Studying the significance of (Bharath Stage 6) BS6 engine oil lubrication

Being future-ready in the BS6 era

The blistering speed of expanding road networks continues to fuel the growth of the trucking sector in India. Over the past decade and a half, the energy consumed by trucks has been growing rapidly-almost one-fifth of India’s final energy use by the transport sector surpassing the increase in freight activity (CEEW – India Transport Energy Outlook, June 2022). The key reason for this variance is the fact that a large number of trucks plying on the roads are old and lacking in key performance metrics. 

Policy Shift 

To address the structure issue plugging the growth, India embarked on renewing policy change, to make a lasting impact. In a major policy shift over the last 3-decades, the government came up with the Increased Axle Loads (IAL) to improve the much-needed freight-carrying capacity of trucks responding to the changing technologies and the dynamism of transport in the sector. 

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Similarly, another key significant decision was to move to the stringent BS6 emission by skipping the intermittent BS5 norms starting from April 2020. This was necessary to address the worsening quality of toxic air and vehicular pollution, as India has the dubious distinction of having world’s 20 most polluted cities. This big shift aimed at reducing the harmful pollutants coming out from the tailpipe, and thus a significant reduction of sulfur content to less than 10 parts per million (10PPM) {Draft Notification on BS6 Emission Standards, Ministry of Road and Transport India, February 16, 2016}.

Furthermore, the new emission norms bring down the carbon monoxide (CO) concentration, unburnt hydrocarbons, nitrous oxide (NOx), and particulate matter. The advent of stringent emission norms warrants newer, more advanced, and complex technologies. This essentially allows engines to migrate from the mechanical to electronics and maintaining them becomes highly complex. The problem is exasperated by the mixed fleet in India-comprising BS4 trucks already running on the road and the new BS6 joining the fleet.

Mix Truck Fleet Challenge

The advent of new technologies and engine designs further expanded maintenance practices to keep vehicles, especially commercial vehicles in good health. Today, a vast majority of truck fleets in India comprises a mix of both BS4 and BS6 making it an obvious concern on maintenance and cost of ownership front for the fleet owners across the board. The average age of trucks is between 7-8 years before they change ownership in the used market, and also pre-buying ahead of the new norms, jumped the overall number of BS4 trucks that are currently on road. This underlines the fact that there is an existence of mix-fleet for a considerable time frame in the Indian trucking sector, thus bringing a challenge to truck owners to do the job of maintaining them cost-effectively.  

In the fast-changing transport business, due to the soaring cost of operations, among the several key elements, engine oil becomes extremely critical in the most stringent emission regime. Keeping the fleet efficient and productive is easier said than done and any cost benefits by reducing overall operating and ownership costs go a long way in a profitable business. There are special lubricants designed, developed, and tested for compatibility with these new BS6 engines offering a much-needed edge to fleet owners. 

Synthetic Oil Technology 

Lubricants made of synthetic technology are the biggest differentiators if you look from longer-term benefits and cost-saving perspectives, hence using the right engine oil is the holy grail here. So, what is unique in synthetic technology? Its ability to maintain viscosity at lower and higher temperatures without permanent shear and degradation, thus offering far lower internal resistance as compared to mineral oils. This enhances the engine's durability ensuring efficient power output delivery. Also, yielding longer drain intervals helps remarkably in superior turnaround time and reduces the chances of any unexpected breakdowns. 

Key Benefits

Engine oils enabled with synthetic technology are compatible with new BS6 trucks, ensuring efficient performance. Mobil Delvac MX ESP 15W-40 API CK-4 is among the leading BS6-compatible engine oils in the market. This oil provides 48% better wear protection, 63% improved high-temperature viscosity control and provides longer oil drain intervals of up to 1,20,000 km, compared to other product that is available in the market right now. 

One of the key benefits of this synthetic technology lubrication is backward compatibility, which essentially means operational ease, whereas a truck owner/fleet operator needs to keep just one oil for the complete fleet, irrespective of a mix of BS4 and BS6 trucks.  There are multiple advantages, the obvious one is scale, which brings down the cost, Besides, it is easy to maintain an inventory to use them effortlessly. 

Consequently, the latest synthetic technology offers tremendous technological benefits along with ease of use, stocking, and reduction in cost, offering huge savings to truck owners. So, for any truck part of a small/medium/large fleet, using synthetic technology lubrication is the way forward to give the much-needed edge to your fleet by gaining several benefits including reduced TCO (Total cost of Ownership), higher revenues, and profits, and faster return on investments!

 Disclaimer:

* Based on Industry Standard Engine test sequence IVA in API SL

**Based on a field trial conducted in India on a BS IV truck of a leading OEM. Actual results may vary based on vehicle type and operating conditions. Please refer to your vehicle service manual for lubricant requirement & service intervals. Service interval recommendation for India market only

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