Almost three years after launch, the "Diesel Rocket" Chevrolet Cruze has undergone a major upgrade. No, not a facelift, but an engine that is sure to blow everyone's mind and blow the competition out of the water

As the old adage goes, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”. This might be a fine philosophy for a lot of car manufacturers in India with regards to their products, but it doesn’t stop a few, and in this case General Motors, from trying to perfect a product which is already rather good. And the car in this case is the Chevrolet Cruze. Of course, there is no such thing as a perfect car, but the Cruze is a potent product that has a lot on its plate to offer for those looking for a stylish and fun to drive diesel sedan. Still, there is always room for improvement and GM has been really paying attention to what customers as well as us motoring hacks have been griping about the Cruze’s drivability.

The 2.0-litre VCDI mill, otherwise brilliant in terms of outputs, suffered from some serious turbo lag issues under 2,000rpm, requiring one to continuously shift gears and rev the engine high in slow moving city traffic to keep from stalling, which in turn was affect fuel economy adversely. So The General decided to tackle the issue head on, which brings us to this ‘new’ Cruze we have here.

Let me get one thing straight, right off the bat – this isn’t a new car. Nor is this the facelifted Cruze that we saw at the Busan Motor Show in Korea a couple of weeks back (that one is destined for India sometime next year though). What this is, is the same old Chevrolet Cruze that we’ve all come to love with a brand new engine. “Now just wait a minute,” you may say. “What new engine? It’s still a 2.0-litre diesel unit”. Yes, but that’s where the similarity between the old and the new engine ends. While the earlier unit displaced all of 1,991cc, this new one running an absolutely square bore x stroke configuration of 86mm x 86mm has a total swept volume of 1,998cc.

Technical details about the new engine : NEXT >>