Jacobs Vehicle Systems announced Tuesday it has signed a long-term supply agreement with Hino Motors, Ltd., which will last through 2025.
With this long-term supply agreement, Jacobs Vehicle Systems and Hino Motors continue their long-standing relationship that began in the early 1990s when engine brakes were first installed on Hino E13C engines. Since that time, Jacobs states it has continued to deliver high-performing braking technologies as seen on the A09 and A05 engine platforms.
“Jacobs is excited about extending our nearly 30-year relationship with Hino through 2025. Over the years, our engine brakes have aided Hino in providing its customers with improved safety, productivity, and drivability while reducing their total cost of ownership,” says Steve Ernest, vice president of engineering and business development at Jacobs Vehicle Systems.
Jacobs also this week introduced its new 2-Step Variable Valve Actuation (VVA) system. By enhancing performance and efficiency across an engine’s operating range, Jacobs states 2-Step VVA will help engine manufacturers further improve fuel consumption and reduce tailpipe emissions, as well as deliver a range of other benefits.
The introduction of 2-Step VVA is a progression from Jacobs’ fully-flexible VVA intake and exhaust system, which has given major engine manufacturers more than two decades of reliable service. The company states the new system’s relative simplicity reflects years of research and development on flexible VVA to yield an optimized two-position system that provides a large portion of the benefits in a more cost-efficient way.
“By simplifying our variable valve technology, we have made a commercially desirable trade-off, only slightly reducing some of the performance benefits of fully-flexible VVA but greatly reducing calibration complexity and cost. Jacobs offers tailored solutions based around an individual customer’s engine architecture and the problems they are looking to solve,” says Ernest. “We’re giving engine designers the ability to add some VVA flexibility without having to make significant base-engine changes.”
The company claims it has many years’ experience of opening and closing valves to enable engine braking. As market demand grew for increased fuel economy and exhaust gas aftertreatment control, it was a logical progression for Jacobs, both in engineering expertise and commercial positioning, to also offer customers similar valvetrain flexibility during positive power, the company states.
