahindra entered into an agreement in 2017 for collaboration in areas like connected car technologies, electrification and product development. This partnership will also see Ford using engines from Mahindra, the first example of which we will see in the Ecosport. This does not only apply to India but this collaboration will be on a global level too. Mahindra introduced their new G-series mStallion petrol engine family at the 2020 Auto Expo and it will be one of these powering the Ecosport.
The Mahindra-powered Ford Ecosport will be powered by a 1.2-litre T-GDI engine which will take place of the now discontinued 1.0 liter Ecoboost engine in the Ecosport. The 1.2-liter petrol engine is a turbocharged gasoline direct injection unit. It’s internally known as the G12 and the BS6 compliant version of this engine produces a rather impressive 130hp and 230Nm of torque. The engine will come mated to a 6-speed manual transmission as standard but Ford could also introduce a dual-clutch automatic gearbox option with this engine.
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With this new engine, the Ford Ecosport will have gained 5hp and 60Nm of more torque over the now-discontinued 1.0-litre Ford EcoBoost engine. Ford’s 1.0 liter Ecoboost engine was very renowned for it peppy performance but the high price of the Ecosport with this engine and low fuel economy did limit its appeal. Ford thus decided to pull the plug on this engine from the Ecosport lineup.
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Before making its way on the Ford EcoSport, Mahindra will be launching this engine on the XUV300 to make for a sportier variant. The Mahindra XUV300 Sport is expected to debut in the coming months. It was originally slated for April this year and pandemic delayed it all. As for the Ecosport, you can expect this new turbo-petrol engine under the hood of the Ecosport by early next year. As for the competition, aside from the Mahindra XUV300, the Ford EcoSport will have to contend with the Hyundai Venue, the Tata Nexon, the Maruti Suzuki Vitara Brezza, and the upcoming Nissan and Renault compact SUVs.
